Monday, November 28, 2011

Things were more like they used to be, back then.

Regarding the passing of the twentieth birthday of the U2 album, Achtung Baby, (the soundtrack, along with R.E.M.'s Out Of Time, of much late-night weltschmerz-soaked aimless driving in my early 20s,) Brian Noggle notes:
So I posted on Facebook about the age of Achtung Baby, and a contemporaneous friend said, “And the album hasn’t aged one bit, I still listen to it all the time.”

To which I replied, “You tell yourself that. To an eighteen-year-old today, you might as well be listening to Pat Boone.”
You kids get off my lawn.
.

47 comments:

bluesun said...

Pop is still my favorite.

Bubblehead Les. said...

Well, since my first Rock Concert was KISS back in 1976, and I sold my soul to the Heavy Metal Gods shortly thereafter, I have one question: U2? Spy Plane, right? ; )

Tam said...

Dude, KISS? That's about as metal as... well... Pat Boone. ;)

Bubblehead Les. said...

Read the comment, Tam. I said that my FIRST Rock concert was KISS. Didn't say that was my ONLY concert. KISS is to Metal what the .22LR is to Shooting. Eventually, you gotta get to the Big Bores, like Motorhead. ; )

DaveFla said...

KISS was a gateway band: one day, you're listening to Alive II; next thing you know, Iron Maiden is opening for Judas Priest at the local ice arena, and tickets are only $12...

wv: bakedr. I was a cop's son and anti-bad-for-me-stuff to boot, so most of the other concertgoers *were* bakedr than me.

Boat Guy said...

My first was the Who when they were still smashing guitars into their amps...
I'd much rather listen to Pat Boone sing than Bono talk...

CGHill said...

Moody river, more deadly than the vainest knife;
Moody river, your muddy water took my baby's life.

(Still listening to Pat Boone after 50 years.)

Firehand said...

I have to throw in, daughter found a video of Gordon Lightfoot on Youtube, and one of the first comments was a 16yoa girl asking "WHY haven't I heard of this guy before?"

So there's hope.

Anonymous said...

"...you might as well be listening to Pat Boone"

So why did my teen-age daughter rip my Pink Floyd, Steely Dan, Led Zep and Who CDs?

I recently grabbed a CD made by her little brother (15) to use in our cars with antiquated sound systems. It had an interesting mix ranging from Booker T & the MGs to Daft Punk.

The point is services like Pandora provide kids with an opportunity to EASILY draw from a wide range of eras and styles; far more so than us old farts could in our youth. They can find stuff they like without being limited by the radio stations' selections.

Samsam von Virginia

BobG said...

I quit listening to radio years ago. I'll listen to my old rock, jazz, blues, CW, and classical, thanks.

fast richard said...

Most of U2's stuff came out after I had passed the torch of keeping up with popular music to my childrens generation. I did just look and found that I do have a U2 album, "The Unforgetable Fire". I found it sitting between Sting and Blondie, all on vinyl. There is also a whole stack of Gordon Lightfoot, and a fairly pristine White Album with 8 by 10 color glossy prints of the bandmembers.

fast richard said...

And my first Rock Concert was outdoors at a minor league baseball stadium, and featured The Band, Ten Years After, Muddy Waters, John Sebastian, Joe Cocker, and others. It was post Woodstock and post Altamont, but not by much.

Ed Rasimus said...

When I inadvertently/accidentally get exposed to some hip/hop or rap "hit" I inevitably ponder what this generation will be listening to on their "Classic..." format radio station in 2035. I'm thinking Beatles, Stones, Who, ELO, Floyd, BTO, Steely Dan, et. al.

Tam said...

Ed,

They certainly won't be listening to any of that hip-wagglin' jungle music by that Elvis Presley guy! Everybody knows that music died over the Channel with Glenn Miller. ;)

Anonymous said...

Glenn Miller ??!?!!?

You kids get off my lawn!

Only Scott Joplin and Rudy Vallee for me :)

-- Bowser

NotClauswitz said...

