What's the deal with new music? aka why it just can't mean as much...

Why newer music seems worse, but why the older stuff isn't necessarily better; unless it actually is...  That seems intentionally confusing to make you more interested...  Yep, that's the fucking point...

It's strange that it keeps coming up.  I feel like I've had some form of the same conversation at least a hundred times over the past five years.  Whether with longtime friends, fellow musicians, strangers at the record store, it doesn't matter, it seems to always find a way into the conversation.  At this point I'm wondering if somehow I'm putting off the vibe.  It's got to be me, right?  (The whole world revolves around me, right?  I am the Truman Show, aren't I?)  But no, the last few times in particular I know that I didn't bring it up.  Or did I?  Having Asperger's, I do tend to bring up the same things over and over.  My girlfriend thinks I never listen to her, and she's probably right, but hopefully it makes her feel at least a little better to know that I never listen to myself either.  It probably doesn't, but still.  Which is weird since I love learning things about other people and listening to them talk is the best way and blah, blah, blah, I'm already off-topic...

What starts this conversation I keep running into is some form of the question "Do you continue to listen to new music?" or "do you still actively seek out new music?"  It's usually followed by a statement on the current state of the music industry, how the labels don't breed artistry, how there's just too many bands and no simple way to sort through them, how there's not enough time to waste on trying to listen to countless bands in order to find one that you actually may like; you know, that sort of thing.  Now, I'm not saying I don't understand this sentiment or haven't spent hours thinking about this myself, trust me, I have.  For years, I felt the same.  New music was shit and I wanted no fucking part of it.  There were enough brilliant records out in the ether that I could spend my life just trying to catch up and never come close to succeeding.  In fact, you can read my thoughts on this, at length I might add, in a two-part blog I wrote in this very space.  See:  PART I and PART II.  So I get it, I really do.  But, with the help of some fancy new tools (Spotify mostly), I no longer subscribe (wholly) to this theory.

Now, for sure, there's a lot to be made about the fact that we are just not as impressionable in our older age, not that I'm "older," but I'm not 16 anymore (yes, ladies, I'm over 18.  So, you know... nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more, say no more...) either.  So, no, I don't anticipate that a record will hit me the same way "The Lonesome Crowded West" did and, of course, there's no way to hear "Bold as Love," "Born to Run" or "Blonde on Blonde" again for the first time (what's with all the B's?  The best bourbons all start with "B" as well.  List for another day perhaps...  All I'll say for now is that John Wick and Bradley Wik share similar tastes...).  But, then again, those are landmark albums the likes of which we'll never see again, so you have to remove them from this conversation.  You can't see the grandiose grandeur of a Monet for the first time "again" or watch "Pulp Fiction" for the first time "again" either.  And yes, I do think of Monet and Tarantino on the same scale of artistry.  It's the same way I'd put Ellsworth Kelly and Michael Bay in the same echelon as well; fucking talking about THIS and THIS, respectively...  Fucking pricks, the both of them...

But, following this train of thought does get us a lot closer to what I feel is the truth.  Here's the reason I believe we stop searching for and finding new artists that really make us feel something:  as we get older and more knowledgeable about music, there's more and more we can compare these new artists to.  It's not fair but it's true.  I'll give you a "for instance."  The first CD I ever bought (in 1996, in case you were wondering, which you probably weren't, but fuck it.  Also, to flesh out your Bradley Wik trivia, the first cassette tape I ever bought was Weird Al's "Greatest Hits Volume II") was The Wallflowers' "Bringing Down The Horse."  Now, when I first heard "One Headlight" or "The Difference" I thought those songs were unlike anything I'd ever heard prior.  For sure, they were doing something great, which they would never accomplish again, by the way, on that album but it wasn't the mind-boggling, genre-defining thing I thought I was hearing.  But I was 9, what did I know other than I really liked it?  The songs on that album are so well-written and the production is amazing, so who knows, it might still hit me the same way today, just for different reasons.  That album is still great and I still love it, but it doesn't sound as unique as it once did.

