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October 19, 2005
Generations
One of the most striking images that come to shine when talking about "generations" (Not the now de-funkt Star Trek typo) is of a man in his forties and his daughter age 5, both on earphones, sucking up the same tune via a split cable out of a single iPod (or other MP3 cracker). If this sounds overly dramatic, private docu-romance of sorts as you know I have a daughter aged 5, expand your view for a moment and generalize the scene but not abstract: this is a common parent-child duet. Why? Did it happen and quietly that our children at some point in time lost their genes, their social-class-like orientation, their natural propulsion to conflict? Why are they not fighting us anymore as we use our elders? How did it happen that they turned a flat and undetermined deep-blue-sea? Economics? Get out. Values and content distribution systems getting global? One sure factor. One: Did it happen? Two: When or how. Three: good or bad? Four: Is evolution, (and conversely revolution), an obsolete psychological class in an aging framework model? Five: It did happen, at some point in time, we dunno when or how, and yes, evolution is obsolete and forgotten and yes, we love it.
Consider this: rock music.
What is rock music today? What can it possibly and inevitably be? Recycling. Wins who does it better. Some do so with such sophistication and ability, we can only kiss their (forehead?) and go (leave a little love to these masters, think Beck, think Squarepusher). Changes are hiding well if any are present at all, combining and refining is what is left to us to do. Distribution and composition processes have changed a lot, dramatically and in ways that are of no return. The best rock bands on the planet today are so because they have perfected this. They rely on a market that has no memory, no saturation threshold, no model or ability to envision, no patience to fight anything but headaches, check grammar as you type. Our kids are all born into this. They love what we use to embrace a generation ago like free fuel to fight our parents schema, as an empowering personality offer too easy to access and too easy to lean on. We share the speakers with little men and women that were once supposed to take us on a battle. Is it good?
We love it. Don't you deny it, you can't. We love to plug in our kids onto our preferred tunes and find they appreciate the same conglomerates of feeling, regrets, passion. Our kids, loving Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and Velvet Underground. How embarrassing.
Good producers, they know the trend well. They have sown it, developed it and exploiting it with a smile. Long dead rock bands re-forming at the sound of big money with a track or two and a number of covers to grab the hail of an army of young kids that still need to believe rock music is revolutionary or at least evolutionary. Play the game.
Depeche Mode new, out yesterday, available on iTunes, Loving The Angel, walking some older shoe's footsteps, Black Celebration, 1986. The band, severely underrated, still remarkably capable of 4 or 5 hits out of the same plate. Exaggeratedly overly romantic, as always (listen to "Precious", #1 on the UK charts). "If god has a master plan, that only he understands, I hope he's you're eyes he's seeing through", geez, breaking the heart of my kid already. And yours? Yours as well, on the same earpiece.
Evolution is over. Just give me a pain that I'm used to.
Posted by lck at October 19, 2005 09:32 PM
