(Please don’t “ok boomer” me just yet.)
November 8, 2019 7:58 AM Subscribe
Is the author certain that he knows about all the potential sources for music that exist, and is he certain that the "offensive" stuff may not be lurking somewhere out of his sight on purpose?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:06 AM on November 8, 2019 [16 favorites]
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:06 AM on November 8, 2019 [16 favorites]
I read the whole article, and I am therefore cleared to say: ok boomer.
The author doesn't want to partake in writing the kind of article that's usually written about comedy or the Kids Today in general, but I don't see how he's made any point that's fundamentally different. He finds the answer in the last paragraph and shrugs it off. You know when pop music was also upbeat or soft and melancholy? During the Second World War.
posted by Countess Elena at 8:10 AM on November 8, 2019 [20 favorites]
The author doesn't want to partake in writing the kind of article that's usually written about comedy or the Kids Today in general, but I don't see how he's made any point that's fundamentally different. He finds the answer in the last paragraph and shrugs it off. You know when pop music was also upbeat or soft and melancholy? During the Second World War.
posted by Countess Elena at 8:10 AM on November 8, 2019 [20 favorites]
I suspect some of it might have to do with the drugs of the period. The drug of choice for the 2010s is Xanax, while in previous decades, uppers of various sorts were popular. Xanax is a depressant, an anti-anxiety medication. In an era that has been increasingly defined by rising anxiety, it's not surprising that pop music has turned towards a more mellow, chill style to help anxious music consumers feel less anxious.
posted by SansPoint at 8:10 AM on November 8, 2019 [8 favorites]
posted by SansPoint at 8:10 AM on November 8, 2019 [8 favorites]
is it because everything is awful because let me tell you that’s why i listen to chillhop maybe it’s the same for the kids
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 8:11 AM on November 8, 2019 [30 favorites]
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 8:11 AM on November 8, 2019 [30 favorites]
The rest of the world is already screaming at us. Who wants to music to do it, too?
I don't know about the kids today, but there's something to this for me. After 2016 it took me until well into 2018 before I was willing to listen to white dudes-yelling at me, which, as a punk rock fan since roughly childhood, comprised a large portion of my record collection. It was weird where I went instead--soul, hip hop, r&b, folky stuff (but, again, no white dudes, no yelling).
My youthful self--record store girl, rock critic, snarky music snob, what have you--is probably dying a little on the inside everytime I mention it, but according to Spotify, my most listened to song in 2017 was Carly Rae Jepson's "Cut to the Feeling," (which, is, to be clear, a great fucking pop song), because it was a good pre-protest motivator and honestly about all I could handle emotionally at the time.
posted by thivaia at 8:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [27 favorites]
I don't know about the kids today, but there's something to this for me. After 2016 it took me until well into 2018 before I was willing to listen to white dudes-yelling at me, which, as a punk rock fan since roughly childhood, comprised a large portion of my record collection. It was weird where I went instead--soul, hip hop, r&b, folky stuff (but, again, no white dudes, no yelling).
My youthful self--record store girl, rock critic, snarky music snob, what have you--is probably dying a little on the inside everytime I mention it, but according to Spotify, my most listened to song in 2017 was Carly Rae Jepson's "Cut to the Feeling," (which, is, to be clear, a great fucking pop song), because it was a good pre-protest motivator and honestly about all I could handle emotionally at the time.
posted by thivaia at 8:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [27 favorites]
Hyden writes about the offensive music he misses: "While a lot of it never made it to Top 40 radio, it still managed to reach critical mass."
He takes his examples of recent, inoffensive music by looking at what songs were most streamed: "Just take a look at the most streamed songs of all time, which all derive from this decade."
His methodology is catastrophically flawed.
I am no kind of a fly guy, there sure do seem to be a lot of young women singing about wanton sexual behavior and immoderate drug use nowadays. Does that count, or will only murder fantasies do?
posted by ckridge at 8:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [20 favorites]
He takes his examples of recent, inoffensive music by looking at what songs were most streamed: "Just take a look at the most streamed songs of all time, which all derive from this decade."
His methodology is catastrophically flawed.
I am no kind of a fly guy, there sure do seem to be a lot of young women singing about wanton sexual behavior and immoderate drug use nowadays. Does that count, or will only murder fantasies do?
posted by ckridge at 8:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [20 favorites]
also, I note that there is currently a recording artist who has consistently appeared on national TV who is called Alaska Thunderfuck and whose 2015 debut album was entitled Anus
so, you know, seek and ye shall find
posted by Countess Elena at 8:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [13 favorites]
so, you know, seek and ye shall find
posted by Countess Elena at 8:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [13 favorites]
If you take as a rule that the nature of the teens vs. adults disparity doesn’t change over time, but just expresses itself differently (which I think is true), the author should be asking different questions here—what’s taken the place of music as a medium for provocation for teens? Or what in the music industry has changed that might have prevented the type of music he describes from breaking through in the 2010s? Or why does he assume music has to be loud, brash, and sexually crude to annoy adults? Is he quite sure he hasn’t been provoked and annoyed by the pop music of today, given the fact that he’s written this article...?
posted by sallybrown at 8:14 AM on November 8, 2019 [20 favorites]
posted by sallybrown at 8:14 AM on November 8, 2019 [20 favorites]
How the world changes--Biggie and 2Pac being casually classed as "pop." Does the author think he is as familiar with the rap of today? I see no mention of Tekashi69, for instance (whom I offer up as an example of offensive content, not musical merit).
posted by praemunire at 8:15 AM on November 8, 2019 [18 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 8:15 AM on November 8, 2019 [18 favorites]
If you take as a rule that the nature of the teens vs. adults disparity doesn’t change over time
Across times? Across cultures? The nature of adolescence and its expression is as varied as anything else in human culture. In other words: Not, in my opinion, a valid rule.
posted by argybarg at 8:19 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
Across times? Across cultures? The nature of adolescence and its expression is as varied as anything else in human culture. In other words: Not, in my opinion, a valid rule.
posted by argybarg at 8:19 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
How the world changes--Biggie and 2Pac being casually classed as "pop."
Biggie and Tupac where pop back then too "Hypnotize" the escargot my cargo track was played on mom radio.
An old track by Game Theory called Dead Center from 1986 had the singer being interviewed at beginning and his theory about loud college rock was that kids moved out of the house and need somebody to yell at them since dad isn't around anymore to do it. All joking of course. So they outsource singers to do it. But that isn't needed anymore, as everyone yells all the time, especially at kids.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:25 AM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
Biggie and Tupac where pop back then too "Hypnotize" the escargot my cargo track was played on mom radio.
An old track by Game Theory called Dead Center from 1986 had the singer being interviewed at beginning and his theory about loud college rock was that kids moved out of the house and need somebody to yell at them since dad isn't around anymore to do it. All joking of course. So they outsource singers to do it. But that isn't needed anymore, as everyone yells all the time, especially at kids.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:25 AM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
> I am no kind of a fly guy, there sure do seem to be a lot of young women singing about wanton sexual behavior and immoderate drug use nowadays. Does that count, or will only murder fantasies do?
sex is a good thing that makes people happy and that makes the world better. likewise it is excellent when women are sexually empowered, because so many of the worst people strive to enforce patriarchy through suppressing/denigrating women’s sexuality.
and likewise drugs are often good things that make people happy and make the world better (though plz stay away from heroin and if you must do coke please do it not around me).
murder is, on the other hand, bad. privileged young men shouting their murder fantasies are maximally horrible.
as an old i have no standing on questions of what the kids these days like, though i have a vague sense that most of the kids are alright and that they’re listening to chill + inclusive music for the same reason i do: the world is awful now and anything that brings calm togetherness is to be cherished. some of the kids, though, are truly terrible people. what are the awful kids listening to? what do the young trumpist nazis put in their ear holes? are they somehow listening to chillhop as well?
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 8:26 AM on November 8, 2019 [23 favorites]
sex is a good thing that makes people happy and that makes the world better. likewise it is excellent when women are sexually empowered, because so many of the worst people strive to enforce patriarchy through suppressing/denigrating women’s sexuality.
and likewise drugs are often good things that make people happy and make the world better (though plz stay away from heroin and if you must do coke please do it not around me).
murder is, on the other hand, bad. privileged young men shouting their murder fantasies are maximally horrible.
as an old i have no standing on questions of what the kids these days like, though i have a vague sense that most of the kids are alright and that they’re listening to chill + inclusive music for the same reason i do: the world is awful now and anything that brings calm togetherness is to be cherished. some of the kids, though, are truly terrible people. what are the awful kids listening to? what do the young trumpist nazis put in their ear holes? are they somehow listening to chillhop as well?
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 8:26 AM on November 8, 2019 [23 favorites]
drugs are often good things that make people happy and make the world better
LOL that needs a giant, opiate-and-meth-shaped asterisk.
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:33 AM on November 8, 2019 [15 favorites]
LOL that needs a giant, opiate-and-meth-shaped asterisk.
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:33 AM on November 8, 2019 [15 favorites]
look man sometimes you just gotta clean the house for 30 hours straight
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 8:35 AM on November 8, 2019 [29 favorites]
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 8:35 AM on November 8, 2019 [29 favorites]
Wow. This dude.
“How is the pop music that my kids like possibly going to offend me?” I wondered.
It was honest, unanswerable question. Growing up in the ’80s and ’90s, I had been subjected to all manner of filth and obscenity.
And then:
It’s true that you can still hear all manner of noise and filth if you seek it out — hardcore punk, death metal, gritty and foul-mouthed rap, and all the rest. But that kind of music didn’t seem at all prominent or commercial in the 2010s.
...This is as far as I got before I was done with this dude. I'm only dismayed at the sight of a fellow Gen-Xer who really does deserve the "OK, boomer" response, because this is exactly it. He clearly is not paying any real attention to younger people, he's having a sad that counterculture isn't commercialized enough for him, and he cannot see that generations exist in a progression because his head is all the way up his own ass with nostalgia for his youth.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 8:41 AM on November 8, 2019 [25 favorites]
“How is the pop music that my kids like possibly going to offend me?” I wondered.
It was honest, unanswerable question. Growing up in the ’80s and ’90s, I had been subjected to all manner of filth and obscenity.
