And the jazz cats said that about us rockers as well.
And the Edwardians were sure that "Jass" music (as it was spelled then for a time) was the downfall of all things decent in Western Civilization they had just fought to preserve in the Great War.
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Shades of Billie Eilish
- Thread starter chazolson
- Start date
And the Edwardians were sure that "Jass" music (as it was spelled then for a time) was the downfall of all things decent in Western Civilization they had just fought to preserve in the Great War.
Smooth_bass88
vaxx!
- Oct 31, 2006
- 12,123
- 16,799
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- have been on nationally released albums, charting on the Billboard 200
"Peg", from 'Aja', was a huge single, in fact practically all of that album got substantial airplay in the day with "Josie" being the secondary tune. "Kid Charlemagne" and "Don't Take Me Alive", in spite of their subject matter, got tracked a lot before that.I'm not a lot younger than very many people.
Aside from "Reelin' in the Years", "Rikki Don't Lose That Number" and "Hey Nienteen", I can't think of a SD tune that got air play. I wasn't a fan duirng those days, but have since come to rate SD as one of my all time favorites.
I, for one, think the weirdest thing about the CL ad is that someone writes the OP to ask who Steely Dan were instead of simply looking them up on Wikipedia."Let me google that for you" and all that.
Not knowing something is fine. Not knowing how to look something up is not.
But why did they even reply?
But then why did I reply to ask why did they reply?
Resist the urge - don't reply to that!
It's a good point. I'm 40 and grew up with all sorts of music from the 50s-80s including classic rock and I know 2 of their hits. A great band that was popular but it's not music that transcends generations.
This is what kills me too. Why not Google something before asking the question? Seems people are too lazy to Google things.I, for one, think the weirdest thing about the CL ad is that someone writes the OP to ask who Steely Dan were instead of simply looking them up on Wikipedia.
Not knowing something is fine. Not knowing how to look something up is not.
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Well, it's because they really aren't a band. It's two guys and a bunch of hired guns that changed every song on some albums.
I think people who ask questions like that are just being rude for sport. It's obviously easy to find the answer to almost any question these days. This is just backhanded rudeness of the "who cares about your boomer band?" variety.
They did start out trying to be a band. It was always Fagen and Becker doing all the writing, but early on they had some consistency in the lineup, but for whatever reason that changed in the mid 70's. I know that they toured early on and then decided they hated touring, so that may have contributed to the change. Later on Fagen decided he liked playing live and Becker got his act together after several years on the skids, so they started touring again. Fagen's still touring as SD.
When our son was little (he's 23 now), he would sometimes ask us if we could get songs he knew from iTunes and make CDs he could listen to in the car. It was mostly Kidz Bop type stuff or some current pop, but every once in a while he'd ask for some old classic rock he heard me listen to.
When he was about 9 or 10 he got one of the Guitar Hero or Rock Band games and was telling me about this cool new song that was on the intro when the game was loading up. He asked if I could find it on iTunes for him. My first thought is that iTunes might not have the music written for a game so I asked him to start up the game so I could check it out. Turns out it was Highway Star by Deep Purple. I pulled the CD out of my collection to show him that it's not new and that the album came out when I was his age. He was floored, but he did ask if I could put the disc in my car for him to listen to.
I believe we are witnessing a more severe generation gap than previously.
Some things to keep in mind:
- young people absolutely love to claim to not know who the Beatles are. Especially if they say "Paul McCartney was in a band before Wings!", that is trolling 100% of the time. It's an internet meme. They know who the Beatles were, this is, like "ok boomer", a way to get under your skin.
But the generation gap is, I believe , worse than before. It used to be a given that the current generation would sort of revere and be fascinated by the one they just missed. This is why I know 100 Beatle songs, Simon, Bowie, etc. I am Gen X, those artists are not of my Generation.
Now, my being a deep-end musician, I went further. I studied jazz, folk, classical, opera, Chinese, Indian, Latin, and it's never ended for me. I don't understand people who's musicology extends one generation in either direction.
But anyway, I don't see the fascination with Gen X music in the current Generations. In fact, I see my Generation being erased from existence: it's either Boomer or Millennial+. I don't see young people digging in on Pearl Jam, Nirvana, the last vestiges of raw rock in America (for now, IMO only), the huge swoon of 90's R&B, nor the singer-songwriters of the 90s. They just don't seem to care about what came before, at all. This dismays me - this is how culture dies.
However, I will also point out, most Boomer-generation people are unfamiliar with their own music. They have no idea who anyone is beyond the Top 40 of their day, just as the current Generation is. Veer even slightly into the album tracks, and in most cases , they can't even name the band or artist.
