A generation gap is an oft-used excuse that has perpetuated across the years. Grandparents, parents, children and grandchildren are all content to be separated from each other by time cocoons that seem to take less time to spin as the generation number increases. The definition of a generation gap is changing now. Time was when a father would see a generation gap as the entire time between his childhood and that of his children… sufficient time for the world to work its magic. Now, even a first-born can find a reasonably well defined generation gap to its sibling.
I suppose every civilization is the cause of its own demise - the evolution of life into a form where it dictates when it starts and when it ends, and with the power to effect both. And so the world incessantly hurtles forward through time even as it hurtles forward through space. Or are they the same?
We are going faster and faster in our rush toward inescapable doom, and ironically, that seems to be our very aim: higher, faster, better, stronger, if I may steal a line. A child born today is incapable of imagining a world without Television, never mind what kind of Television it is, because its parents always had TV in some form. Similarly, the Internet. Although the Internet was not big around here till around the early nineties, since then, it has so deeply embedded itself in public psyche/culture that it may as well have been around forever. And with it came the MP3 and the cold silverage of other new-fangledness. Twenty or thirty years ago, the cut-off would have probably been Radio. A fairly large stride forward from radio to the Internet, I would think. As we go forward, technologies are being obsoleted and disposed of so quickly that it takes increasingly less time for a generation gap to come to be. Those born in the middle of a generation are lucky, relatively speaking, for they will experience both, the old and the new, with the ability to adapt well enough. The ones born at the sharp ends are the real victims of the generation.
The offspring of my generation will likely not know of Records or VHS. Or single screen theatres or potato wafers that did not come with a Lay’s tag. DVD playerss may be helluva lot more advanced than the old tape decks, but the dispensability and sheer inorganicity of NOW technology makes me melancholy so.
Gap or not, music is one thing, I guess, that will tie generations together with an ease unrivalled. I may not have always been a knowledgeable Beatles fan, or even much of a fan for that matter, but what I will never argue against is that they truly exist across time. It doesn’t matter whether or not you were around when they were, they always sound fresh. I’m pretty confident that I don’t know most of their songs, so I’m always surprised when I can fairly easily sing along to one of their tunes that I would never have thought myself familiar with. Truth be told, more than surprised, I am proud. Proud that what was created years and years before the thought of my conception was ever conceived, has had the longevity to make itself part of my consciousness, even as these days rapidly promote a disposable fashion.
Some years ago, when I fell into the deep end in my exposure to music, what I took to be an introduction, was only me revisiting the sounds that governed the formative years of my musical education in the home of my parents, more than 15 years ago. I’d say ‘a return to myself’, if I wanted to be cheesy; but it’s the truth.
My children, if and when they are, will find these same sounds in the home of their parents… It’s not as if I have any much contempt for music more recently released. Led Zeppelin, Bob Marley, Metallica, Marky Mark, Moby and Maroon 5 can all file onto the same stage on any given day. Not to forget, The Funky Bunch…
It’s like culture: those who have it will actually recognize it. I’m glad I can always depend on the musicians who I know made music, rather that having to wait for a contemporary someone to find a spark of genius, or two.
All things considered, this was pretty weak. Blame it on Floyd...
Righteous Brothers – You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling
The Beatles – Hold Me Tight