And then:
It’s true that you can still hear all manner of noise and filth if you seek it out — hardcore punk, death metal, gritty and foul-mouthed rap, and all the rest. But that kind of music didn’t seem at all prominent or commercial in the 2010s.
...This is as far as I got before I was done with this dude. I'm only dismayed at the sight of a fellow Gen-Xer who really does deserve the "OK, boomer" response, because this is exactly it. He clearly is not paying any real attention to younger people, he's having a sad that counterculture isn't commercialized enough for him, and he cannot see that generations exist in a progression because his head is all the way up his own ass with nostalgia for his youth.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 8:41 AM on November 8, 2019 [25 favorites]
But for real pop music has, like, always been predominantly bland and anodyne, hence the mass appeal. I honestly think we went through something of a golden era around the time Teenage Dream was released, that album is amazeballs, as is Lights by Ellie Goulding.
Does the author not remember Boyz II Men, NKOTB, Nelson, Phil Collins, the #@&^%#@ Goo-Goo Dolls? GODDAMN THOSE GOO GOO DOLLS.
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:44 AM on November 8, 2019 [8 favorites]
Does the author not remember Boyz II Men, NKOTB, Nelson, Phil Collins, the #@&^%#@ Goo-Goo Dolls? GODDAMN THOSE GOO GOO DOLLS.
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:44 AM on November 8, 2019 [8 favorites]
This article is rockist bloviate that makes me sad for my otherwise unnoticed generation.
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:47 AM on November 8, 2019 [13 favorites]
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:47 AM on November 8, 2019 [13 favorites]
ecstatic to see a mention of Anusavailable on itunes in this thread and need to add that "Your Makeup Is Terrible" will be a bop as long as there is a drag queen on earth with a pump, a piece of hair, some kind of jewelry, and trash to rummage through
posted by youarenothere at 8:50 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]
posted by youarenothere at 8:50 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]
I'm an old, honestly, I figure what the kids listen to is none of my damned business. I work with college students and what we talk about musically and what they seem to listen to run the gamut. We had a group that loved metal, we had a group that seemed to only listen to k-pop, we've got a young IT guy who describes himself as a punk who loves Taylor Swift. I was a young punk once and my crew would have jumped on the hater bandwagon on that. But, whatever. The kids are smarter, angrier and stronger than we were and I suspect they're gonna fix (or seriously attempt to) the mess we've gotten them in to. If they want to listen too Old Town Road while doing it, I ain't gonna argue. Plus I love that song.
posted by evilDoug at 8:51 AM on November 8, 2019 [8 favorites]
posted by evilDoug at 8:51 AM on November 8, 2019 [8 favorites]
Lowkey - Soundtrack to the struggle 2
Bet they wouldn't say the youth don't know how to be offensive and political if they were faced with 3 dozen capped out youths singing the SAM song. Maybe we don't even need a whole lot of new tunes when the old ones don't seem to be less relevant.
I have never felt in the slightest like there was a shortage of rebellious and revolutionary music that appealed to me.
Is there a problem with the co-option of anti-capitalist and counter-hegemonic themes by the same forces they seek to defeat?
Most certainly.
Is there any shortage of music that feeds an upwelling of political consciousness?
Not in the least sense.
The people's flag is deepest red, shrouded oft our martyred dead. The drops run cold & heart's blood pumps through young and old.
posted by Acid Communist at 8:55 AM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
Bet they wouldn't say the youth don't know how to be offensive and political if they were faced with 3 dozen capped out youths singing the SAM song. Maybe we don't even need a whole lot of new tunes when the old ones don't seem to be less relevant.
I have never felt in the slightest like there was a shortage of rebellious and revolutionary music that appealed to me.
Is there a problem with the co-option of anti-capitalist and counter-hegemonic themes by the same forces they seek to defeat?
Most certainly.
Is there any shortage of music that feeds an upwelling of political consciousness?
Not in the least sense.
The people's flag is deepest red, shrouded oft our martyred dead. The drops run cold & heart's blood pumps through young and old.
posted by Acid Communist at 8:55 AM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
(And ere their limbs grew stiff and cold, their hearts' blood dyed in every fold, surely)
posted by Frowner at 8:56 AM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
posted by Frowner at 8:56 AM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
TBH, everyone should read Stuart Hall on the ideological moves that are part of the early shift toward more law and order - defining youth as a threat and an Other is one of them. This was a proto-Thatcherist move and I don't feel more enthused about it now.
There are legit ways to study and theorize about the differences between eras, generations, genres, etc but the frantic taxonomizing of today seems to me more about anxiety and otherizing and is unlikely to go anywhere good.
Stuart Hall, people! He knew what he was on about.
posted by Frowner at 8:58 AM on November 8, 2019 [11 favorites]
There are legit ways to study and theorize about the differences between eras, generations, genres, etc but the frantic taxonomizing of today seems to me more about anxiety and otherizing and is unlikely to go anywhere good.
Stuart Hall, people! He knew what he was on about.
posted by Frowner at 8:58 AM on November 8, 2019 [11 favorites]
I guess my only "OK Xer" moments are when I'm listening to the Sirius "alternative" channel and so many current songs have a lead who is whispery. I like to sing to things and I can't with those. But hey: it's not for me. There are lots of other channels with singable stuff. And every now and then they play Sir Sly, which is fun, or other less whispery singers and I am into those.
posted by emjaybee at 8:59 AM on November 8, 2019
posted by emjaybee at 8:59 AM on November 8, 2019
The 80s equivalent to Ed Sheeran isn't Twisted Sister, it's Tiffany.
Plus I wouldn't be surprised if people just don't "get" the references in newer music. Did you know Old Town Road has a reference to drug use? Probably not, if you don't know what "Lean" is...
posted by explosion at 9:00 AM on November 8, 2019 [15 favorites]
Plus I wouldn't be surprised if people just don't "get" the references in newer music. Did you know Old Town Road has a reference to drug use? Probably not, if you don't know what "Lean" is...
posted by explosion at 9:00 AM on November 8, 2019 [15 favorites]
evilDoug:
I'll go even further, as an Old, and say that music may not be the kind of galvanizing cultural medium it was for many in the near past — that other media have absorbed the attention of teenagers. And I don't lament that, either.
I don't think that idolizing pop stars and seeing them as our road to transgressive freedom was an inherently good thing. As it happened, a lot of those avatars of freedom turned out to be abusive, over-empowered men who made shitty work of the energy they were fed. Not all. But enough that it wasn't some golden era.
If people want to build their cultural materials out of video games and social media and short videos instead of rock stars, it is not some kind of decline.
posted by argybarg at 9:00 AM on November 8, 2019 [9 favorites]
I'll go even further, as an Old, and say that music may not be the kind of galvanizing cultural medium it was for many in the near past — that other media have absorbed the attention of teenagers. And I don't lament that, either.
I don't think that idolizing pop stars and seeing them as our road to transgressive freedom was an inherently good thing. As it happened, a lot of those avatars of freedom turned out to be abusive, over-empowered men who made shitty work of the energy they were fed. Not all. But enough that it wasn't some golden era.
If people want to build their cultural materials out of video games and social media and short videos instead of rock stars, it is not some kind of decline.
posted by argybarg at 9:00 AM on November 8, 2019 [9 favorites]
Maybe we don't even need a whole lot of new tunes when the old ones don't seem to be less relevant.
I couldn’t believe my ears when I stumbled across “Masters of War” as an angry US teen in 2002. Like water in the desert.
posted by sallybrown at 9:01 AM on November 8, 2019 [10 favorites]
I couldn’t believe my ears when I stumbled across “Masters of War” as an angry US teen in 2002. Like water in the desert.
posted by sallybrown at 9:01 AM on November 8, 2019 [10 favorites]
> (And ere their limbs grew stiff and cold, their hearts' blood dyed in every fold, surely)
okay i am going to share a secret i love the old songs but inevitably billy bragg's (often watered-down) versions end up being my favorites to actually listen to does this make me a menshevik
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 9:03 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]
okay i am going to share a secret i love the old songs but inevitably billy bragg's (often watered-down) versions end up being my favorites to actually listen to does this make me a menshevik
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 9:03 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]
Also, is Lizzo not angry enough for this guy? She's everywhere and she certainly isn't putting up with anyone's shit.
posted by emjaybee at 9:03 AM on November 8, 2019 [28 favorites]
posted by emjaybee at 9:03 AM on November 8, 2019 [28 favorites]
One thing I do enjoy about the Teens and their music now: because a LOT of music is available, the Teens tend to have way broader taste, both genre-wise and temporally, than was common when I was a teen. I mean, when I was a teen, you really had to work to find older music, and unless you lived in a place with a fantastic record store, you would almost never find obscure older music. Whereas now I am spoiled for choice about the weird difficult music of the past and so are the teens.
posted by Frowner at 9:05 AM on November 8, 2019 [15 favorites]
posted by Frowner at 9:05 AM on November 8, 2019 [15 favorites]
The Mensheviks are unjustly slandered, IYAM. History written by the victors, etc etc. Or at least, the Bolsheviks are unjustly held up as obviously better when this is not really obvious at all if you think about the actual course of events.
posted by Frowner at 9:06 AM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
posted by Frowner at 9:06 AM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
> Also, is Lizzo not angry enough for this guy? She's everywhere and she certainly isn't putting up with anyone's shit.
But she's a lady! Not like all the true rebellious musicians, as seen in the writer's golden age.
posted by The corpse in the library at 9:07 AM on November 8, 2019 [28 favorites]
But she's a lady! Not like all the true rebellious musicians, as seen in the writer's golden age.
posted by The corpse in the library at 9:07 AM on November 8, 2019 [28 favorites]
liiiiizzzoooooooooo!!!!!
also janelle monáe. i keep expecting her to launch some kind of militant revolutionary phase two which ends up being bigger than the panthers.
fuck beyoncé has been dead-center mainstream for decades and also she knows what to do to a police car.
i think emjaybee has found the skeleton key to this dude's problem. he doesn't listen to music by black women.
