The Test Of Time

I think we've reached that point already - at least, I'm 36 & don't remember any of those as going concerns. Labels are constantly unearthing lost gems by unknown bands, the Velvet Underground weren't well known until after they had split etc. etc., so I think it's all about quality of the music the myths surrounding the artists which keeps them 'alive'.

As for the second point, I've thought about this time & time again; this 'music based around youth culture' or however rock & pop can be concisely labelled represents a tiny blip in music history...I mean, the teenager didn't exist until 45 years ago. I expect it will be remembered, partly because we now have far superior archiving methods. I just wonder how long music will continue to play a part in youth culture...

if records are superseded, then all *this* will pass (into limbo zone where music hall hits of 1850s exist)

hard-to-sum-up-quickly twist on this: incompatibility of recording formats-techniques

means what?

"if records are superseded. . ." But the content of records can easily be transferred to other media, so those records aren't necessarily going to pass into limbo--not for that reason anyway.

I don't think the 60sesque bands will be as reassesed until after the current generation of kids -- the ones raised as much if not more on hip-hop than rock, Internet more than Rolling Stone -- grows up and sets some sort of canon, or at least, 'creates' their own. From an Americentric POV, I don't see much evidence that the bands from the 60s and such are being 'rejected' by the generations immediately following the Baby Boomers (sorry to use this phrase, it seems lazy but it's early here!). Between endless list-making, that blasted Hall of Fame, and a (still) dominant position in the "legitimate" (not Internet, 'zines) media, the Baby Boomers have kept a pretty good stranglehold on how, say, the Doors are remembered. Even when kids are 'unearthing' things, it seems to be Nuggetsesque stuff, Odessey and Oracle, etc., -- very pre-punk-oriented music. The Baby Boomers have led the rest of 'us' around by the nose, to some degree.

I dunno, maybe I'm being too sour and not giving enough people proper credit, but there seems to still be a big inferiority complex among U.S. pop/rock fans, who still deify the 60s and 70s as some promised land of creativity but then refuse to acknowledge that same inspiration in contemporary non-guitarcentric music and just bitch about, say, the ...Trail of Dead or some E6 band as being fine and all but not as good as the old days. All the while, there's too much resistance to whisper 'Public Enemy' and 'Velvet Underground' in the same sentence. (I dunno, this prolly isn't very lucid. Coffee!)

But that doesn't mean that the reason I think 60's and 70's pop music was better than what has come since isn't that I was born in 1965, had a brother who was nine years older than me, and have been brainwashed, etc.

I'm not sure anyone's making the egalitarian argument. They're making the argument that it's too soon to know, which is fair enough I think. I also think that art can vital and important within its time and that its lasting is not neccessarily relevant (i.e. even if you accept that "all art that lasts is good", it doesnt follow that "all good art is built to last").

What makes it different is that the original wave of rockers were seen as unhip and corny only 10 years after their peak (Elvis had to make a "comeback" in 1968) where the same thing never really happened with the Beatles, Stones, Doors. They overthrew the '50s rockers, and have retained an aura of "cool" ever since, pretty much continuously. Whether that's a result of the Boomer media machine I can't say -- in some ways, perhaps, but I think most people want to have a certain era to hold up as "the ultimate," a standard by which to judge everything else, and '60s music fits the bill. The received wisdom re the superiority of '60s music is so strong I think most people take it for granted. Example -- 18, 19 year old kids have never heard half the stuff I listened to when I was their age (Replacements, etc.), but they all agree that the Beatles are the best band of all time. That's the baseline.

Tom, I guess this (from scott pl.) looked a little like that egalitarian argument to me, but maybe I am reading that argument into it.

I agree, btw, that it's too soon to tell, and will be for a while.

Agreed, but that's a different issue, or did I read the question wrong?

Also, for some reason there is a culture and an investement in choosing which pop/rock music will last. It's why so many insufferable people call their records a "collection" and why listmaking is so associated with it, I guess. I suppose it's a popular art form (which, I guess, literature is sadly not) in which we have personal ownership and create our home-based canon. The product of other major art forms is still mostly digested publically, in galleries or theaters or film houses. Records aren't. The popular belief is that you have to make the right "choices" -- ones you feel you can live with for most of your life, which too often rewards professionalism and careerism.

Sad to say, but I think it will probably be similar to the way we see films from the first half of the twentieth century, ie The Citizen Kane effect: a seemingly impregnable top 20 of "all time classics" with various historical nooks and crannies explored by buffs.

Scott - no it's tangential to the rest of the discussion but it was replying to DeRayMi's some-periods-are-better-than-others point.

(I'm a librarian: calling my records, CDs, etc. a "collection" comes naturally.)

i agree that analog recording (needle to groove) will always be relatively easy to access

(can’t finish thought -- I have a work meeting)

museums and libraries are both going through convulsions currently as to what shd be stored, and how (and also, what shd be available and how)

I don't think that's very sad to say. Unless people can remember a lot more in 100 years time, I have no problem with anything I now listen to making up less than 5% of the mind-share. Beatles, Elvis, Nirvana and that's it.

Not, of course, that we are likely to have any idea of what things in 100 years time will be like.