Jeepers, when are the dulcet tones of Bing Crosby ever coming back?
8-tracks to LP's to CD's and DVD's? My dad listens to scratchy sounds emenating off the Victrola - I don't see how music even survived that device.

Anonymous said...

The big song at our college crash house was Ride the Tiger by the Jefferson Starship.

I just read that Grace Slick turned 72 so I'm feeling old enough, thank you very much already Missy!

Gerry

staghounds said...

You do know this one, right?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OE7KT4fnoMQ

staghounds said...

From Stacey P. via Zan: "... a few years ago in a supermarket check out line, 2 teenage girls were gasping "He's so hot!" at a magazine cover of Kevin Federline (Mr. Britney Spears). I pointed to a magazine with Sam Shepard on the cover and said, "Now HE'S hot."

One girl said,

"Yeah, I bet my mom thinks he's hot, too."

Mikael said...

Pat Boone's take on metal:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfmcrXNuCwg

Anonymous said...

What?

U2 produced more albums after "October"?

*is listening to 'Tyranny and Mutation' on the new fangled thing called a computer*

Terry

Ken said...

My folks took us to see Three Dog Night and the Doobie Brothers in our younger years. My first concert post-drivers' license was Black Sabbath, with special guest Van Halen, for the princely sum of $7 at the local arena. After that was Dylan (first time in Greater Cleveland since '65), for $14.

Last thing I went to was summer of 2010: Cheap Trick and Squeeze. My wife and I took our sons. :-)

Firehand said...

There's a radio station in Fort Worth that's run at a high school, and the students on the staff choose all the music: almost all is 70's, some early 80's.

Things do chase around a bit, do they not?

Mark Alger said...

I did work for that tour (U2's ZooTV/Zooropa Tour). I think I *stopped* going to concerts about then -- burnt out.

M

southtexaspistolero said...

Funny that Brian should say that; I was thinking the other day about how interesting it was that so many folks al least from my generation (I was born in '77), listened to that older music. I'd think it hadn't changed that much with later generations, especially considering the folks I went to college with, born in the mid '80s, were listening to stuff like the Beatles, Black Sabbath and ZZ Top.

BL and Dave, Metallica was my gateway drug. The Black Album, then Ride, Master and Justice, and later on I discovered Priest, Megadeth, Queensryche & Iron Maiden. And Motorhead too.

Beaumont said...

My first real concert experience was U2, the Joshua Tree tour, in Vegas -- heck, the whole album sounded as though it was written ABOUT Vegas.

When Achtung Baby came out, it put me off U2 for a while; it seemed as though the boys discovered their blues roots during the Rattle & Hum period, and ran screaming in the opposite direction.

Anonymous said...

"Eventually, you gotta get to the Big Bores, like Motorhead. ; )"

And err, Motorhead was already cutting albums in '76. So, KISS was still bubble gum. Lemmy IS God.

If it was Jefferson Airplane you'd be old, the Jarship were still recording when we had the Grenada FTX. "Find Your Way Back" SPANKS that "Ride the Tiger" gaiety:-)

Jeffro said...

Same as it ever was.....

BobG said...

My first concerts were groups like The Moody Blues, The Doors, Paul Revere and the Raiders, The Byrds, and The Beach Boys. Great music during my high school years.

roland said...

The first time I heard U2 on a classic rock station I kinda got an inkling I might be getting on in years. Out of Time is actually in the cd player right now, grist for the road trip mill. Near Wild Heaven. Damn.

Anonymous said...

Bye bye Miss American Pie! Hasn't been any real music since then! Metal? Please, chimps with instruments!
Old Grump

thesouthtexaspistolero said...

"Metal? Please, chimps with instruments"

You've obviously never sat down and given the genre an honest listen.

Brad K. said...

