Why don't we trust younger people to listen to "better" music when they grow up?

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Didn't we all listen to crappy music when we were kids? I myself had a copy of "New Miserable Experience".

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:34 (twenty-one years ago)

he's beating the rockists at their own game!

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:35 (twenty-one years ago)

(you know i love you, aaron.)

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:36 (twenty-one years ago)

:-)

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:36 (twenty-one years ago)

i do think there's a kernel of a point here (although it gets into all sorts of tricky areas like what is "better" music?), in that there's a real tendency amongst ilx to whitewash their own past in favor of their oh-so-hip present. (when really 75% of them had better taste at 10 than 30.)

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:38 (twenty-one years ago)

it's rare to have a ronan who listens to much better music in his 20s then he did in his teens.

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:40 (twenty-one years ago)

excuse me, "better."

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:40 (twenty-one years ago)

but "music fans" (and therefore music critcs) have never quite known what to do with kids, have they? they seem to ping pong back and forth between the cult of the innocent child ("14 year old girls are the best rock crits") and the idiotic child ("kids have no ability at aesthetic discernment.")

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:42 (twenty-one years ago)

Because most people my age listen to shitty music!

― Jon Williams (ex machina), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:43 (twenty-one years ago)

I put "better" in quotes to avoid that trap. I just know that at one point when I was 14 I had the Offspring record on my "to-buy" list. I just think all of this can work both ways. I can list a number of records that I owned before starting High School that would make me seem quite fucking hip for that age (AT's SAW II, Violator, maybe Unkonown Pleasures), but I also had the first Enigma and Deep Forest records!

Maybe, besides this thread being used to discuss the larger issue, we can also list records for our younger posters here?

I feel bad that Caitlin is getting so much shit on the other threads, so let me say simply that when I was 14 and into Nirvana quite heavily, I also quite enjoyed these records:
1. "For Your Own Special Sweetheart" Jawbox
2. "13 Songs" Fugazi
3. "Copacetic" Velocity Girl
4. "Unknown Pleasures" Joy Division
4. "Diary" Sunny Day Real Estate
5. "Loveless" My Bloody Valentine
6. "Gish" Smashing Pumpkins

I think maybe the issue is that "kids" music gets so much attention instead of "art" but some may think that it would be better to have more superchunk videos on mtv, whereas I keep wondering why PBS shows so much Lawrence Welk instead of a live performance of "The Rite of Spring".

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:48 (twenty-one years ago)

and whether the Offspring, Deep Forest and Enigma are horrid is up for debate... from my own perspective, I simply have realized over the years that I like post-punk more in the first case, and that there is a lot more electronic dance music out there in the latter two cases.

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:52 (twenty-one years ago)

My first records besides Thriller were the 11 records for a penny deal with Columbia House mail order. The ones I can remember were:

1) Huey Lewis - Sports
2) Pat Benatar - Live From Earth
3) Billy Joel - Innocent Man
4) Lionel Ritchie - Can't Slow Down
5) Richard Pryor - Live on the Sunset Strip
6) The Police - Synchronicity

And five more!!! What were they?

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:55 (twenty-one years ago)

I totally forgot that I was a huge Billy Joel fan when I was young but that was a little earlier on. Also, I think my first concert was my parents taking me to see Peter, Paul and Mary for what it is worth.

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:56 (twenty-one years ago)

I might take "Self-Esteem" over anything on Nevermind.

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:57 (twenty-one years ago)

i think kids' responses to music have their own virtues and limitations. a virtue is unselfconsciousness, and an unfamiliarity with criticism such that their comments about music can reflect a more spontaneous connection to other things in their life. i think that's what some (adult) critics try to recapture in their writing, usually unsuccessfully. on the other hand, as paul said, "when i was a child, i spoke like a child, i thought like a child, i reasoned like a child, but when i became an adult, i put an end to childish things." there are virtues to growing up, and one of them is to enjoy music (and other things) in new ways that would have been incomprehensible to child-you, and to like new music therefore.

asolescence is commonly the transition between these two modes which is precisely why it both is remembered with a great intensity and can be the source of great embarrassment.

― amateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 28 August 2003 20:59 (twenty-one years ago)

Just like in school, what matters a lot as far as how you'll turn out later is not WHAT you know but, rather, developing an inquisitve mind and the ability to learn. Likewise with music: you may listen to crap when you're 14 (the author admits to Rush and Sting records in his collection at this age), but if you develop the desire/ability to seek out music through different avenues than whatever you're spoon-fed by radio/TV/major label hegemons, you'll probably end up improving your tastes by adulthood.

Judging "improvement", of course, is relative, but you know what I mean.

― Nom De Plume (Nom De Plume), Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:01 (twenty-one years ago)

like a thousand dogs

― Nate Patrin (Nate Patrin), Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:03 (twenty-one years ago)

I just don't trust the younger people, what with their baggy jeans, nose rings, and REO Speedwagon.

― Bruce Urquhart (Bruce Urquhart), Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:05 (twenty-one years ago)

I have a nine year old nephew who likes Linkin Park, and I have to restrain myself from kidnapping him, locking him inna closet Patty Hearst stylee and force-feeding him a steady audio diet my favorite music......but that would be wrong, wouldn't it.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:14 (twenty-one years ago)

My boy's just turned nine, and there's nothing that he likes that makes me cringe. If I liked some of it, I might cringe, though ;-)

― David A. (Davant), Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:19 (twenty-one years ago)

I've no kiddies and my father's kids are 13 years younger than me, so I'm not subjected to the R&B (what they were last into). As I was an only kid, I was mostly listening to Reggae (Mister Marley, Arrow, etc), plus:

PSB: Actually;
Depeche Mode Music for the Masses and Violator were two faves;
Duran Duran (everything)
and mucho other 80's bands....

So I guess I trained myself to listen to cool music. My parents despaired, though --- still do;>

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:31 (twenty-one years ago)

I never knew 'we' didn't trust ppl to listen to ''better'' music. I would suspect that their tastes would change (bcz their life changes).

anyway, I didn't buy any records and had little interest in music until abt 13-14 but before I liked lots that i listened to on the radio (prob 90% of the stuff). at 13-14 I got stuff from the record library like the smiths, joy division and then I eventually bought some britpop and so on.

I like my younger brother's directness when dealing with some of my stuff ('its shit...you're crazy...how can anyone like this stuff!!!), cuts through any bullshit.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:34 (twenty-one years ago)

I still like the music (well most) I liked when I was younger. I'm stubborn like that. You people are changelings or assholes, cant tell which.

― Michael B, Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:40 (twenty-one years ago)

"Didn't we all listen to crappy music when we were kids?"
Sorry, I've always listened to good music. I've never liked crap. And I'm not ashamed of any music I ever liked.

― Cacaman flores, Thursday, 28 August 2003 21:49 (twenty-one years ago)

Define "when we were kids", though - I listened to fantastic stuff, Michael Jackson and Take That and the Beatles, when I was about eight. It's what happened when I hit twelve/thirteen and started listening to nothing but bad mainstream indie and thinking it superior to everything else that I'm slightly embarrassed about.

I don't have any faith in the twelve-year-olds in Finch moshpits to start listening to something I like, but it's not certain that they'll keep caring that much about music as they get older. And what does it matter if they grow up and don't get into "better" music but stick with their teenage tastes? So long as they still care about the music they listen to, so long as it still means something to them, whether the music's credible or not is unimportant. I'd take nine-year-old Linkin Park fans over thirtysomethings who use music as an unobstrusive air-conditioned hum beneath coffee-table conversation any day.

― cis (cis), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:05 (twenty-one years ago)

I had better taste at 10 (favourite band: Madness) than at 14 (fb: Pink Floyd), that's for certain. But it's all steps on life's great journey ect ect.

― Tom (Groke), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:18 (twenty-one years ago)

what's wrong with New Miserable Experience?!

i still like everything i liked when i was 10. you can draw a pretty direct line from what i was listening to then to what i listen to now.

