Yes, damn kids are ruining my lawn!

The thing I tried to point out though is, the music of the 60’s-80’s is still revered by youngsters today. It is sampled, quoted and imitated every day by young musicians. This is a LONG way away from most young musicians of the 60’s-80’s, who were doing their level best to sound NOTHING like the jazz and big band era, which was really only 20 years before the 60’s, let alone 50 years prior, which is how far back the 70’s are to today..!

There’s plenty of modern music that floats my boat, I don’t really think I’m analogous to jazz musicians from the 40’s and 50’s who hated rock and roll and the Beatles etc.. Snarky Puppy, Jacob Collier and many others excite me at every listen, but let’s face it, they’re not even a blip on the charts. I think much of the pushback in the 60’s from the old jazzers was from their gigs drying up as rock and roll took over the dancehalls. Money talks!

But the same thing hasn’t really happened to 60’s-80’s rock, yacht rock and pop. One of the biggest trends in today’s bar/club scene is the proliferation of ‘tribute bands’, just a fancy form of cover bands. And trust me, they’re not doing tributes of modern music! It’s all Led Zeppelin, Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Billy Joel, David Bowie, Queen, Journey etc. that are getting the ‘tribute’!

And that’s simply something you NEVER saw in the 70’s.

If these things are popular now with youngsters, I think it’s a tacit admission that their own generation’s pop music just doesn’t excite them as much as ours did us.

I think a generation of music made primarily in bedrooms and small studios on computers hasn’t translated into something most people want to go see live. We’ve a handful of mega-acts like Taylor Swift and Beyoncé taking huge reviews out on the road, but local venues can’t afford that, and cover bands can’t afford that kind of staging. Strip away the glitz, what’s left musically is a bit threadbare…

Maybe I’m just an old fogey, but I stand by what I said… I doubt anywhere NEAR the percentage of 60’s-80’s music still popular now will survive the next 50 years as today’s music ages..! 🎹❤️