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 9:08 AM on November 8, 2019 [43 favorites]
also janelle monáe. i keep expecting her to launch some kind of militant revolutionary phase two which ends up being bigger than the panthers.
fuck beyoncé has been dead-center mainstream for decades and also she knows what to do to a police car.
i think emjaybee has found the skeleton key to this dude's problem. he doesn't listen to music by black women.
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 9:08 AM on November 8, 2019 [43 favorites]
Also, is Lizzo not angry enough for this guy?
Well for one, she's not a screaming man in pants which are either too tight or too loose, so.
posted by uncleozzy at 9:09 AM on November 8, 2019 [17 favorites]
Well for one, she's not a screaming man in pants which are either too tight or too loose, so.
posted by uncleozzy at 9:09 AM on November 8, 2019 [17 favorites]
If I were being more charitable, I'd say he just wanted an excuse to dunk on the milksop stylings of Ed Sheeran. Yet, somehow he failed at that, too.
posted by explosion at 9:11 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by explosion at 9:11 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
billy bragg's (often watered-down) versions end up being my favorites to actually listen to does this make me a menshevik
I don't know, but I feel compelled to mention that I drank too much at book club last night, came home and sang Billy Bragg songs to my cat while taking a bubble bath, which may or may not make me a Menshevik, but definitely ticks the "Weird Old Lady" box
posted by thivaia at 9:11 AM on November 8, 2019 [17 favorites]
I don't know, but I feel compelled to mention that I drank too much at book club last night, came home and sang Billy Bragg songs to my cat while taking a bubble bath, which may or may not make me a Menshevik, but definitely ticks the "Weird Old Lady" box
posted by thivaia at 9:11 AM on November 8, 2019 [17 favorites]
Then raise the scarlet standard high! Within its shade we'll live and die...
I also have to side-eye the equation "active or offensive" and "bland or passive" here. There's a lot of active resistance music that isn't predicated on trying to be offensive for offense's sake. I can't be the only person who remembers Guante's "Matches" being everywhere for almost a year after the fall of 2016, for example, or the work of Kendrick Lamar or Janelle Monae. Want super popular shit? Twenty-One Pilots' "Stressed Out", or Lorde's "Royals". Want popish countryish? I've been getting a lot of recommendations for Delta Rae (for example, "Hands Dirty"). Active resistance music is everywhere, and it's not exactly restricted to genre at this point.
posted by sciatrix at 9:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [9 favorites]
I also have to side-eye the equation "active or offensive" and "bland or passive" here. There's a lot of active resistance music that isn't predicated on trying to be offensive for offense's sake. I can't be the only person who remembers Guante's "Matches" being everywhere for almost a year after the fall of 2016, for example, or the work of Kendrick Lamar or Janelle Monae. Want super popular shit? Twenty-One Pilots' "Stressed Out", or Lorde's "Royals". Want popish countryish? I've been getting a lot of recommendations for Delta Rae (for example, "Hands Dirty"). Active resistance music is everywhere, and it's not exactly restricted to genre at this point.
posted by sciatrix at 9:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [9 favorites]
> I don't know, but I feel compelled to mention that I drank too much at book club last night, came home and sang Billy Bragg songs to my cat while taking a bubble bath
todo: the things thivaia does
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 9:15 AM on November 8, 2019 [14 favorites]
todo: the things thivaia does
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 9:15 AM on November 8, 2019 [14 favorites]
Also there's a lot of smuggling of teleology in the article and this whole discussion. Pop music isn't evolving toward an endpoint, whether that endpoint is warmer or edgier.
It's like saying that the novel is evolving toward an endpoint - in 1975 you would have wondered just how much more punchily aging academic drunks could revile their ex-wives or how much more zanily yet misogynistly Donald Barthelme could use language, but then you'd have to wonder about how the vaguely woman-centered but not precisely feminist novel with literary SFnal elements is somehow the inevitable result in 2019.
posted by Frowner at 9:15 AM on November 8, 2019 [7 favorites]
It's like saying that the novel is evolving toward an endpoint - in 1975 you would have wondered just how much more punchily aging academic drunks could revile their ex-wives or how much more zanily yet misogynistly Donald Barthelme could use language, but then you'd have to wonder about how the vaguely woman-centered but not precisely feminist novel with literary SFnal elements is somehow the inevitable result in 2019.
posted by Frowner at 9:15 AM on November 8, 2019 [7 favorites]
One thing I do enjoy about the Teens and their music now: because a LOT of music is available, the Teens tend to have way broader taste, both genre-wise and temporally, than was common when I was a teen.
Right? Like, I was kind of poorly socialized as a teenager, so my musical tastes were heavily shaped by online streaming stations. That meant that I discovered so much music I never, ever would have encountered otherwise, and it was easy to follow a taste for Celtic folk right up into the Dropkick Murphys and from there into punk more generally, or to follow an affection for Phil Ochs derived from an eighth grade history class into modern folk and further into the maritime folk scene, and then there was the top 100 stuff, and I could follow that thread into other directions based on what I liked that the internet radio threw at me...
And I'm nearly thirty. How do these "genre-specific" subcultures intend to stick when it's so easy to be exposed to all manner of art and enjoy all of it?
posted by sciatrix at 9:17 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
Right? Like, I was kind of poorly socialized as a teenager, so my musical tastes were heavily shaped by online streaming stations. That meant that I discovered so much music I never, ever would have encountered otherwise, and it was easy to follow a taste for Celtic folk right up into the Dropkick Murphys and from there into punk more generally, or to follow an affection for Phil Ochs derived from an eighth grade history class into modern folk and further into the maritime folk scene, and then there was the top 100 stuff, and I could follow that thread into other directions based on what I liked that the internet radio threw at me...
And I'm nearly thirty. How do these "genre-specific" subcultures intend to stick when it's so easy to be exposed to all manner of art and enjoy all of it?
posted by sciatrix at 9:17 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
Popular music is way more complex than this writer gives it credit for. There are cycles, of course (you get Tiffany and Taylor Swift for the same reason you got Shirley Temple, really), but there are other things at play. First: fragmentation of the market is way, way, way up from forty, thirty, twenty, and even ten years ago, which will dramatically alter the relationships between the mainstream of pop and controversial artists of the past.
Additionally, dude seems to be mistaking anger for aggression. I really dig Lizzo's album, and there's definitely anger there, but she expresses it in a way that's got more in common w/ Raphael Saadiq's Stone Rollin' than RATM's Bulls on Parade. And Billie Eilish is certainly whispery and mellow on most of her tracks, but her lyrics are both complex and transgressive (her song bad guy has a lot in common with Joan Jett or, maybe even, like, Bikini Kill even though it doesn't sound much like either of them), and I don't think I've ever listened to a song written by a woman and truly thought "this person sounds like an enormous asshole" until that track (an effect that I believe to be deliberate), though I've been thinking that about dudes for decades.
But yeah, super aggressive music is not huge right now in a way that it used to be, but there is still anger there. We're also at a place where artists are making room for different things. The aggression of previous generations was a legitimate reaction to specific stifling elements, but it's something we've been mostly okay with for a while now; we've got other, more nuanced places that need a push right now, and folks are pushing there instead.
posted by Fish Sauce at 9:17 AM on November 8, 2019 [8 favorites]
Additionally, dude seems to be mistaking anger for aggression. I really dig Lizzo's album, and there's definitely anger there, but she expresses it in a way that's got more in common w/ Raphael Saadiq's Stone Rollin' than RATM's Bulls on Parade. And Billie Eilish is certainly whispery and mellow on most of her tracks, but her lyrics are both complex and transgressive (her song bad guy has a lot in common with Joan Jett or, maybe even, like, Bikini Kill even though it doesn't sound much like either of them), and I don't think I've ever listened to a song written by a woman and truly thought "this person sounds like an enormous asshole" until that track (an effect that I believe to be deliberate), though I've been thinking that about dudes for decades.
But yeah, super aggressive music is not huge right now in a way that it used to be, but there is still anger there. We're also at a place where artists are making room for different things. The aggression of previous generations was a legitimate reaction to specific stifling elements, but it's something we've been mostly okay with for a while now; we've got other, more nuanced places that need a push right now, and folks are pushing there instead.
posted by Fish Sauce at 9:17 AM on November 8, 2019 [8 favorites]
posted by sciatrix at 9:18 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
A lot of the Big Thrill of the music of the 1960s was opening the door for white Americans to African-American music, which had been forbidden except by caricature. Getting to dance to blues and R&B was exciting and transgressive and, in that fucked-up way of white mainstream culture, went along with a notion of sexual freedom.
You can't let that genie out of the bottle again and again. And the first sexual revolution, while necessary in many ways, mostly turned out to be a re-expression of white male power over women (sorry — "girls").
Just replaying that putative revolution in endless cycles, and dressing it up as social rebellion, is a dead end. Music's going to be whatever it wants to be, even if it wants to be nothing for a while — that happens as part of the cycle, too.
posted by argybarg at 9:23 AM on November 8, 2019 [9 favorites]
You can't let that genie out of the bottle again and again. And the first sexual revolution, while necessary in many ways, mostly turned out to be a re-expression of white male power over women (sorry — "girls").
Just replaying that putative revolution in endless cycles, and dressing it up as social rebellion, is a dead end. Music's going to be whatever it wants to be, even if it wants to be nothing for a while — that happens as part of the cycle, too.
posted by argybarg at 9:23 AM on November 8, 2019 [9 favorites]
But yeah, super aggressive music is not huge right now in a way that it used to be, but there is still anger there.
I think there's also an aspect to it that is... call it joyful nihilism? Or, hm, a sense that joy is something that is to be actively seized--it's not a passive thing that just happens, but joy is something you have to fight for and actively protect.
Now add that to the big cultural war that we see these days--the kids who think that aggression qua aggression is valuable, regardless of who it's targeted at, those are the kids who wind up cosying up to groups like GamerGate. The kids who have seen the results of untargeted anger and the collateral damage it causes are wary of winding up like that, and so of course it's not going to be popular to foster rage without specific targets and goals. We're living in a cultural space that is increasingly aware of the potential for collateral damage and who pays for it, and I think that's also part of the shift in music.
posted by sciatrix at 9:27 AM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
I think there's also an aspect to it that is... call it joyful nihilism? Or, hm, a sense that joy is something that is to be actively seized--it's not a passive thing that just happens, but joy is something you have to fight for and actively protect.
