Today, music is living in the past

At the risk of being labeled old or past it (which in this case will be shown to be a wonderful thing), I continue to be disappointed with the state of musical affairs in 2012, which is rife with nostalgia and looking backwards, not forwards. Now, you can argue that it is because the people driving the entertainment world today all grew up in the 80's or 90's (or even 70's!) , i.e. they are all old, and perhaps in mid-life crises, that they want to look back longingly to their days of youth and wonder. With so many has-been bands concurrently reforming, it is the perfect mix: let's celebrate the 80's once again, people! My argument, considering that it is young people who ultimately drive the success of any such trip down nostalgia's creaky lanes, is that the real problem has got more to do with the serious lack of music of any real import that pervades that machine that today's kids are stuck in front of, the TV. 

I was working on my laptop last night, with DWTS on in the background, and three very different musical spots caught my attention. Let's get the worst out of the way first! I watched in horror at what appeared to be some kind of rip-off sing'n'dance pastiche of the glory days of rock, entitled Rock of Ages, but when I saw Mary J. and Julianne Hough up there, I realized that this was probably not meant to be a joke. At all. It was such a boringly horrific spoof of what had not been that great (in the case of certain songs) the first time around, and I could not believe that this was viable today. What self-respecting 16-24 year old who thinks of themselves as "cool" would ever be seen dead, walking into the cinema to see that drivel? Yes, some of those bands were musical monsters, never to be seen again in terms of sheer multifaceted talent, and hopefully never to be seen again via some shambolic reunion tour, or way worse, via an ensemble the like of which I saw last night. And do kids really want to be rocking out, enjoying the same music with perhaps  sexually explicit lyrics, and looking around in the concert and seeing Dad also singing along to "Squeeze my lemon, till the juice runs down my leg...."? 
Regarding the reformation of old bands with/without all original members, well, it's all about the money, isn't it? Nothing to do with the art they were previously known and loved for, especially as they often ruin the memory of it with lacklustre faded renditions today. You only had to see The Who on the Superbowl a year or two ago, with a white-haired (not even grey!) Pete Townsend and Roger Daltrey physically unable to reach the high notes of his past, to realize that not having seen The Who live was a better thing than having done so, 30 years too late.  

Next on the list was a semi-forgotten old familiar face, Alanis. You know, at one point, she was on the raw edge of women's "pop" music, and seemingly had a brilliant future ahead of her, but frankly, since the heady days of her first album, I feel that she more or less has gone nowhere. Even after the first verse was over and before the chorus kicked in, I felt like it could have been Alanis from more than five years ago. In a way it was, as it's her first release inside 4-5 years. Her very stylized phrasing and lyrics just somehow sound old-fashioned today, so ingrained were they in an earlier time and sound. To hear it played out today, as a clearly more mature adult woman just doesn't work anymore. Where is the progression? Lyrics like "you, you in the chaos feigning sane" or "now, no more smiling mid-crestfall" just tend to make me reach for the sick bag. But to be fair, she never was the future of rock'n'roll, she was an old hippy at heart, but one without a fraction of the real genius and unending inspiration of fellow Canadian songstress Joni Mitchell, for example. Alanis was relevant back at Jagged Little Pill, but today she is as relevant as the next musical item on the list. 

Carrie Underwood. Well, I am not a huge country fan so I am biased perhaps, but guess what? It doesn't matter as it wasn't country! This was some sort of young-guys-with-guitars pop-rock mish-mash but with the prerequisite countrified lyrics thrown in for at least a smidgen of authenticity: "You better git to gettin' in your goodbye shoes", yawn. I felt that the song was yet another attempt at crossover by someone who is better off staying in their comfort zone, because no one is ever going to take her seriously as some kind of bad-ass rock chick, even if she's acting it okay. But like all major stars today, greed for more fame and  money dictates that singers in one genre want to conquer another, singers want to be actors, actors want to be singers, dancers want to be singers, and on and on and on. In any case, I just cannot see why anyone under 30 would ever want to have friends at home rifling through their CD collection, and finding three Carrie CDs. The music and lyrics speak to young people and their concerns about as much as candyfloss does for nutrition. It doesn't fill the void, and there's nothing of any real substance in it. It was also messy, just like candyfloss. Noisy and messy. Not noisy in a good way, like say, Green Day. Ex-AI girls take note, neither Clarkson or Underwood are the Lavigne a big part of them would love to have been. She is in another league entirely: one that begins with an A, not only for Avril, but also for authenticity. Artistic authenticity, as opposed to the manufactured airbrushed version.

But my main point? Well, given the terrible economic times that today's young people are now growing up in, with their own futures very much in jeopardy even with a college degree, where is either the musical rebellion or at least a slew of music that is more sociopolitical in nature and actually speaks to the developing sense of despair of the 16-24 year olds? It doesn't have to be the firestorm that was the punk explosion back in 1976 onward, but we could use something a little more current and relevant than the crap shown on TV all of the time and played on the radio most of the time: 99% of which will not be looked back on nostalgically, by anyone, ever. That is probably the point: with so little true brilliance out there today, we may as well just look back and relive the past, because the bulk of the great bands in the 70's, 80's and 90's simply have no equal and no replacements, even today in 2012. Which brings me to my conclusion: thank God I got to grow up when and where music mattered, to us, the young, because it spoke to us about things that mattered, to us, the young, and which was also music that, rather magnificently, our parents couldn't stand. That was the whole point and on that note, I can finish by saying that given the state of things today, it sure feels great to be old! ;)  - Kevin Mc