"But you don't really care for music, do you?" - Leonard Cohen
Maybe I overstate the Generation gap, maybe this is normal. It just seems worse than before. I believe it is important for those of us who value such things, to keep it alive as best we can.
Some things to keep in mind:
- young people absolutely love to claim to not know who the Beatles are. Especially if they say "Paul McCartney was in a band before Wings!", that is trolling 100% of the time. It's an internet meme. They know who the Beatles were, this is, like "ok boomer", a way to get under your skin.
But the generation gap is, I believe , worse than before. It used to be a given that the current generation would sort of revere and be fascinated by the one they just missed. This is why I know 100 Beatle songs, Simon, Bowie, etc. I am Gen X, those artists are not of my Generation.
Now, my being a deep-end musician, I went further. I studied jazz, folk, classical, opera, Chinese, Indian, Latin, and it's never ended for me. I don't understand people who's musicology extends one generation in either direction.
But anyway, I don't see the fascination with Gen X music in the current Generations. In fact, I see my Generation being erased from existence: it's either Boomer or Millennial+. I don't see young people digging in on Pearl Jam, Nirvana, the last vestiges of raw rock in America (for now, IMO only), the huge swoon of 90's R&B, nor the singer-songwriters of the 90s. They just don't seem to care about what came before, at all. This dismays me - this is how culture dies.
However, I will also point out, most Boomer-generation people are unfamiliar with their own music. They have no idea who anyone is beyond the Top 40 of their day, just as the current Generation is. Veer even slightly into the album tracks, and in most cases , they can't even name the band or artist.
"But you don't really care for music, do you?" - Leonard Cohen
Maybe I overstate the Generation gap, maybe this is normal. It just seems worse than before. I believe it is important for those of us who value such things, to keep it alive as best we can.
I like Billy Eilish, especially "White Wedding." That song rocks!
Back when it was just 57 channels and nothing on(now it's more like 5700), you had "old" movies being ghettoized on TMC, PBS, and to a certain extent some specialty channels, and it has remained that way ever since. As a kid, I would see these films(basically anything released before I was 5)on regular broadcast, and it was, for me, a window to the world that existed before I existed, and I was glad of it. In spite of the cornball and over-melodramatic stuff, it helped me understand my parents and grandparents better. But those who are in charge of manipulating programming content for ad time sales decided that passive audiences would be likely to turn away from such stuff, it's old and musty and in black and white and slow and may demand some intellectual processing of what's going on and the characters are dressed funny and so on, so this material got swept under the rug. You might remembet the negative reaction from film buffs when Turner sought to 'colorize' certain black and white classics, because he thought that B&W would be a turn-off for some viewers, too much of a comfort challenge.
Real question is: will anyone book a Steely Dan tribute band?
Personally, SD's always been one of those bands that left me scratching my head, thinking "who the hell was the A&R rep that thought this was good?" The best of their music is the session players, the lyrics and vocals I can do with out.
Personally, SD's always been one of those bands that left me scratching my head, thinking "who the hell was the A&R rep that thought this was good?" The best of their music is the session players, the lyrics and vocals I can do with out.
In response to those who ask "who the heck would want to see a SD tribute act", I can only respond that "yacht rock" bands have been all the rage around my home for several years (and most play several SD tunes).
BTW Billie Eilish is really beginning to grow on me. Saw a video of her and her brother Finias (who basically produced her last album) talking about Bad Guy. Listen to the way she enunciates the words in the verses - really precise - the tune wouldn't work without that approach. Pretty sophisticated for an 18-year-old.
BTW Billie Eilish is really beginning to grow on me. Saw a video of her and her brother Finias (who basically produced her last album) talking about Bad Guy. Listen to the way she enunciates the words in the verses - really precise - the tune wouldn't work without that approach. Pretty sophisticated for an 18-year-old.
You are spot on; I was the guy behind the counter selling your music to you. Remember the big 'swing' revival in the aftermath of Nirvana? Lounge? Sinatra and Bennett becoming cool again? Logically, you wouldn't see the connection between Cobain and The Great American Songbook, but as the explosion of the grunge era was truly the very first "OK Boomer" moment, the line drawn in the sand, the embracing by your age group of this seemingly old, unfashionable music was a sort of an extended middle finger, as the generation before would dismiss that stuff as THEIR parent's music.
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This one that operates in my area does pretty well. They don't play that often, but these are not small venues. These are mostly 1000+ seat theaters. They just played the Crest here 2 weeks ago, which is where I've seen acts like Todd Rundgren, Dixie Dregs, Stanley Clarke and Pat Metheney.
Shows