― electric sound of jim (electricsound), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:22 (twenty-one years ago)

I still like all the stuff I liked when I was 10 (except maybe Howard Jones) but I like a lot of the stuff I hated then too. I suppose that means I've got 'better' taste but maybe it just means I have 'less' taste. I was playing an 80s dance and soul compilation this evening and wondering if there was ANYTHING from the 80s I'd really genuinely dislike any more. The best I can come up with is "Incommunicado" by Marillion.

― Tom (Groke), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:26 (twenty-one years ago)

what about the pastels?

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:28 (twenty-one years ago)

but I like a lot of the stuff I hated then too

this is a good point

― electric sound of jim (electricsound), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:30 (twenty-one years ago)

hahahaha alex

― Caitlin O'Neil (kurdtkobain205), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:31 (twenty-one years ago)

I wish I could say for sure that I wouldn't like the Pastels strongo. I did have a Pastels record once and the first track was OK.

― Tom (Groke), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:32 (twenty-one years ago)

I think i derailed my own thread.

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:41 (twenty-one years ago)

I still like the music (well most) I liked when I was younger. I'm stubborn like that. You people are changelings or assholes, cant tell which.

Why does it have to be either/or?

― Al Andalous, Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:44 (twenty-one years ago)

Tom, it is a well known fact that you hate everything released on SST!

― Ricardo (RickyT), Thursday, 28 August 2003 22:53 (twenty-one years ago)

OK insert "that got into the charts" somewhere in my first post, guilty as charged.

― Tom (Groke), Thursday, 28 August 2003 23:10 (twenty-one years ago)

A lot of the stuff I listened to back then, I still like. I think particularly Thompson Twins and Howard Jones have got an undeserved bad reputation, because they did actually make some really great music.

That being said, the stuff I listen to nowadays is of course better than those were :-)

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Friday, 29 August 2003 00:08 (twenty-one years ago)

I can't really think of anything I used to like that I don't like anymore. Like less, yes.

― N. (nickdastoor), Sunday, 7 September 2003 23:55 (twenty-one years ago)

I think the only thing I loved as a kid that I can't stand now is Abbey Road, and really, that's only parts of it. (Well, LARGE parts of it.) I still love the Beatles above all other bands (I don't even think Geir feels the same way), but AB is the sound of the Beatles getting conceptually flabby.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Monday, 8 September 2003 00:05 (twenty-one years ago)

Abbey Road = classic.
"Come Together" < dud.

― Lewis J. Bateman (Lewis Bateman), Monday, 8 September 2003 03:13 (twenty-one years ago)

God, here's me thinking "oh you mean like how I liked Howard Jones" and then two people bring him up - argh. He did write some grand songs though, he just looked daft.

I can't speak for anyone else, obv - but in my experience it was merely what I was exposed to that determined a lot of my young tastes. As a kid all I got to know what whatever was on the radio or TV so by default it was chart stuff by and large, hence Howard Jones, Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet etc - all of whom I'll happily say I still like, even if some might think it crap.

I would have liked Japan, Bauhaus and the like at a muchyounger age than I did, had I actually had a chance living as I did in shitty Canberra. I know I liked the tiny amount of cool stuff I did get to hear by accident - Visage, Cocteaus, the Clash.

I like Tom's point about likingstuff now he DIDNT like then - thats more me. For example, I used to say I hated punk when I was 14. Why? I don't think I even knew any apart from "God Save the Queen". Very odd.

― Trayce (trayce), Monday, 8 September 2003 09:37 (twenty-one years ago)

I guess in the end if someone's gonna have shit taste, they'll just have shit taste, and that probably won't change much.

― Trayce (trayce), Monday, 8 September 2003 09:39 (twenty-one years ago)

i had better taste at 8 than at 17. but at 21 i think i've just about topped 8.

