I’m trying to figure out that moment when I stopped following current music.
Surely, I remember the start was when I was maybe three, in the 1950s. But the coming of age music was in the 1960s, with the Beatles and Motown, et al, and later Cream and Aretha, and the like. Still active in the singer-songwriter 1970s, and revived in the early 1980s with the Clash, the Talking Heads, the Police, and so forth.
Was it the 1990s when I didn’t “get” Nirvana initially?
No, I actually eventually purchased some Nirvana and Pearl Jam. And, even as my music consumption diminished, MTV was still actually playing music videos, so that I was vaguely aware of the hit songs. But now? I look at the charts and don’t even recognize most of the names, let alone the songs.
It’s not that I don’t buy ANY new music, it’s that I am more likely to buy tried and true artists. My favorite album last year? By Paul Simon. The albums I’m most looking forward to right now? By Bonnie Raitt (her first on her own label) and Leonard Cohen. Oh, and that album of Bob Dylan covers. Got Bruce Springsteen for my birthday, and picked up Lyle Lovett and Paul McCartney with a gift card.
I’ve purchased very few albums by artists whose recording career started in the 21st Century, and most of those tend to be singers such as Corrine Bailey Rae or Adele. There may be an outlier, such as Arcade Fire, but it is the exception.
If you are of a certain age, are you still buying new music, and if so, is it from newer artists or ones you’ve grown up with?