Anon 6:41,

I hate to say it,
Coldplay, "Viva la Vida"
Lily Allen, "22", even the Porter Waggoner parody "Not Fair" (Golly, I like watching the drummer's expressions, and the redhead, too)
Adele, Rolling in the Deep
Natasha Beddingfield, Pocketful of Sunshine, Sweet Escape


And then there is the whole CD, "The Unforgettable Glenn Miller". Some of the highest energy music I found when I was programming at 2:30 am. 20 years ago. Ada,PL/1,Fortran/Unix/Cray-2. Also the "For the Last Time" Bob Wills CD.

the pawnbroker said...

Heart. Hollywood FL, '79.

Best live guitar ever.

And the last concert I attended just for me.
33 frickin' years ago. Groan

the pawnbroker said...

Oh, and "weltschmerz", eh?

Newly single again at 24, a new career, a new black '79 280ZX, and a case full of painstakingly recorded-from-vinyl TDK cassettes to set the night roads of Palm Beach County and the angst in my young heart and mind to music.

So that's what that was.

Justthisguy said...

1. I feel so old. I remember hearing "Itsy-Bitsy-Polka-Dot Bikini" when it first came out.

2. My Pastor went to elementary school with the members of U2, in Ireland, and later jammed with them. He also rode an RD350 when he was young. He wields a Kaman guitar in church, and sometimes a claymore. The man is kewl.

Anonymous said...

I went with my friends in college repeatedly to Springsteen concerts--something like four in as many years, which was a lot for me.
Now the same exact music bores me to death.

Although twenty years is not that old for a recording. Probably half of my CDs were originally recorded before 1990--and some of them go far back enough that they're in mono. Yes, there was a time when stereo was a new fangled thing that not everyone had...

Kishnevi

Mikael said...

My gateway drug was alice cooper... then onto metallica, and from there to iron maiden, from there to tons of other bands.

Mind you, I sang along to twisted sister songs in the playground in pre-school... (we're not gonna take it, I wanna rock).

Joe in PNG said...

Hell, back during my high school days in the early ninties, I was all about Floyd, Zep, Hendrix, Yes, Rush... as were pretty much all my classmates at the time.

og said...

In my 20's I was already listening to talk radio and yelling at the dashboard.

Once Brian Eno got his mitts on U2, they just got weird. I never bought any of the albums and in retrospect, "One" is about the only U2 song I can listen to all the way through anymore; odd enough that it's an Eno produced song.

Stretch said...

By stinging copper along the ridge pole for the antenna and grounding the Grundig to the cold water pipe I could pick up WABC out of NYC. The were the first to play the latest Beetles releases. I'd sing the song one the way to school and people wouldn't believe it was a real Beetles tune until the local rock station (WPGC) would air it later that day.
First concert was Spooky Tooth and Humble Pie.

Old Grouch said...

Last night on the way to the hardware store, WITT played "(Talk About) Pop Muzik."

I found myself chanting along.

Has senility finally set in?

Woodman said...

Nah, Devo is a kids band now.

NotClauswitz said...

After *seeing* The Dead at Winterland, is there really anything else left (in the brain-pan)? First was the SNACK concert at Kezar in '75 - the last was Sting at Shoreline with his mirror-image/clone-band Geggy Tah (bleh!) in 1996 because my wife always wanted to seem him. I hate musicians.

Will said...

Iron Butterfly (In a Godda-da-vida) sounded much better when played on a record player that was turning maybe 10% slower than spec. When I heard it on a jukebox, I was like, WTF?

BTW, researchers have figured out that Glen Millers's single engine transport was hit by a bomb(s) from a flight of bombers dumping their loads after an attack was aborted due to weather over their target.

His plane was small and at low altitude over the Channel, and the bombers were much higher. I wonder how many times something similar happened during the war?

Mikael said...

Saw this in the news today(different place, had to find an english one), couldn't help but think of this post:

http://www.contactmusic.com/news/bono-annoyed-by-own-voice_1266731

Justthisguy said...

Will, IIRC, he was riding in a Noorduyn Norseman, an airplane designed for flying in the boonies of Canada.