Now add that to the big cultural war that we see these days--the kids who think that aggression qua aggression is valuable, regardless of who it's targeted at, those are the kids who wind up cosying up to groups like GamerGate. The kids who have seen the results of untargeted anger and the collateral damage it causes are wary of winding up like that, and so of course it's not going to be popular to foster rage without specific targets and goals. We're living in a cultural space that is increasingly aware of the potential for collateral damage and who pays for it, and I think that's also part of the shift in music.
posted by sciatrix at 9:27 AM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
most of the kids are alright
As an old, +1 to this. Kids seem fine to me. Always have been. I likely don't understand them anymore than my parents understood me in the 80s. In my opinion "OK Boomer" == "Don't trust anyone over 40." and yeah, sounds good...they should be pissed off at the world. More power to them, and don't worry about what they're listening to, you old fart.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 9:29 AM on November 8, 2019 [7 favorites]
As an old, +1 to this. Kids seem fine to me. Always have been. I likely don't understand them anymore than my parents understood me in the 80s. In my opinion "OK Boomer" == "Don't trust anyone over 40." and yeah, sounds good...they should be pissed off at the world. More power to them, and don't worry about what they're listening to, you old fart.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 9:29 AM on November 8, 2019 [7 favorites]
Is "don't OK Boomer me yet" the new "I'm not a racist, but..."?
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 9:31 AM on November 8, 2019 [12 favorites]
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 9:31 AM on November 8, 2019 [12 favorites]
My son listens mostly to rap by people who's names start with "lil" and who are mostly either in prison for murder or already dead from massive drug overdose, gang violence, or suicide. Almost none of them have albums in the sense that would get them on the radio or on Billboard's top list.
I'm fairly sure that at least some of it is that he's black, I'm white, and while my partner is black we live in a whiter part of town so he's flailing around trying to find his roots via the worst possible music he can discover.
Since kids have been listening to awful music forever I don't fight with him about it. Though we do talk about the misogyny in the music and being a conscientious consumer of problematic media.
posted by sotonohito at 9:44 AM on November 8, 2019
I'm fairly sure that at least some of it is that he's black, I'm white, and while my partner is black we live in a whiter part of town so he's flailing around trying to find his roots via the worst possible music he can discover.
Since kids have been listening to awful music forever I don't fight with him about it. Though we do talk about the misogyny in the music and being a conscientious consumer of problematic media.
posted by sotonohito at 9:44 AM on November 8, 2019
> In my opinion "OK Boomer" == "Don't trust anyone over 40."
though i am going to insist that any statement that involves putting the equality operator between stuff from the boomer era and stuff from today is a statement that's missing the point. the world is irrevocably slow-motion fucked today in a way that it wasn't in the mid-20th century and our language must reflect that.
folks who'll die of old age before they'll die of climate change must immediately cede cultural relevance to the people who will actually confront the terrors that the olds have made. that ancient don't-trust-anyone-over-30 stuff came from a place of aimless pseudo-revolt, a stymied product of the stymied 1968 revolutions. and the white boy music of the 90s was a frustrated echo of that pseudo-revolt.
ok boomer, on the other hand, is a justified and necessary response to an existential threat.
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 9:56 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]
though i am going to insist that any statement that involves putting the equality operator between stuff from the boomer era and stuff from today is a statement that's missing the point. the world is irrevocably slow-motion fucked today in a way that it wasn't in the mid-20th century and our language must reflect that.
folks who'll die of old age before they'll die of climate change must immediately cede cultural relevance to the people who will actually confront the terrors that the olds have made. that ancient don't-trust-anyone-over-30 stuff came from a place of aimless pseudo-revolt, a stymied product of the stymied 1968 revolutions. and the white boy music of the 90s was a frustrated echo of that pseudo-revolt.
ok boomer, on the other hand, is a justified and necessary response to an existential threat.
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 9:56 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]
Yeah, this is off topic, but "OK boomer" is the dismissive response to boomers voting for Trump and climate devastation who lecture young people about avocado toast or chide them for giving half a fuck about the idea that the planet might be unlivable if we don't make drastic changes.
posted by sotonohito at 10:01 AM on November 8, 2019 [11 favorites]
posted by sotonohito at 10:01 AM on November 8, 2019 [11 favorites]
Ceding cultural relevance isn't enough when it comes to climate change. Do the work, too. Citizens' Climate Lobby, or whatever else is meaningful to you. Spending even 4 seconds boo-hooing that young people don't like you is still a waste of your time.
posted by argybarg at 10:03 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by argybarg at 10:03 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
He's mostly right, but if you want to find music that will offend the older generation (and anyone with taste), look no further than "Gucci Gang."
posted by Edgewise at 10:05 AM on November 8, 2019
posted by Edgewise at 10:05 AM on November 8, 2019
Jon Wurster's reply is the best thing I've read all day.
posted by grumpybear69 at 10:09 AM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by grumpybear69 at 10:09 AM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
Also, is Lizzo not angry enough for this guy? She's everywhere and she certainly isn't putting up with anyone's shit.
But she's a lady! Not like all the true rebellious musicians, as seen in the writer's golden age.
And from the article:
“This is the sound of pissed-off youth in 2018?” I asked rhetorically. “Really? Where is the screaming? The wanton cursing? The down-tuned guitars, mile-a-minute blast beats, and provocative lyrics that denounce the systemic corruption of the adult world?”
I humbly submit to the writer that the screaming and wanton cursing that signifies his pissed-off youth has nothing on (among other modern examples) a confident Black woman, defiantly challenging fatphobic standards of beauty and sexuality in a bridal... leotard(?) and not much else, whipping out a frenzied flute solo mid-twerk, punctuated with a laser focused "BITCH!"
posted by orbit-3 at 10:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [13 favorites]
But she's a lady! Not like all the true rebellious musicians, as seen in the writer's golden age.
And from the article:
“This is the sound of pissed-off youth in 2018?” I asked rhetorically. “Really? Where is the screaming? The wanton cursing? The down-tuned guitars, mile-a-minute blast beats, and provocative lyrics that denounce the systemic corruption of the adult world?”
I humbly submit to the writer that the screaming and wanton cursing that signifies his pissed-off youth has nothing on (among other modern examples) a confident Black woman, defiantly challenging fatphobic standards of beauty and sexuality in a bridal... leotard(?) and not much else, whipping out a frenzied flute solo mid-twerk, punctuated with a laser focused "BITCH!"
posted by orbit-3 at 10:13 AM on November 8, 2019 [13 favorites]
The world had to crawl back from the cliff edge that was the 2007 release of Ernie and Bert Go BRUTAL.
posted by user92371 at 10:16 AM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by user92371 at 10:16 AM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
Is "don't OK Boomer me yet" the new "I'm not a racist, but..."?
Only if getting older is a serious character flaw, which apparently it is.
posted by Crane Shot at 10:18 AM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
Only if getting older is a serious character flaw, which apparently it is.
posted by Crane Shot at 10:18 AM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
I struggle to pinpoint what radicalised me. Was it queer tumblr spaces? Was it the 2016 election and YCTAB and the Whelk's radposting? Watching Ferguson and Charlottesville play out in horrific detail online in front of me? Was it the incredibly clear memory of first listening to David Rovic's 2015 album "The Other Side"? I don't know what to give credit. But I know I've not managed to get past that radical ouvre since then, and now I've a few years of anarchist folk songs echoing around my head.
The idea that older folks are necessarily opposed to the young has always been nonsense to me, because I learned what I was a part of from songs like "The Last Lincoln Veteran". Everything else, organising talks, academic readings etc pales in comparison to how much I feel I've learnt from that tradition of oral memory and bardic tradition.
After all, "Some say people get conservative / The older that they age / They say that being radical / Is just a youthful stage / But the finest communist I've known / Lived to 95 / And he spent his whole life fighting / For humanity to thrive / To forget these fallen heroes / Is something I cannot abide / Now that the last Lincoln Veteran died."
Musical tradition has been invaluable to me and mine. It connects us to other movements overseas and to our own history. I'm too young to have known the actual Builder's Labourer's Front. But I can think of Maralinga, and the BLF, know of 1917 and the red flag flying high, above the streets of Glasgow and beneath a blood-red sky.
Sort of off-topic I guess, because it's not pop music by any means, and I'd be absolutely lying if I said it was liked outside of my immediate bubbles by my peers, but in the context of the "ok Boomer" discussion, where I've been arguing in favour of the meme, I'd like to point out that music has done far more to undermine the idea that older people are necessarily my enemies than anything else.
posted by Acid Communist at 10:20 AM on November 8, 2019 [7 favorites]
The idea that older folks are necessarily opposed to the young has always been nonsense to me, because I learned what I was a part of from songs like "The Last Lincoln Veteran". Everything else, organising talks, academic readings etc pales in comparison to how much I feel I've learnt from that tradition of oral memory and bardic tradition.
After all, "Some say people get conservative / The older that they age / They say that being radical / Is just a youthful stage / But the finest communist I've known / Lived to 95 / And he spent his whole life fighting / For humanity to thrive / To forget these fallen heroes / Is something I cannot abide / Now that the last Lincoln Veteran died."
Musical tradition has been invaluable to me and mine. It connects us to other movements overseas and to our own history. I'm too young to have known the actual Builder's Labourer's Front. But I can think of Maralinga, and the BLF, know of 1917 and the red flag flying high, above the streets of Glasgow and beneath a blood-red sky.
Sort of off-topic I guess, because it's not pop music by any means, and I'd be absolutely lying if I said it was liked outside of my immediate bubbles by my peers, but in the context of the "ok Boomer" discussion, where I've been arguing in favour of the meme, I'd like to point out that music has done far more to undermine the idea that older people are necessarily my enemies than anything else.
posted by Acid Communist at 10:20 AM on November 8, 2019 [7 favorites]
Xanax is a depressant, an anti-anxiety medication. In an era that has been increasingly defined by rising anxiety, it's not surprising that pop music has turned towards a more mellow, chill style to help anxious music consumers feel less anxious.
