The thing about Rent's music is that it's not considered as "rock" as it probably was when Larson wrote it. People talk a LOT about Rent being dated, but they talk about the themes much moreso than they do the score. I don't really like to call the themes "dated" so much as "period," just for the sake of connotation, but the music is dated, too, in a sense -- that isn't what's considered "edgy" anymore. It IS a rock show, it's just falling into a certain period of "rock" sensibility. Spring Awakening is a pop score that's been planted into a theatrical story. There's a lot about that score that isn't theatrical. Rent is a pop opera score -- of course it's "way more musical theatre than rock." It's theater with a rock infusion; every one of those songs does what a theater score is supposed to do -- it fuels that story. Spring Awakening is structured in a way that makes a lot of its songs disconnect from that.
Rent is absolutely flawed. Few great things are truly WITHOUT their flaws. I think Spring Awakening is a poorly written freaking mess with a lot of things going for it, but to each his own.
A work of art is an invitation to love.
Updated On: 11/19/07 at 12:35 AM
