I was listening to the radio last week and the announcer was wondering if teens these days enjoy music as much as he did back in the 80's. He doubted it mostly because he
really loved his bands and it's hard to see how any of today's music could really measure up to that.
Mentioned it to the FP Gal and she thought that of course they love it as much as we did. Pretty much everyone thinks the music of their formative years was greatly superior. It was the soundtrack for a great time of their life after all. That's pretty much true but I don't think that we can really just assume that the teen relationship with music has stayed static or that it won't change. (Comments from you folks that actually lived through this time are welcome and appreciated.)
Consider how much has changed in the way we get music. In the 30's people got popular music from the radio. You had no control over what was played. I don't really know what how different radio stations differed in what they offered but my sense is that they were mostly similar.
This changed as record players became more widespread (50's?) and the pop star infrastructure became more powerful. People now had control over their own music and (more importantly) a format for more permanent storage. They didn't need to keep listening to whatever was popular on the radio, they could determine their own song list.
On came the 60's and music became a defining individual trait. You couldn't be part of the counter culture unless you listened to certain stuff. Or you could stick to mainstream or join the growing appreciation for jazz. Or just stick to your records from the 50's.
The 70's brought cassettes and 8-tracks to cars. Radio's dominance eroded even more. I think that more and more different formats of radio became available then too. Popular music was even more fractured. And you could still listen to 50's and 60's music without any difficulty. The 80's continued this and later in the decade a large portion of the popular stuff was openly recognized as different and called 'alternative'. The 90's saw the rise of the CD and promised people a higher sound quality and a much longer lasting format. By this time genres have fractured to such an extent that the Grammys need 400 categories to cover everything.
But things have changed even more in the 00's. Teens start to get their music directly from the computer. It's very cheap and could hardly be more convenient. Also, bands can more easily produce their own music and get their songs out to people without major label help.
Will this lead to more one hit wonders and shorter music careers? Or create more a more disposable type of music? And does the higher level of fragmentation mean that there is less for current teens to hold onto? And who knows what the future will hold? How will Relia approach music? Our hopes are that she gloms onto our tastes but we can't be certain.