I really wouldn't like to guess at how many of my peers are on anti-depressants, but yes, you're right, it's a lot. Nonetheless, when it comes to popular music, what's being played at nightclubs and on the dancefloor, I would absolutely have to say that amphetamines are the drug of choice where I am. I don't know if sizzurp and friends are popular outside of the US, they're certainly not here. I know one person who uses GHB recreationally, they're an outlier.
Ketamine is definitely big though because coke is expensive and terrible here, I associate coke use with the right. But dexamphetamines and eccies, MD variants and so on, they're absolutely rife. Pop music better work with ritalin, or it's not audience-targeted.
posted by Acid Communist at 10:31 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
I really wouldn't like to guess at how many of my peers are on anti-depressants, but yes, you're right, it's a lot. Nonetheless, when it comes to popular music, what's being played at nightclubs and on the dancefloor, I would absolutely have to say that amphetamines are the drug of choice where I am. I don't know if sizzurp and friends are popular outside of the US, they're certainly not here. I know one person who uses GHB recreationally, they're an outlier.
Ketamine is definitely big though because coke is expensive and terrible here, I associate coke use with the right. But dexamphetamines and eccies, MD variants and so on, they're absolutely rife. Pop music better work with ritalin, or it's not audience-targeted.
posted by Acid Communist at 10:31 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
> Around the time that Odd Future was inspiring reams of thinkpieces, Skrillex was at the head of an EDM revolution in pop that was every bit as brash musically as Tyler The Creator was lyrically. Here was music that seemed designed for rock-weaned oldsters to hate. And then something interesting happened: EDM didn’t take over the culture. The culture absorbed EDM.
As a genXer who was listening to tons of electronic music in the eighties and nineties this piece is ostensibly about: what. It feels like pretty much all modern pop music is influenced by EDM to me, it just replaces the repeated voice samples from Sixties Entheogen Boosters with someone singing actual verses and choruses. It’s meticulously produced by people who will happily program a few beats and loops instead of hiring musicians to play actual instruments, I couldn’t tell you the last time I heard a guitar in the middle of anything called “pop”.
Also I dunno how the hell you can go on and on about NIN while ignoring the immense debt Reznor owes to the general industrial scene, which was surgically separated from its conjoined EDM twin sometime in the early nineties. He moved to more of a live act over time but still.
posted by egypturnash at 10:32 AM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
As a genXer who was listening to tons of electronic music in the eighties and nineties this piece is ostensibly about: what. It feels like pretty much all modern pop music is influenced by EDM to me, it just replaces the repeated voice samples from Sixties Entheogen Boosters with someone singing actual verses and choruses. It’s meticulously produced by people who will happily program a few beats and loops instead of hiring musicians to play actual instruments, I couldn’t tell you the last time I heard a guitar in the middle of anything called “pop”.
Also I dunno how the hell you can go on and on about NIN while ignoring the immense debt Reznor owes to the general industrial scene, which was surgically separated from its conjoined EDM twin sometime in the early nineties. He moved to more of a live act over time but still.
posted by egypturnash at 10:32 AM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
His basic thesis is, "where is the music that annoys the Olds?"
First, he lists his bonafides - but also proves he's an Old.
And then expresses, at length, how annoyed he is at the non-abrasiveness of Kids These Days.
So he's an Old. Annoyed.
Huh. I can't seem to figure out the connection...
posted by notsnot at 10:44 AM on November 8, 2019 [16 favorites]
First, he lists his bonafides - but also proves he's an Old.
And then expresses, at length, how annoyed he is at the non-abrasiveness of Kids These Days.
So he's an Old. Annoyed.
Huh. I can't seem to figure out the connection...
posted by notsnot at 10:44 AM on November 8, 2019 [16 favorites]
Does the author think he is as familiar with the rap of today? I see no mention of Tekashi69, for instance (whom I offer up as an example of offensive content, not musical merit).
Yeah I mean there's a whole swath of dudes who basically re-invented "rap metal" but from the rap side. I guess they aren't topping the charts necessarily...
There are a couple parts here that remind me of the recent reddit thread I saw where a guy asked why distorted electric guitar is the heaviest possible sound, as if it were a given that people were going to agree with him on this point.
posted by atoxyl at 10:44 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
Yeah I mean there's a whole swath of dudes who basically re-invented "rap metal" but from the rap side. I guess they aren't topping the charts necessarily...
There are a couple parts here that remind me of the recent reddit thread I saw where a guy asked why distorted electric guitar is the heaviest possible sound, as if it were a given that people were going to agree with him on this point.
posted by atoxyl at 10:44 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
If he thinks today's pop doesn't annoy old people he should hang out more on electric guitar and bass forums where there's no shortage of old men wheezing that the stuff the kids are listening to these days isn't even music, not like the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin and so on from their own youths whose worthiness as music must be incontrovertible now that their own Sinatra-loving parents have died.
posted by ardgedee at 10:50 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]
posted by ardgedee at 10:50 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]
I'm surprised there was no mention of Kanye in any of this? Which sort of proves the point that many in this thread are making: these days, offensive music most likely means you're an asshole -- or worse. That said, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is really good, even if its moral vision is depraved.
posted by Cash4Lead at 10:52 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by Cash4Lead at 10:52 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
Only if getting older is a serious character flaw, which apparently it is.
"OK Boomer" is not (nor has it ever been) an indictment of age. It's an indictment of losing touch with youth culture and values, a willingness to sell out the future for comfort and profit today.
No one's going to ever "OK Boomer" Jane Goodall, for example.
posted by explosion at 10:52 AM on November 8, 2019 [22 favorites]
"OK Boomer" is not (nor has it ever been) an indictment of age. It's an indictment of losing touch with youth culture and values, a willingness to sell out the future for comfort and profit today.
No one's going to ever "OK Boomer" Jane Goodall, for example.
posted by explosion at 10:52 AM on November 8, 2019 [22 favorites]
I guess they aren't topping the charts necessarily...
A few of them are absolutely hitting the charts though, I should clarify that.
And yes I feel like part of his problem is not recognizing all the taking pills/wallowing in despair stuff as the current expression of the negative stuff. Hell, the Suicideboys album made number 9 on the Billboard 200, apparently? That's just... not actually that many album sales these days.
posted by atoxyl at 10:54 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
A few of them are absolutely hitting the charts though, I should clarify that.
And yes I feel like part of his problem is not recognizing all the taking pills/wallowing in despair stuff as the current expression of the negative stuff. Hell, the Suicideboys album made number 9 on the Billboard 200, apparently? That's just... not actually that many album sales these days.
posted by atoxyl at 10:54 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
An off-the-top list of edgy and edgy-ish stuff from the past decade: Cardi B, Run the Jewels, Kendrick Lamar, This is America, Titus Andronicus, A Giant Dog, Cherry Glazerr, Tekashi 6ix9ine, Lil Yachty, Death Grips, Bob Vylan, Nicki Minaj, Chief Keef, Shilpa Ray
As much as I like some (but not all) of the stuff above, I have come to value edginess for the sake of edginess less and less, and to appreciate wholesomeness more and more. I used to write wholesomeness off as conservative or polyannaish. It took me far too long to realize that it can be transformational and radical and straight-up good.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 11:07 AM on November 8, 2019 [13 favorites]
As much as I like some (but not all) of the stuff above, I have come to value edginess for the sake of edginess less and less, and to appreciate wholesomeness more and more. I used to write wholesomeness off as conservative or polyannaish. It took me far too long to realize that it can be transformational and radical and straight-up good.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 11:07 AM on November 8, 2019 [13 favorites]
Acid Communist: Dance music is always going to be an uppers thing, I think. There's a distinction between dance club music and pop music in my mind. They do overlap, but not everything you hear on Top 40 or Pop Radio is the sort of thing that will be played in a contemporary dance club, because it's not the sort of stuff that gets butts shaking.
posted by SansPoint at 11:07 AM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by SansPoint at 11:07 AM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
After all, "Some say people get conservative / The older that they age / They say that being radical / Is just a youthful stage / But the finest communist I've known / Lived to 95 / And he spent his whole life fighting / For humanity to thrive / To forget these fallen heroes / Is something I cannot abide / Now that the last Lincoln Veteran died."
It's funny, I immediately knew that was a David Rovics* song because of the the last line. I'm not sure why.
~~
Honestly, a lot of the cathexis around this is because we as a culture don't deal with aging really well. You can't tell me that half the emotional energy people pour into these articles isn't driven by simply not wanting to be old. We all try to be as young as possible or to insist that we're still young or whatever, when of course we're not. This is not entirely the fault of the average non-young person, because all we've grown up with is "being old is bad, old people are boring and stupid, there's nothing good about being old unless you get rich or have lots of power and can use those things to force younger people to get in line". It's not like everyone is flocking to be nice to older people, and that's not because they're all monsters - perfectly lovely older activists and queer elders and so on get frozen out all the time for no reason**. One does occasionally hear stuff along the lines of "oh, I'm not bothering talking to older people because older people are all politically terrible" in social circles where this is not remotely true and that's really about people being stupid and bad.
In many ways, I like being older. I'm far less afraid to say what I think, I'm far less afraid to be different from my peers, I have better judgement about people, I have more patience - and merely by being alive I've built up some in-depth knowledge about books that of course I could have built up by diligent study when I was younger but is still nice to have. I actually appreciate music a lot more because I'm not caught up in the anxieties of my youth and can pay better attention to it. There were fun parts of being younger, too, but getting older isn't actually just about losses and misery unless you buy into all the rhetoric about it.
Worrying about ageist hiring practices and whether I'll get horribly sick and bankrupt my family and then die in a gutter, those are down sides, and being nearer the grave is a drag, but the first two are social issues and the last comes to us all in time.
Anyway, embrace being old and you won't get so mad at the young, IMO.
