Compensation?
I may be old but blah, blah...
I may be 'old' (what, over 20?) as in close to being a baby boomer but missed out by ten years thus not only missing 'the best bands' but also full employment & the opportunity to walk into a job in the arts despite being a prole & getting the chance to prove my worth rather than not even getting an interview because I didn't have the right kind of education - like you could in the 60s - so they say...............
Saw a t-shirt like the one above (same sentiment) advertised in The Guardian the the week-end.....
...and despite, admittedly, being able to relate because, as I said, I'm close to the bb gen, it's a sad thing to wear, isn't it? Yes? No?
As if to try & make up for being so damned 'old' by at least staking a claim to having been in on The Best of music.....................were they?
& what's battling what to decide?
Let's see....
Rock'n'Roll, Soul, Rock & Psychedelia
vs
Funk, Punk, Hip Hop & Techno
Seconds out - Round One!
Of course, in theory, a baby boomer could have still caught Funk & Punk, still only being in her/his late-20s when they happened, possibly. I know one who remembers the impact of Rock'n'Roll but still enjoyed Punk.
What the t-shirt says (one of the things anyway) is that the 'live' experience is crucial to lending credibility to 'proper' music - they could really play! I geddit. That's how Rock 'grew up', didn't it? Going from a joyful Pop 45 to 'proper' bands (as opposed to manufactured) who could play because they'd been doing so in pubs years before they became stars.
We know the story..........................Rock got serious, long-haired, technical, pompous, indulgent, conceptual etc.......
but........................
what was I going to say?
Yes.
Are the 'classic' genres really better than the newer ones?
Hold on
I've got to throw Punk in with the classics now, haven't I? Hasn't it been forced to grow up along with it's fans & get all Rock'n'Roll hall of fame stadium (The Clash, yes, them) 'proper music' all these years on? Don't old farts crow about Metal Box being seminal...Joy Division...The Sex Pistols, The Jam...all elevated to Serious land long after being branded at birth as Punk rubbish - they can't play! - well did you ever see Stiff Little Fingers back in the day? Did you? Or The Jam?
Besides...
what happened to the notion that not being able to play as well as Jimmy Page was a bonus, a reason to celebrate, a call to arms in order to demolish serious Rock culture?
How soon we forget.
Now. I look around...squinting without my glasses, at the current musical landscape...I think I see a lot of bands fallen on the skinny arse between both stools, being neither rebel amateurs & proud nor technical wizards of dazzling virtuosity..........................................
(admittedly, this vision is based on watching about ten minutes of Later...With Jools Holland & not even every week)
what the fuck.
Trouble is, see, being my age it's almost impossible not to value Bowie, Roxy Music, Parliament, The Pistols or The Clash (I'm trying to stick to bands I've seen 'live' but wavered there although two out of five random names isn't bad - ha!) above what came afterwards..............
yes
I know...
..............every generation treasures the music it held sacred in it's teen years...I know...................................
I've never seen rappers perform 'live'. In footage, they always sound shit....&...it stopped being a genre I liked around the time of the second Public Enemy album, probably, although, as you know if your ancient like me remembering any of this stuff gets harder...& unlike some baby boomers I can't even blame drugs for having erased half my brain cells........................
Techno? 'Live'? I saw Underground Resistance at a club, playing their own music, of course, but the only interesting 'live' element were their dancers...& they didn't dance so much as strike militaristic poses............anyway, I hate seeing Techno acts at Glastonbury, they way they ramp up the showbiz lighting, crowd-pleasing bollocks for the audio sheeple - bah!
Trouble is it's hard to get over the Big Bang theory...but only if you're a certain age. To The Kids the 60s boom is quaint nostalgia at best - "Look, Mum! He's smashing his guitar!"
Or "Dad, why are they spitting?"
Must be hell having kids grilling you about your rebellion-turned-into-money......because History always reminds us that it All began (EVERYTHING) in the 50s & 60s & OK, the mid-70s too - all of it - the purest (& best) Pop, raw power, holy Soul, trippy vibes, snotty noise........
....& everything ever since just rewrote it..........apart from Techno which, in my adult serious music pomposity, I'm placing above House because...well...it just hasn't lasted as well as the best Techno & unlike that exerts no influence on electronic music today & anyway at least, in the deeper examples, can be said to have cocked an ear towards even more complex electronic music rather than simply being Dance music................................................................................................................................damn! I forgot Disco in all this! but we know what that turned into, don't we? how it gradually diluted itself to become totally piss weak compared to, say, James Brown, Cymande, Gil Scott-Heron (now there's a black artist who got taken seriously by the Rock crowd - so what? who needs their blessing?)
To sum up: everything turns to shit. I was thinking about Hip Hop. But everything goes global in one form or another - gets itself accepted by Mr & Mrs People. We all get older...even disillusioned enough to dismiss a mature genre just because we no longer listen to it & therefore probably miss anything that's actually good (Hip-Hop, I'm looking at you...sorry).
As you know if you're a regular reader, I do still enjoy a lot of contemporary electronic music - see? I ain't past it! ha-ha. Which is not say...thinking about it....about having seen The Jam...Gil Scott-Heron...Parliament/Funkadelic...Art Blakey (what's he got to do with all this? nothing, it's a Jazz thing therefore outside all this)...I don't sometimes weaken & understand the meaning the that bloody stupid t-shirt.....
TTFN
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