Dwapara Yuga - It might get loud

This week saw the DVD release of It Might Get Loud, a documentary on modern guitar, illustrated by Jimmy Page, The Edge and Jack White.

Each is a testament to abilities developed in this and past lives shining through adverse early circumstances, moving towards a form of musical or self-expressive mastery. They are an almost uniquely Dwapara phenomenon, previous self-taught musical greats like delta bluesmen having lived and died in near perfect obscurity.

Ravi Shankar lamented the lack of intense formal training found in Western rock musicians, especially in the 60s and 70s. The "Guitar Gods" tended to be self taught and to viscerally express themselves without tens of thousands of hours under acknowledged masters, conforming to every last nuance of a traditional past.

The Indian model had once been the mainstay of formal musical education in the west, with those with the right early talent, social, political connections and money to pursue it -- armies of Salieris, knowing the rules of composition and form but lacking the raw and disruptive genius of a Mozart, their carefully weighed compositions often indicative of their oppressed and oppressive natures.

Outside of fairs ('the devil's melodies') and the church, in Kali Yuga, music was limited to those with the means to engage orchestras and ensembles. In that period, talent or ability did not determine position in society, or career, rather birth - the son of a King was to be King, no matter how insane, perverse or incompetent, the son of a Knight a Knight and so on. Even outright genius such as Mozart's still required sponsorship. Martin Luther had to find his protectors (and limit his criticisms of their foibles) and the first reflex of society for a Saint Francis was imprisonment.

We each have before us a wonderful opportunity to flower in whatever field yet with the erosion of middle class incomes at highs in the 1950s, 60s and 70s before declining in real terms. The pressure of the exploitative Kali Yuga system is for commoditized, expendable doctors, lawyers, engineers and professors to trot out traditional formulae (with a handful of world famous exceptions). There are to be no gaps in resumes for time in India, or retreats, or distracting musicianship (or mechanical rather than compositional work), art or languages a measured progression from the right undergrad to grad school to the modern factory of cubes and beeping phones and emails - credit slaves (paying for schools, mortgages, cars, divorces, healthcare and trips to get away from constant stress).

The Kali memes left over to us are factories not of the spinning machines of dark satanic mills but spinning pre-defined, pre-approved ideas in easily palatable forms -- not the hard to get into Jethro Tull with its deep layers of meaning but the bubble gum pop of Britney Speers, with a flavor used up in seconds and a long-lasting bitter aftertaste.

The current musical fad is for vocals created with auto tune software, making anyone and everyone sound like the 'singer' T-pain - he even has his own iPhone app. That is talent bought and paid for in a single download, instant stardom and instant obsolescence -- just right for a lingering Kali Yuga system about collectivism and regimentation, as afraid of a musical or writing spark as any bomb.

How wonderful for Page and company to show us what can really be done, beginning by expressing themselves on hand-me-down or throw away instruments as they came up from nothing - denying the Kali ideas of years of private tuition in far away institutions, multi thousand dollar silver flutes and grand pianos.