By JC Maraddon
When rock covered all the covers, a common practice of the music megastars was to meet in the so-called “supergroups”, which summoned them behind a musical project that resulted in at least one album and mammoth tours, and then dissolved. in the air. And it is that the coexistence of the egos is not something so easy to carry out in a common band, much less simple is that procedure in a group in which figures who compete for the favors of the public and who must resign some of their stardom so that everything does not explode.
Names such as Traffic, Asia or Power Station sound like ancient history today, but at the time they moved crowds with their appearance, which represented something like the presence of a musical dream team before which one had to bow without fuss. Sometimes, the result of these initiatives was not up to the parchments of its members, but that did not matter: the idea was to pair famous names behind the same brand and impose products that were supposed to attract together the fans that each of them had separately.
Too much time has passed since the days when these initiatives gained momentum. In fact, rock itself is now experiencing a not too happy stage, in which it seems to have lost that desire for constant renewal that kept it alive. As the new litters are not so attracted by that sound, the audiences that are still aware of rock and roll have begun to age and, as a consequence of this phenomenon, that style that was proclaimed rebellious and defiant has become conservative and complaining, distancing itself more and more. more of the artists that dominate the sales charts today.
For this reason, one might think that there is no place in this panorama for ventures like the ones that once brought together the best rock exponents, in selected instrumentalists and vocalists that one would never have believed might cohabit. However, given the anemia of young talent that the genre suffers, perhaps reviving these sleeping giants might be a convincing marketing strategy, beyond the fact that it is directed almost exclusively at the most staunch fans, who may be combing gray hair but they have not forgotten their youthful musical passions from several decades ago.
To put the result of this nostalgic marketing to the test, there is the launch of 3rd Secret, a formation behind which some grunge heroes are enlisted, an American movement that marked the rock scene in the early nineties. Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic, Pearl Jam drummer Matt Cameron and Soundgarden guitarist Kim Thayil enlisted guitarist Jon “Bubba” Dupree (Void) and singers Jillian Raye and Jennifer Johnson to take on this challenge of reaffirming the scrolls. that they had 30 years ago, through an album that came out a couple of weeks ago.
Listening to that album, you can experience a journey into the past and recall that time that represented one of the last links of the rock epic, with the guitar at the forefront and an analog imprint that would later be devastated by digital tools. But it’s unlikely that 3rd Secret can nurture hopes of a return to the source or a revival of that once-widespread fury. Rather, we are facing another resurrection exercise destined to excite veterans, but that will hardly be registered by the radars of centennials.
