Recently, Johnny reminded me how cranky boomers get when you disagree with their claim to have produced the best music in the history of the universe ever. See, Johnny has a dirty secret. He's one of them. He falls in the tail end of the Boomers, and I, well I am in the vanguard of the musically superior Generation X.
(I may have mentioned this before, but even the name Generation X is an indication of just how self-absorbed the Boomers are about their music. A pair of Boomers named my generation after a band made up of musicians from their generation. What tools.)
But I digress. Every once in a while, Johnny does something that reminds me that we are not just a few years apart, but a whole generation apart. One of them is when he rambles on and on about his appalling taste in music. Tired old Motown this... Crusty old folk singer that... But you have to forgive the guy. He's a product of a different generation, and that's just the way they are. You can't change them. Just nod and smile when they talk about the good ol' days. They like that. It comforts them.
With a few notable exceptions (elect me president and my first executive order will be to make the Jimi Hendrix version of the national anthem the only version you're allowed to play at sporting events) the 60s and 70s were a musical wasteland. Honestly, has there ever been a band more overrated than the Beatles? I think not. Fridays I'm In Love is so much better than Eight Days A Week that it's not even funny, and Fridays I'm In Love isn't even a particularly good song by the Cure.
Sure, the late 70s had some redeeming factors. Punk was starting up and some good alternative bands were starting their careers... but please, it was practically the 80s by then, and their music belongs to us, not to you.
Oh, and if Johnny offers you a Werther's, just thank him and fiddle with the wrapper until you can put it back in the candy dish without him noticing. It won't be hard. Just get him started about Bob Dylan...
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6 comments:
At the ripe old age of 28 I will have to disagree with you. I love me some Cure but they will never touch The Beatles. Sure, they had some crap but any band with a catalog that big is bound to. They had to come into their own. Motown...tired? Never that stuff is timeless. I love the music of my day but collectively it can't touch the greatness of the music of the boomer generation
You're probably not familiar with
>Opie Gone Bad - a local band here in Denver (because the lead singer looks like Ron Howard) but he does an awesome version of the National Anthem before every Avalanche game. Although I like Hendrix' version too.
First of all, a band more overrated than the Beatles? Hello! Led Zepplin!
Secondly, I might be wrong, but I believe Mr. Y was born in 1960 or after, which puts him with me in the post-Boomer but pre-X generation.
The 70s were my decade in music, and I own all of it, from 1970 to 1979, the year I graduated high school, thank you very much. That means I own Bowie and the good version of Genesis and both the good and bad versions of the Doobie Bros. too. I own the best work of the Rolling Stones, and I also own the Sex Pistols and almost all the good Ramones tunes, so suck it, Mr. Cure.
I can't help it if my decade is so musically diverse. I can't help it if I'm stuck between two "generations" who think they invented awesome. Yeah, you all go on and squabble, I'll just be over here listening to "Who's Next."
I've often said that the only people who can be nostalgic for the 1970s are the one's that didn't live through them.
Good enough. Colorado gets an exemption. They can choose between Opie and Jimi.
Led Zepplin? Wasn't that Robert Plants old band before the Honeydippers?
I thought the "official" Boomer years were 46-64 which, thank GOD, leaves me out. I am so over the Beatles, just like I am so over Boomers and all their self-absorbed self-indulgent crap. Get off the fucking stage and give someone else a chance. ( I do luv Johnny though, and his punk collection gives him enough cred to make up for his occasional lapse into bad taste)
I know boomers can be annoying little f**kers, but the evidence is there - there was a LOT of great music in the 60s. And, yes, it really did start with the Beatles. Their talent can't be denied. I know the hype is nuts, but their music will stand the test of time. And then, who else? Dylan, Hendrix, The Velvet Underground (which inspired all the bands this blogger loves), Traffic, The Doors, Janis Joplin, the Grateful Dead, Santana, the Rolling Stones, the Kinks, the Who, and on and on and on.
There are certainly great bands now, as there were in the 80s and 90s, but nothing matches the sheer quantity of great artists in the 60s. The only thing that is close is the 50s, when good old rock n' roll started - Elvis, Buddy Holly, Eddie Cochran, Carl Perkins, etc.
The boomers were just lucky to have been born into such great music. But I can see some future youngster sneering at his parent's generation for going on and on about Nirvana, Pearl Jam, the Meatpuppets, R.E.M., etc.
The smart people ignore that crap and just pay attention to the music.
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