Bagster
I work in the entertainment/media field and am always on the lookout for good new artists, even though I’m well beyond 30. I think the problem isn’t that older people don’t like good new music, but that it’s so hard to find it. There are tons of terrific new artists, but most of them are putting out self-produced indie albums that you have to search for. Meanwhile, the major labels and broadcast radio are serving up heaping helpings of unlistenable, cliched, over-processed crap. If that’s all you can find, it’s no wonder you’d rather just play “Abbey Road” again.
Agreed. Indie. Indie pop for even the lazy listeners. And I’m getting old.
Rock and roll is a zombie. Contemporary country is a scarier zombie.
somafm.com
If “you” pick up a collection of Bessie Smith, Robert Johnson, Frank Sinatra, Cole Porter, Miles Davis, Henry Mancini, Tom Waits, etc and never listened to it much before but delve into it and put it in “your” rotation, it’s “new music” to you.
Generationally some of these artists bubble up time and again, when they die, when “they turn” 100, when there is a biopic, when there is a retrospective boxed collection, when someone famous namechecks them...
Check the links in my post at #24
Bagster
But you have to LOOK for it. And it does seem 30+ folk are locked in our ways. But there are great riches to be had for the adventurous amongst us.
I challenge us older types to go to a bar or club and catch 5 acts for $10. In NYC you can go on Bleeker St any night and do this...I used to gig at The Elbow Room (now a CVS...RIP) and, yes, a few of the bands will suck but you may find that the Death of Music is not here yet. Maybe you'll pay $10 for a CD or shirt and keep things moving (my latest CD additions are from punk bands in Maine and Philadelphia). I heard of a program where you pay a fixed amount and you can get into any participating club for free. On a larger scale, go to a show of 1000-1500 people and catch some new acts.
There is equally no shortage of boring old people blogging that Rock is Dead while listening to The Stranger and The Last Waltz (yet again) on their iPad. Be part of the solution, not the problem!
Plus 1 billion to your comment, HHFi, and I would add that since most musicians believe in socialism (that is, no private property, no property rights), I want to accommodate them by never buying their music. It should be free.
I think the key is the phrase “seek out”. I’ve been exposed to, and like, a lot of new artists. Heck, I’ve bought Lorde and ZZ Ward on vinyl, but I didn’t seek them out. I discovered their stuff via Pandora channels.
Older people have usually moved on unless they are in the business and forced to seek the stuff out.
It’s not about liking new stuff, it’s about actively searching for it. A lot of us would just say we have higher priorities.