*A long, long time ago David Rovics played a very tiny show at my house. I was not there at the time because the house was mostly green anarchists right then and no one ever cleaned so I was out a lot, but by all accounts he was very nice. Also, speaking of David Rovics, I will never tire of "I'm A Better Anarchist Than You", which is a bit dated now that life is more awful, but:
I don't eat meat
I just live on moldy chives
Or the donuts that I found
In last week's dumpster dives
Look at you people in that restaurant
I think you are so sad
When you coulda been eating bagels
Like the ones that I just had
I think it is a shame
All the bourgeois things you do
I'm a better anarchist than you
**I am in a queer reading group where everyone is older than me, some by as much twenty five or thirty years, and it's really great because I've gotten past a lot of my own bullshit about older people qua older people.
posted by Frowner at 11:12 AM on November 8, 2019 [22 favorites]
It's funny, I immediately knew that was a David Rovics* song because of the the last line. I'm not sure why.
~~
Honestly, a lot of the cathexis around this is because we as a culture don't deal with aging really well. You can't tell me that half the emotional energy people pour into these articles isn't driven by simply not wanting to be old. We all try to be as young as possible or to insist that we're still young or whatever, when of course we're not. This is not entirely the fault of the average non-young person, because all we've grown up with is "being old is bad, old people are boring and stupid, there's nothing good about being old unless you get rich or have lots of power and can use those things to force younger people to get in line". It's not like everyone is flocking to be nice to older people, and that's not because they're all monsters - perfectly lovely older activists and queer elders and so on get frozen out all the time for no reason**. One does occasionally hear stuff along the lines of "oh, I'm not bothering talking to older people because older people are all politically terrible" in social circles where this is not remotely true and that's really about people being stupid and bad.
In many ways, I like being older. I'm far less afraid to say what I think, I'm far less afraid to be different from my peers, I have better judgement about people, I have more patience - and merely by being alive I've built up some in-depth knowledge about books that of course I could have built up by diligent study when I was younger but is still nice to have. I actually appreciate music a lot more because I'm not caught up in the anxieties of my youth and can pay better attention to it. There were fun parts of being younger, too, but getting older isn't actually just about losses and misery unless you buy into all the rhetoric about it.
Worrying about ageist hiring practices and whether I'll get horribly sick and bankrupt my family and then die in a gutter, those are down sides, and being nearer the grave is a drag, but the first two are social issues and the last comes to us all in time.
Anyway, embrace being old and you won't get so mad at the young, IMO.
*A long, long time ago David Rovics played a very tiny show at my house. I was not there at the time because the house was mostly green anarchists right then and no one ever cleaned so I was out a lot, but by all accounts he was very nice. Also, speaking of David Rovics, I will never tire of "I'm A Better Anarchist Than You", which is a bit dated now that life is more awful, but:
I don't eat meat
I just live on moldy chives
Or the donuts that I found
In last week's dumpster dives
Look at you people in that restaurant
I think you are so sad
When you coulda been eating bagels
Like the ones that I just had
I think it is a shame
All the bourgeois things you do
I'm a better anarchist than you
**I am in a queer reading group where everyone is older than me, some by as much twenty five or thirty years, and it's really great because I've gotten past a lot of my own bullshit about older people qua older people.
posted by Frowner at 11:12 AM on November 8, 2019 [22 favorites]
His basic thesis is, "where is the music that annoys the Olds?"
Right? And then he listens to what "kids these days" are listening to and promptly gets annoyed, so, Mission Accomplished, I guess.
posted by soundguy99 at 11:15 AM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
Right? And then he listens to what "kids these days" are listening to and promptly gets annoyed, so, Mission Accomplished, I guess.
posted by soundguy99 at 11:15 AM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
To be fair, if his point is that music today is anodyne and apolitical, where it should have room for screams of rage, then ok. Maybe.
But I don't exactly think Linkin Park is a good counterexample. Honestly, I don't remember much but empty signifying in Rage Against the Machine, either. Genuinely challenging stuff, especially with actual political substance to it, has always been outside the mainstream. Quick exercise: Go find political lyrics from a popular artist of the '60s and '70s that genuinely cuts. 95% of it was fashion — stances you could try on like a Halloween mask for your own thrills.
posted by argybarg at 11:24 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
But I don't exactly think Linkin Park is a good counterexample. Honestly, I don't remember much but empty signifying in Rage Against the Machine, either. Genuinely challenging stuff, especially with actual political substance to it, has always been outside the mainstream. Quick exercise: Go find political lyrics from a popular artist of the '60s and '70s that genuinely cuts. 95% of it was fashion — stances you could try on like a Halloween mask for your own thrills.
posted by argybarg at 11:24 AM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
I was just about to write a comment about Linkin Park. It's interesting that in the execrable nu-metal trend of the '00s, which we are told was ended by the indie rock/garage rock/new wave revival, LP was one of the few rap-rock survivors. And they were probably one of the more clean-cut and less shocking examples of that trend.
posted by Apocryphon at 11:27 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by Apocryphon at 11:27 AM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
Quick exercise: Go find political lyrics from a popular artist of the '60s and '70s that genuinely cuts.
Ahahaha, okay, I just mentioned Phil Ochs, so let me try a few on for size:
"Love Me, I'm a Liberal"
I cried when they shot Medgar Evers
Tears ran down my spine
And I cried when they shot Mr. Kennedy
As though I'd lost a father of mine
But Malcolm X got what was coming
He got what he asked for this time
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
"Here's To the State of Mississippi"
And here's to the cops of Mississippi
They're chewing their tobacco as they lock the prison door
Their bellies bounce inside them when they knock you to the floor
No they don't like taking prisoners in their private little war
Behind their broken badges they are murderers and more
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi, find yourself another country to be part of
"I'm Going to Say It Now"
Ooh, you'd like to be my father you'd like to be my Dad
And give me kisses when I'm good and spank me when I'm bad
But since I've left my parents I've forgotten how to bow
So when I've got something to say, sir, I'm gonna say it now
And things they might be different if I was here alone
But I've got a friend or two who no longer live at home
And we'll respect our elders just as long as they allow
That when I've got something to say, sir, I'm gonna say it now
I've read of other countries where the students take a stand
Maybe even help to overthrow the leaders of the land
Now I wouldn't go so far to say we're also learnin' how
But when I've got something to say, sir, I'm gonna say it now
Do they cut hard enough for you? I still often go back and listen to Ochs, and there's an awful lot in that music that is painfully, painfully relevant to the issues that we're staring down today. As with Acid Communist, I find that the tradition of protest music is one of the things that ties me to older generations and reminds me: there have always, always been people who fought for what is right. Imperfectly, but still there. That gives me hope.
posted by sciatrix at 11:53 AM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
Ahahaha, okay, I just mentioned Phil Ochs, so let me try a few on for size:
"Love Me, I'm a Liberal"
I cried when they shot Medgar Evers
Tears ran down my spine
And I cried when they shot Mr. Kennedy
As though I'd lost a father of mine
But Malcolm X got what was coming
He got what he asked for this time
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
"Here's To the State of Mississippi"
And here's to the cops of Mississippi
They're chewing their tobacco as they lock the prison door
Their bellies bounce inside them when they knock you to the floor
No they don't like taking prisoners in their private little war
Behind their broken badges they are murderers and more
Oh, here's to the land you've torn out the heart of
Mississippi, find yourself another country to be part of
"I'm Going to Say It Now"
Ooh, you'd like to be my father you'd like to be my Dad
And give me kisses when I'm good and spank me when I'm bad
But since I've left my parents I've forgotten how to bow
So when I've got something to say, sir, I'm gonna say it now
And things they might be different if I was here alone
But I've got a friend or two who no longer live at home
And we'll respect our elders just as long as they allow
That when I've got something to say, sir, I'm gonna say it now
I've read of other countries where the students take a stand
Maybe even help to overthrow the leaders of the land
Now I wouldn't go so far to say we're also learnin' how
But when I've got something to say, sir, I'm gonna say it now
Do they cut hard enough for you? I still often go back and listen to Ochs, and there's an awful lot in that music that is painfully, painfully relevant to the issues that we're staring down today. As with Acid Communist, I find that the tradition of protest music is one of the things that ties me to older generations and reminds me: there have always, always been people who fought for what is right. Imperfectly, but still there. That gives me hope.
posted by sciatrix at 11:53 AM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
Or why does he assume music has to be loud, brash, and sexually crude to annoy adults ?
I have met people who collect Jackie Gleason orchestral records, which for bland on bland is pretty out there as far as I am concerned, but they are across the generations, demographically speaking.
posted by y2karl at 11:54 AM on November 8, 2019
I have met people who collect Jackie Gleason orchestral records, which for bland on bland is pretty out there as far as I am concerned, but they are across the generations, demographically speaking.
posted by y2karl at 11:54 AM on November 8, 2019
FWIW, despite my best efforts in adolescence and early adulthood, I never found any music I could get into that annoyed my dad. I'm into stuff he doesn't like, but nothing has fazed him in the sense of "you damn kids and your music" stereotype sense. This is a guy who just turned 75 this year, too.
posted by SansPoint at 12:05 PM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by SansPoint at 12:05 PM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
I think there probably is an inter-generational shift going on, but I think the author is missing it by only looking, drunk-under-the-streetlight-style, in the area that's illuminated by his own past experience and ignoring other places and ways culture manifests itself.
AFAICT, the linkage between adolescent/teen culture and pop music is relatively new, because it was related to the development and popularization of the radio, and really took off with the Boomer generation in the postwar era. Music radio was a major source of cultural transmission at a time when the Boomers were becoming economically important enough to be targeted as a distinct audience, and things went from there. Teen music became pop music and vice versa.
Today there are a lot of different ways of transmitting culture from person to person and for identifying yourself as part of a group. Young people seem to have more diverse tastes in music, and to be more tolerant of differing tastes in others, than I recall being the case when I was younger (when one's choices in music were a fairly important signifier of what social group you belonged to, and being asked what kind of music you were into was an incredibly fraught, loaded, even dangerous question).
Simultaneously, there just aren't that many kids relative to the overall population. Millennials are admittedly the next-biggest demographic group after the Boomers, but they aren't the giant rat-through-the-python that the Boomers were in the 60s. So we wouldn't expect overall, popular culture to reflect teenagers' whims to the same extent. I also suspect that today's teenagers and young adults have less disposable income relative to their parents than a teenager in the 60s might have had relative to their parents, since an entry-level job pays a lot less today in terms of real income (or compared to the median income or their parents income), college is more expensive, etc.