― mitch lastnamewithheld (mitchlnw), Monday, 8 September 2003 09:57 (twenty-one years ago)

I used to be heavily into The Video Kids' "Woodpeckers From Space" for some weird reason. Didn't last long though....

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Monday, 8 September 2003 23:33 (twenty-one years ago)

I dunno, I sort of enviously expect them to get better taste faster than I did thanks to access: Net etc. Maybe I'm not yet old enough to be a total crank. Then again, I did write that bitchy article about electroclash... I guess there's access, and then there's context.

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Monday, 8 September 2003 23:39 (twenty-one years ago)

Why does 14 seem to be the magic age where we critique our childhood tastes? I didn't start buying records until I was nearly 16. I've had shitty taste at every age since, except at 20, which I am currently. This will change soon no doubt.

Anyway, record buyers are younger these days anyway, at least in the singles arena. The Spice Girls changed that. Under 10s started buying singles on a regular basis.

― Nick H, Tuesday, 9 September 2003 14:49 (twenty-one years ago)

I used to live with this total garage-rock/rockabilly enthousiast who had tattoos of the sun records logo and johnny cash's signature. she had a 4-year-old kid who came into the room when we were watching mtv and announced that he like the linkin park video that was playing. she accused him of rebelling. i thought it was awesome.

i like everything now i ever liked, except primus (8th grade). and maybe bob marley. i'm more embarrassed about ignoring hip-hop from age 13 to age 16-ish. i was totally missing out.

― Tom Breihan (Tom Breihan), Tuesday, 9 September 2003 15:27 (twenty-one years ago)

ten months pass...

I had just turned 15. I wanted to buy a new CD.

I narrowed it down to...

Seal, Seal (1994)
Spin Doctors, Turn it Upside Down
Sonic Youth, Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star

The one I chose? Seal.

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 18:52 (twenty years ago)

(It was a few months later that I met a girl who let me borrow the Sonic Youth album and also PJ Harvey's 4-Track Demos and it was all downhill from there.)

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 18:52 (twenty years ago)

Actually, given those three albums to choose from, you definitely did the right thing.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:14 (twenty years ago)

Is that the Seal album with Damo Suzuki

― Holy Crap! Typhoon is Coming!!! :O (ex machina), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:15 (twenty years ago)

No, that's the one Peter Hammil and Christian Vander were on....

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:16 (twenty years ago)

Two self titled albums in a ROW?!

― Holy Crap! Typhoon is Coming!!! :O (ex machina), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:19 (twenty years ago)

Yeah, that damned Peter Gabriel.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:19 (twenty years ago)

Jon, you've let me down.

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:21 (twenty years ago)

What did I do?

― Holy Crap! Typhoon is Coming!!! :O (ex machina), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:22 (twenty years ago)

fuck i just googled and realized you were being serious about damo! wow i didn't know about that hott collabo....

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:24 (twenty years ago)

Damo has a very pretty voice!

― Holy Crap! Typhoon is Coming!!! :O (ex machina), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 19:26 (twenty years ago)

one year passes...

Did someone say Pink Floyd is bad taste? Thats crazy. 60's and 70's are infinately better than 80's.

― leroy, Saturday, 8 October 2005 09:46 (nineteen years ago)

The '60s and '70s were better than the '80s if you're talking about Pink Floyd's ouvre. Not so sure about the rest...

― js (honestengine), Saturday, 8 October 2005 20:37 (nineteen years ago)

I might take "Self-Esteem" over anything on Nevermind.

-- sundar subramanian (sundar_subramanian200...), August 28th, 2003.

I do still like that tune but I don't even know why I said this!

(Heh, jaymc, faced with a similar choice at 15, the Rose Chronicles' Shiver just beat out Jet Set. Then I heard Dirty a couple months later and we know the rest. I do wonder if I'd have been such a fan if Jet Set had been my first SY though.)

― Sundar (sundar), Saturday, 8 October 2005 21:34 (nineteen years ago)

I sometimes wonder if I should check out a Seal album.

― Sundar (sundar), Saturday, 8 October 2005 21:36 (nineteen years ago)

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