Skip to main content

Help the Aged

Reading through the most recent issue of Alternative Press, I came across a quote in a review that really struck me:

Fire, Blood, Water's tracks burst with the kind of fuzzbombs and jangly riffs found on your parents' old Replacements and R.E.M. records, but feel as fresh and innovative as the latest iPod jam.
Your parents' old Replacements and R.E.M. records? I couldn't believe it at first, but then it sunk in: those who grooved to Let It Be and Murmur when they first came out are old enough to have teenagers. I'm curious what kinds of conversations parents like these have with their kids about music. But, there is a stumbling block that often rears its head.

For some reason, a lot of children resist a lot of things that their parents were into when they were their age. What is newer/closer in age to younger people is often more appealing than something older. This definitely applies to music. There are exceptions (like the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, the Who, etc. in the case of music), but a lot of older stuff is often seen as past its relevance point by a younger generation because it's, well, "old."

In my eyes, it's pretty amazing to go back through your parents' record collection and give certain stuff another listen. In my case, I've never sunk my teeth into the big band music that my father likes, but I've always liked other stuff my parents played for me when I was younger. Growing up, I identified with the Top 40 music of the '80s a little more, but I didn't dismiss older music because it was older. I still fancy those Simon & Garfunkel, Neil Diamond and John Denver hits, among other stuff. In those cases, those songs get better with age and they are often introductions to the original albums they came from.

There are definitely differences between the musical generations, but the approaches haven't really changed. There are people that have to play/listen/write music and/or there are people that want to become famous because of music. There's always a sense of rebellion in some form or another; it's a part of human nature. It's important to understand that it's always going to be there. In other words, those that sang along and identified with the Replacements' "Kids Don't Follow" back in '82 can still identify with it now. Maybe their kids can identify with it too.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Catherine Wheel

Originally posted: Tuesday, August 29th, 2006 Despite managing to release five proper albums, Catherine Wheel was one of those bands that always seemed to slip past the mainstream rock crowd. Yes, they got some nice airplay in their day, but people seem to have forgotten about them. You may hear “Black Metallic” or “Waydown” on a “classic alternative” show on Sirius or XM or maybe even on terrestrial radio, but that’s about it. For me, they were one of most consistent rock bands of the ’90s, meandering through shoegazer, hard rock, space rock and pop rock, all while eluding mainstream pigeonholing. Led by the smooth, warm pipes of vocalist/guitarist Rob Dickinson (cousin of Iron Maiden’s Bruce Dickinson), Catherine Wheel featured Brian Futter on lead guitar, Dave Hawes on bass and Neil Sims on drums. They weren’t a pretty-boy guitar band, but they weren’t a scuzzy bunch of ragamuffins either. Though the band hailed from England, Catherine Wheel found itself more welcome on American air

Best of 2021

  Last year, my attention span was not wide enough to listen to a lot of LPs from start to finish. Too much went on in 2020 to focus on 10-15 albums, so I went with only a couple to spotlight. Well, 2021 was a little better, as I have a list of top four records, and a lot of individual tracks.  (I made a lengthy Spotify playlist ) So, without further ado, here’s my list of favorites of the year: Albums Deafheaven, Infinite Granite (listen) Hands down, my favorite album of the year. I was not sure where Deafheaven would go after another record that brought My Bloody Valentine and death metal fans together, but they beautifully rebooted their sound on Infinite Granite. The divisive goblin vocals are vastly pared-down here, as are the blast beats. Sounding more inspired by Slowdive, the band has discovered a new sonic palette that I hope they explore more of in the future. It’s a welcome revelation. I still love their older material, but this has renewed my love of what these guys do.  J

Hello, Control

I'm still a big fan of iTunes . I haven't tried Napster , Urge or eMusic as I've been perfectly happy with Apple's program ever since I downloaded it two years ago. However, an annoying new feature has come up with its latest version, 7.0. Whenever you pull up your music library, a sidebar taking up 3/4ths of the screen appears plugging the iTunes Music Store. Why is this an annoyance? Well, first and foremost, since you can't close the sidebar, you can't escape it. I believe a music library is a private collection, a spot away from the music store. So what's the need for constant advertisements and plugs? To provide a better visual, let me describe what I see whenever I pull up a song in my iTunes library. When I listen to "This is a Fire Door Never Leave Open" by the Weakerthans, I see a graphic for Left and Leaving , the album that it comes from (and available in the iTunes Music Store), along with a list of the Weakerthans' other albums,