I think there's probably interesting things to be written about both sides—the shifts in teenagers' attitudes towards each other and towards being more tolerant of each others' tastes; and the shift in society more broadly around the place that adolescents/teens/young adults hold, and how much economic power they wield—but I think they need to be approached without nostalgia to do them justice.
posted by Kadin2048 at 12:11 PM on November 8, 2019 [10 favorites]
AFAICT, the linkage between adolescent/teen culture and pop music is relatively new, because it was related to the development and popularization of the radio, and really took off with the Boomer generation in the postwar era. Music radio was a major source of cultural transmission at a time when the Boomers were becoming economically important enough to be targeted as a distinct audience, and things went from there. Teen music became pop music and vice versa.
Today there are a lot of different ways of transmitting culture from person to person and for identifying yourself as part of a group. Young people seem to have more diverse tastes in music, and to be more tolerant of differing tastes in others, than I recall being the case when I was younger (when one's choices in music were a fairly important signifier of what social group you belonged to, and being asked what kind of music you were into was an incredibly fraught, loaded, even dangerous question).
Simultaneously, there just aren't that many kids relative to the overall population. Millennials are admittedly the next-biggest demographic group after the Boomers, but they aren't the giant rat-through-the-python that the Boomers were in the 60s. So we wouldn't expect overall, popular culture to reflect teenagers' whims to the same extent. I also suspect that today's teenagers and young adults have less disposable income relative to their parents than a teenager in the 60s might have had relative to their parents, since an entry-level job pays a lot less today in terms of real income (or compared to the median income or their parents income), college is more expensive, etc.
I think there's probably interesting things to be written about both sides—the shifts in teenagers' attitudes towards each other and towards being more tolerant of each others' tastes; and the shift in society more broadly around the place that adolescents/teens/young adults hold, and how much economic power they wield—but I think they need to be approached without nostalgia to do them justice.
posted by Kadin2048 at 12:11 PM on November 8, 2019 [10 favorites]
Ochs was an incisive voice to be sure. You didn't really hear him on pop radio. My point is not that that somehow reduces his worth, just that the perception that the radio waves were full of protest and political agitation at any point falls apart when you look closely. Even music that had a sense of political engagement, like "For What It's Worth," doesn't turn out to have a point of view when you read it closely. It's a tradition that carries right on through "American Idiot," which might as well be an Urban Outfitters ad in content. It signifies jackshit outside the vague impression of saying something Angry and Rebellious.
And maybe that's all we want. Maybe the sensibility is more important than the sense. But it sure obviates any lectures about how pop music used to have something to say. What piffle.
posted by argybarg at 12:34 PM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
And maybe that's all we want. Maybe the sensibility is more important than the sense. But it sure obviates any lectures about how pop music used to have something to say. What piffle.
posted by argybarg at 12:34 PM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
Young people seem to have more diverse tastes in music(1), and to be more tolerant of differing tastes in others (2),
Everybody keeps saying (1) -more diverse taste, but if you look at the streaming titles, I just don't see it. Therefore, #2 (more tolerant) doesn't come into the picture. My guess would be that music as a signifier is less important, but I don't know what has replaced it.
I also suspect that today's teenagers and young adults have less disposable income relative to their parents than a teenager in the 60s might have had relative to their parents, since an entry-level job pays a lot less today in terms of real income (or compared to the median income or their parents income), college is more expensive, etc.
age 16-19 employment
I would say it very much depends on who you are talking about. Overall, teens have jobs less than Xers and earlier did, mostly due to school being more time-intensive. But one must at least surmise that they have enough income to concentrate on more schooling than in the past, which means they have equally as much if not more disposable income than teens did in the past. This number evens out in the 19-24 range. Or alternatively, there are not jobs for 16-19 year olds because they are taken by some other group or they simply aren't offered. I'm not sure I'd agree with that anecdotally, but it is an option. This number also wildly varies based on demographics which is why I think teens generally have more disposable income now (or more met needs). Whatever.
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:45 PM on November 8, 2019
Everybody keeps saying (1) -more diverse taste, but if you look at the streaming titles, I just don't see it. Therefore, #2 (more tolerant) doesn't come into the picture. My guess would be that music as a signifier is less important, but I don't know what has replaced it.
I also suspect that today's teenagers and young adults have less disposable income relative to their parents than a teenager in the 60s might have had relative to their parents, since an entry-level job pays a lot less today in terms of real income (or compared to the median income or their parents income), college is more expensive, etc.
age 16-19 employment
I would say it very much depends on who you are talking about. Overall, teens have jobs less than Xers and earlier did, mostly due to school being more time-intensive. But one must at least surmise that they have enough income to concentrate on more schooling than in the past, which means they have equally as much if not more disposable income than teens did in the past. This number evens out in the 19-24 range. Or alternatively, there are not jobs for 16-19 year olds because they are taken by some other group or they simply aren't offered. I'm not sure I'd agree with that anecdotally, but it is an option. This number also wildly varies based on demographics which is why I think teens generally have more disposable income now (or more met needs). Whatever.
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:45 PM on November 8, 2019
what are the awful kids listening to? what do the young trumpist nazis put in their ear holes? are they somehow listening to chillhop as well?
He's not a kid so much, but the local one whose musical tastes I know about is really into Rush.
posted by eviemath at 12:46 PM on November 8, 2019
He's not a kid so much, but the local one whose musical tastes I know about is really into Rush.
posted by eviemath at 12:46 PM on November 8, 2019
He spends a lot of time on Van Halen’s “Hot For Teacher” but it was “Jump” that made US Billboard's Hot 100 Year-End chart for that year. Twister Sister doesn’t appear, nor does W.A.S.P., despite having albums out that year. Guns N’ Roses made the chart in 1988, but for “Sweet Child O’ Mine”, not “One In A Million”. 2 Live Crew didn’t rate in 1989, nor the Geto Boys in 1990, nor did N.W.A. in 1991 despite selling well as an album. N.I.N. didn’t make it in 1994, when the most popular single was Ace Of Base’s “The Sign”.
But instead of “Why Was The Macarena So Popular”, it’s “Why Won’t These Kids Get On My Lawn”.
bigass shrug
posted by Coda at 12:50 PM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
But instead of “Why Was The Macarena So Popular”, it’s “Why Won’t These Kids Get On My Lawn”.
bigass shrug
posted by Coda at 12:50 PM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
Unless it was very very young, rat through a python wouldn't even show. Pig, on the other hand, would and makes for a more felicitous phrase.
posted by y2karl at 1:05 PM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by y2karl at 1:05 PM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
This does bounce against a more abstract thing I wonder about occasionally... Born at the tail-end of 1974, I grew up completely immersed in the idea that angry young people would always go through a rebellious phase where they listened to high-energy, rude, anti-authority music. And then one day I had this epiphany that this entire cultural assumption is completely based on my immediate context, and that there was nothing universal about it at all. And then that got me wondering about what the music/youth/phase associative assumptions were in other cultures and other times. Were teens in Jalisco in the early 20th century assumed to be really into aggressive forms of Mariachi music? What did rebellious Roman teens listen to? How universal *is* teen rebellion, anyway? What does it all mean, maaaan?
posted by COBRA! at 1:08 PM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by COBRA! at 1:08 PM on November 8, 2019 [2 favorites]
A: It isn’t universal at all.
posted by argybarg at 1:13 PM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
posted by argybarg at 1:13 PM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
look please don't take my vision of punk Roman teens away from me
posted by COBRA! at 1:23 PM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by COBRA! at 1:23 PM on November 8, 2019 [5 favorites]
the perception that the radio waves were full of protest and political agitation at any point falls apart when you look closely
Yeah. There's a lot less stick-it-to-the-man in this video than I would have thought.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 1:25 PM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
Yeah. There's a lot less stick-it-to-the-man in this video than I would have thought.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 1:25 PM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
I'm disappointed that this thread is all about the generation stuff and no one is arguing about his idiosyncratic use of the term pop.
posted by betweenthebars at 1:39 PM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by betweenthebars at 1:39 PM on November 8, 2019 [3 favorites]
Were teens in Jalisco in the early 20th century assumed to be really into aggressive forms of Mariachi music? What did rebellious Roman teens listen to? How universal *is* teen rebellion, anyway? What does it all mean, maaaan?
*warning: this is actually a serious answer to what I suspect was tongue-in-cheek*
"Teenagers" as a state of being is a fairly recent concept. You were either a child, or you were an adult - that was it. If you were before the age of puberty, you were a child; you became an "adult" when you left school and started working, presuming you'd hit puberty. In the Middle Ages, people would often marry as teenagers.
The idea of a teenager being a third sort of in-between category didn't come around until the early 20th Century, in fact - a combination of the industrial revolution and the invention of the automobile is what created the time and space for teenagers to have the time to do all that stereotypical teenage stuff.
So - it's indeed possible that teens in Jalisco got into punk mariachi music, but teenagers in ancient Rome were probably seen as young adults just starting to make their way in society and were either being worked hard and trying to make money or were being guided through Socratic thinking - or they were raising ruckuses alongside older Romans.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:43 PM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
*warning: this is actually a serious answer to what I suspect was tongue-in-cheek*
"Teenagers" as a state of being is a fairly recent concept. You were either a child, or you were an adult - that was it. If you were before the age of puberty, you were a child; you became an "adult" when you left school and started working, presuming you'd hit puberty. In the Middle Ages, people would often marry as teenagers.
The idea of a teenager being a third sort of in-between category didn't come around until the early 20th Century, in fact - a combination of the industrial revolution and the invention of the automobile is what created the time and space for teenagers to have the time to do all that stereotypical teenage stuff.
So - it's indeed possible that teens in Jalisco got into punk mariachi music, but teenagers in ancient Rome were probably seen as young adults just starting to make their way in society and were either being worked hard and trying to make money or were being guided through Socratic thinking - or they were raising ruckuses alongside older Romans.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:43 PM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
I notice that the artists he lists as being somehow rebellious and subversive are, surprise surprise, male. I’m definitely more sensitive to the effects of humor and societal discourse than I was back in the mid-2000s when “The Aristocrats” seemed like the height of comedy, but I tend to think of myself as someone who takes things in stride.
