Guitar... Decline of an American Dream 🎸 - Part 2

Rock was the soundtrack of the baby boomers. They became guitar collectors, older males with a set-list of memories and a basement hobby

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If you missed it here is the Part 1 published on Monday: Guitar... Decline of an American Dream 🎸 - Part 1

It is a signal problem for manufacturers.

It was an age of emulation, when wannabe guitarists mimicked the legends

Unfortunately for Gibson and Fender, it was fifty years ago, and the children looking to get down on their knees and play are now silver-haired oldsters worrying about the size of their pensions and the cost of equity release.

It is a vicious circle. As music moves further away from guitars, so the number of axe heroes for children to admire and to emulate diminishes.

The problem for manufacturers therefore is how to push a guitar into a teenager’s hands and to ensure it stays there

It is a similar issue to that facing Apple, the extra challenge for Fender and its ilk being that teenagers’ hands are already full of Apple’s products.

In response, Fender has started an online subscription tutorial service, Fender Riffstation, to combat the age-old stat that most children give up within a year.

There are pockets of hope

In truth, the electric guitar’s problems are probably insurmountable, relating as they do to wider global cultural change.

In this maelstrom, America is losing the capacity to tell its own story; the electric guitar was one medium through which it was told.

Guitar... Decline of an American Dream 🎸 - Part 1