I'll give you another.  Currently, there are two albums I cannot stop playing on repeat:  PUP's "The Dream is Over" and The Jellyrox's (or The Jellyrox'?  How the fuck do you make that a possessive?) "Bang and Whimper."  I know what you're thinking if somehow you know both these bands, but, yes, punk rock and synth pop go so well together, seriously.  Like bleu cheese, roast beef and apples.  No fucking joke, try it on whole wheat bread.  It's delicious.  Unless you're gluten-intolerant or just have no patience for gluten and you won't tolerate it.  Then maybe try it over a bed of mixed greens, just not fucking kale; that shit tastes like fucking dirt.  Or, more simply, how about you just listen to these fucking masterpieces back to back:

PUP - "DVP"

The Jellyrox - "Hoop"

How much fun are those?  Almost too much.  Like a puppy and a kitten snuggling...  Sorry, picturing that now...  But, PUP's "The Dream is Over" is the kind of album that ten years ago would've changed my life as I played it non-stop for six fucking months, memorizing every single word and beat and note and nuance til it became a part of me.  But that particular hole they look to fill has already been filled by the Hold Steady (not saying it's the same music, outside of "The Coast" sounding like a Hold Steady B-side); a band that fucking changed my life as I played "Boys and Girls in America" non-stop for six fucking months and memorized every single word and beat and note and nuance til it became a part of me.  On the opposite end, we have The Jellyrox.  I don't know fuck-all about synths (although after months and months of fucking around with my Moog Sub 37, you'd think I'd picked some up.  Well, I have just not enough, clearly, after listening to this record) or synth pop music past Duran Duran and whatever Genesis or Phil Collins used on their albums, so this record hit me hard.  I already know most of the words, and by the time I take "Bang and Whimper" out of my car, I'll know every... well, you know the rest...  I just don't have a frame of reference for this album so it sounds like aliens learned english and how to craft amazing songs and sing and record and mix and master their music and release it on a piece of plastic that uses laser beams to extract the 0's and 1's and, in turn, return them into their musical form.  In fact, that sounds like every CD now that I think about it...  Except MINE.  But that's only because I know I'm not an alien; I have two eyes, two ears, a nose, an appendix, tonsils (yep, got 'em both.  Suck on that nerds...), a spleen, an average sized penis and knees that still don't like running (thanks Coach Murphy!).   Otherwise, the whole CD thing still doesn't make sense...  Probably why I still prefer vinyl.  Shameless plug:  Be on the lookout for the vinyl release of my new album "In My Youth, I'm Getting Old..." (yes, I'm obsessed with long names and ellipsises, ellipsisses, ellipsi?  Fuck!).  But that's not meant to take anything away from The Jellyrox, it's just to say that the record means more to me being my first foray into this world apart from some requisite CHVRCHES tracks.  And, no offense to CHVRCHES (that lead singer is so fucking hot and has such a sexy voice, goddamn it, that Scottish accent, that I'd like to, well, you know, nudge, nudge, wink, wink), but The Jellyrox is much more impressive.  Matt (lead singer, songwriter, producer, talented muthafucker) can sing and play his fucking ass off.  Although, I've had the pleasure of meeting him in person, and though I didn't inspect it too thoroughly, it seemed like he still has an ass.  Maybe he can regenerate it after singing and playing it off, who knows.  Fucking extremely talented people, they always seem to have magical powers and he is no different.  My magical powers are drinking, swearing and eating...  Not as impressive.  Fuck, I got shafted again!

It's also kinda funny how pervasive this idea is.  Everything seems better, by comparison, to when we were younger, even sports.  The last Super Bowl notwithstanding (Greatest Game Ever, since Super Bowl XXXI.  Yes, I'm a hopelessly homer Packer fan and watching Brett Favre win the Super Bowl and restore glory to Green Bay is still the most important game I'll ever see), football was better when I was a kid.  Same for basketball and baseball.  Though, of all of them, baseball is definitely the closest to its' former glory.  What a wave of young, talented shortstops in Lindor, Correa, Bogaerts, Seager, Arcia, and on and on.  And a great crop of catchers and infielders and center fielders and pitchers, shit, I guess baseball is just good again.  Took me until a couple years ago to forgive the steroids and that terrible era of Sosa and McGwire and Bonds and Clemons.  It was so fucking obvious!  Come on (does his best Job voice)!  Wait, Super Bowls, CD's, vinyl, baseball, what the fuck was I talking about?  Oh yeah, I don't remember.  Good night and good luck!