Then I heard that my 15-year-old niece was into Melanie Martinez, and I decided to take a listen, because I’m still vainly clinging to Cool Aunt status.
Jesus, that lady is dark. She lashes out against dynamics that this dude probably couldn’t begin to relate to. She weaves seriously disturbing stories about child and adolescent abuse, and I don’t know that they’re from her personal experience, but they’re experiences that belong to someone. Too many someones, in fact. And she does it all in a little girl voice with her marketing wrapped in candy-pink fluff.
To me, bellowing and screaming your rebellion is easy enough. Being LOUD and GROWLY is immediately identifiable as being an in-your-face confrontation. (Hell, if you want that from a current female vocalist, you can find it by listening to Halestorm.) But to hear a deeply personal expression of wounded anger in a creepy distortion of innocence is way more unsettling and provocative to me. I can’t listen to Martinez any more than my parents (or even my older sister) could listen to Nine Inch Nails or Tori Amos and feel what my niece feels. Her life experience isn’t in those songs, any more than my life experience was in the heroin-fueled or weary interpersonal angst laced through the music I listened to, but the alienation resonated to me then and it resonates to her now. There’s nothing nice or safe about it.
If this guy can’t be bothered to listen to lyrics or hear songs that aren’t on the radio - and how many teenagers listen to radio these days? - then I hardly see why that reflects current music. Both Melanie Martinez and Halestorm have charted in the Top 10 with their albums, so we’re not exactly talking about obscure SoundCloud artists.
posted by Meghamora at 1:49 PM on November 8, 2019 [12 favorites]
Then I heard that my 15-year-old niece was into Melanie Martinez, and I decided to take a listen, because I’m still vainly clinging to Cool Aunt status.
Jesus, that lady is dark. She lashes out against dynamics that this dude probably couldn’t begin to relate to. She weaves seriously disturbing stories about child and adolescent abuse, and I don’t know that they’re from her personal experience, but they’re experiences that belong to someone. Too many someones, in fact. And she does it all in a little girl voice with her marketing wrapped in candy-pink fluff.
To me, bellowing and screaming your rebellion is easy enough. Being LOUD and GROWLY is immediately identifiable as being an in-your-face confrontation. (Hell, if you want that from a current female vocalist, you can find it by listening to Halestorm.) But to hear a deeply personal expression of wounded anger in a creepy distortion of innocence is way more unsettling and provocative to me. I can’t listen to Martinez any more than my parents (or even my older sister) could listen to Nine Inch Nails or Tori Amos and feel what my niece feels. Her life experience isn’t in those songs, any more than my life experience was in the heroin-fueled or weary interpersonal angst laced through the music I listened to, but the alienation resonated to me then and it resonates to her now. There’s nothing nice or safe about it.
If this guy can’t be bothered to listen to lyrics or hear songs that aren’t on the radio - and how many teenagers listen to radio these days? - then I hardly see why that reflects current music. Both Melanie Martinez and Halestorm have charted in the Top 10 with their albums, so we’re not exactly talking about obscure SoundCloud artists.
posted by Meghamora at 1:49 PM on November 8, 2019 [12 favorites]
music may not be the kind of galvanizing cultural medium it was for many in the near past — that other media have absorbed the attention of teenagers
My two no-longer-teenagers are both oblivious to Top 40 and probably have no idea how to find radio channels at all, but can rattle off video-game-based and weird indie songs by the hour.
I notice his article doesn't mention Bendy and the Ink Machine.
posted by ErisLordFreedom at 2:18 PM on November 8, 2019
My two no-longer-teenagers are both oblivious to Top 40 and probably have no idea how to find radio channels at all, but can rattle off video-game-based and weird indie songs by the hour.
I notice his article doesn't mention Bendy and the Ink Machine.
posted by ErisLordFreedom at 2:18 PM on November 8, 2019
This seems like the music-critic hot take version of "LOL, our straight laced kids aren't experimenting with sex or drugs" after we grew up with DARE and sex-ed programs that emphasized how dangerous and scary sex was, mixed with a frequent gag rule about discussing birth control or abortion.
posted by nakedmolerats at 3:50 PM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by nakedmolerats at 3:50 PM on November 8, 2019 [1 favorite]
This seems like the music-critic hot take version of "LOL, our straight laced kids aren't experimenting with sex or drugs" after we grew up with DARE and sex-ed programs that emphasized how dangerous and scary sex was, mixed with a frequent gag rule about discussing birth control or abortion.
Doesn't most of this go back to the Reagan administration in more-or-less its current form? Not to mention the 50s/60s version. It is absolutely a tired old person thing to complain about but I feel like the subtext of one common version of that complaint is that kids today don't have the inner wherewithal to rebel against that programming. When in fact they mostly just have other stuff going on in their lives, or other ways to express things.
posted by atoxyl at 5:49 PM on November 8, 2019
Doesn't most of this go back to the Reagan administration in more-or-less its current form? Not to mention the 50s/60s version. It is absolutely a tired old person thing to complain about but I feel like the subtext of one common version of that complaint is that kids today don't have the inner wherewithal to rebel against that programming. When in fact they mostly just have other stuff going on in their lives, or other ways to express things.
posted by atoxyl at 5:49 PM on November 8, 2019
youtube and twitch made everyone a pop star
also a nazi, but you wanted edgy
posted by inpHilltr8r at 5:53 PM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
also a nazi, but you wanted edgy
posted by inpHilltr8r at 5:53 PM on November 8, 2019 [4 favorites]
I was speaking with a DJ from Brooklyn who is into House a while back. He told me that an African man asked him "What happened to your music?"
posted by DJZouke at 5:50 AM on November 9, 2019
posted by DJZouke at 5:50 AM on November 9, 2019
It's amazing how when I was a kid, I only listened to excellent, rebellious music that my parents thought was offensive rubbish (not like the excellent music of their youth), but now I'm a parent my children only listen to offensive rubbish instead of the excellent music of my youth.
["Am I so out of touch? No, it's the children who are wrong"]
posted by EndsOfInvention at 8:22 AM on November 9, 2019 [2 favorites]
["Am I so out of touch? No, it's the children who are wrong"]
posted by EndsOfInvention at 8:22 AM on November 9, 2019 [2 favorites]
He wants aggro, and topical (and implicitly, masculine) and popular, but somehow hasn't heard of Idles. As a think piece, the essay was long on the piece and short on the think.
posted by ardgedee at 9:29 AM on November 9, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by ardgedee at 9:29 AM on November 9, 2019 [2 favorites]
what do the young trumpist nazis put in their ear holes? are they somehow listening to chillhop as well?
Standard stuff for full alt-right is a fashy haircut and synthwave (much to the annoyance of a lot of synthwave artists). That's not mainstream Trumpist, though you did ask for Nazis.
posted by jaduncan at 10:42 AM on November 9, 2019 [1 favorite]
Standard stuff for full alt-right is a fashy haircut and synthwave (much to the annoyance of a lot of synthwave artists). That's not mainstream Trumpist, though you did ask for Nazis.
posted by jaduncan at 10:42 AM on November 9, 2019 [1 favorite]
Were teens in Jalisco in the early 20th century assumed to be really into aggressive forms of Mariachi music?
Funny you ask this, since the Mexican revolution took place between 1910 and 1921, and resulted in the end of real bad dictatorship.
So I would hazard the guess that early 20th century youths in Jalisco would annoy the pearl-clutching elites by listening to revolutionary sons such as El Barzón (land reform), Carabina Treinta Treinta (guess what, your dad's hunting rifle is also good for hunting federales), La Adelita, Las Soldaderas, and La Valentina (celebrating women in the revolutionary military, Valentina Ramirez was made first 1st lt.), Corrido de Pancho Villa, Valentin de la Sierra, General Emiliano Zapata, etc...
Mariachi being a type of mid 19th century wedding music your question sounds like asking if 1968 counterculture types in San Francisco were really into agressive forms of big swing bands.
posted by Dr. Curare at 9:46 PM on November 9, 2019 [6 favorites]
Funny you ask this, since the Mexican revolution took place between 1910 and 1921, and resulted in the end of real bad dictatorship.
So I would hazard the guess that early 20th century youths in Jalisco would annoy the pearl-clutching elites by listening to revolutionary sons such as El Barzón (land reform), Carabina Treinta Treinta (guess what, your dad's hunting rifle is also good for hunting federales), La Adelita, Las Soldaderas, and La Valentina (celebrating women in the revolutionary military, Valentina Ramirez was made first 1st lt.), Corrido de Pancho Villa, Valentin de la Sierra, General Emiliano Zapata, etc...
Mariachi being a type of mid 19th century wedding music your question sounds like asking if 1968 counterculture types in San Francisco were really into agressive forms of big swing bands.
posted by Dr. Curare at 9:46 PM on November 9, 2019 [6 favorites]
She lashes out against dynamics that this dude probably couldn’t begin to relate to. She weaves seriously disturbing stories about child and adolescent abuse,
That's a trick she learned from Belle and Sebastian, or whomever else did it first. Still I like that genre so I'm going to check it out.
posted by The_Vegetables at 9:50 AM on November 11, 2019
That's a trick she learned from Belle and Sebastian, or whomever else did it first. Still I like that genre so I'm going to check it out.
posted by The_Vegetables at 9:50 AM on November 11, 2019
This is going to make me sound like I want the kids off my lawn, but you'd be hard-pressed to find huge pop hits in the 20th century with totally unnecessary profanity, but even the most candy-coated contemporary confections throw around "f-bombs" with abandon. That's not a complaint! It just makes it hard for me to see how, like, this generation doesn't know how to be offensive anymore, maaaaan.
posted by zeusianfog at 12:00 PM on November 11, 2019
posted by zeusianfog at 12:00 PM on November 11, 2019
That's a trick she learned from Belle and Sebastian, or whomever else did it first
Long-time B&S fan here. They learned it from the Velvet Underground.
posted by sjswitzer at 3:49 PM on November 12, 2019
Long-time B&S fan here. They learned it from the Velvet Underground.
posted by sjswitzer at 3:49 PM on November 12, 2019
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posted by feckless at 8:04 AM on November 8, 2019 [6 favorites]