getting old

One of the things that I have noticed about myself lately is that i am spending a lot of time writing about what must be considered old music. This is not something that i thought much about before i started to write this blog.
I have always been reasonably proud that my love of music has always meant that i like to listen to new things as much as possible.

But I will admit to have a crisis in confidence here. Maybe i am not that into new music. Maybe I am turning into one of those people that only likes music from when i was younger. Maybe I would be that person that only talks about bands that was cool when I was a lot cooler than i am now. Looking back to a halcyon age of music as I see it.

I am also going to have to admit that this is something that has worried me from a young age. i saw my parents and many other people hang onto the music of their youth like an obsessive limpet. I always thought it was a bit depressing. Imagine the fact that you had already heard the best song you were ever going to hear. The best album now, was probably the best album you were going to hear as well.

I can not decide is that means you should bask in the glory of knowing your favourite music, or it sucks balls

There is nothing wrong with knowing what you like and sticking to it. The obvious other side of the argument is that if you try to be something you are not then by any modern standard of being real to yourself you have failed.  The idea that you like new things just because they are new is as bad as not liking things because they are new. the ying for the yang as it were.

So we try and sit in the middle of an extreme view. We like the music we like and hope that sometimes more than often we will like new things that are released.

I have said before that I think the concept of what is new music has changed in the last 5 to 7 years. The digital revolution has meant that it may just be new to you. If it is new to you then when does it matter when it was released? In this post i said that I quite liked the lady gaga song. This is very much a fad. I do not necessarily mean that from my perspective that liking lady gaga is a fad. Although that is also true to an extent. What i mean is that Lady Gaga's music is not revolutionary in any sense of the word. It is not anything more than the latest thing. She is the Madonna, Britney, Pink type of character for the last couple of years. She will release a couple of albums and then more than likely fade into the background. Her next album will do extremely well, but will alienate many of her original fans. Her antics will become more and more outrageous until we are bored by the dancing bear.

It does not bother me in the slightest that i feel no connection to this. What bothers me is that by forever going backwards and finding lost classics that i will miss something truly great. You know something though. i am not so sure I have missed anything lately. has there been a truly seminal album in the last few years? Has there been something that was completely unmissable? Something we all had to have that united us all in the love of music? Was there an album that made everyone go, you know, i don't usually like this kind of music , but I love that album?

I did a quick search using the somewhat ubiquitous google for the best albums of the 2000s. Now I know i am not going to find the answers to life's mysteries using google. However, This is it, by the strokes came up a lot.

this was the main song from that album

I have to post a live version as apparently copyright has blocked it in my country. Which is odd. However, it is a good song and a good album. Is a great album. Well no, it isn't. in fact it does not compare to great albums very favourably.

That said a band that deserve a lot more accolades for making great music are Interpol. Interpol are fucking brilliant. Sorry about the language, but I feel quite strongly about this. if there was a band that i would say stood above all of the other dross on the 2000s , it would be Interpol. A band that have a song called, There's no I in threesome. Has there been a better song title? Listen to the lyrics of the song. Actually listen to them this time

Not only slightly humours title, but a somewhat haunting song in the isolation it brings to the party.


What else was there? Well there was Queens of the Stone age. I know, they are pretty good. There was The White Stripes, There was The Shins. I don't know about the shins. I like there music a lot at times. I rarely hear a song come on shuffle and think to myself, wow that is special.

Hear is song that deserves to be called truly great

You had to be into Slipknot to find that song. That is an amazing song. i mean truly brilliant.

Dangermouse . . .or in this incarnation gnarls barkley

As the man says
"yeah out there I was out of touch
but it wasn't because i didn't know enough
I just knew too much"

Maybe that's the issue.

Don't worry , I am not trying to suggest i know too much. But maybe ,, because there is so much choice that sometimes, things get hidden or forgotten. Going back to them means you perhaps give them a better listen this time around. You know, maybe I am not so old after all.