What do teen-age and young men listen to nowadays?

He is not a "towering cultural figure" ... he just an old guy now whose best music is 40 years in the rearview mirror.

Go ask a thousand people 35 or younger "So what do you think of Bob Dylan?" and see how they answer.

The Stones will stay relevant for a long time. Their brand of rock 'n' roll will never die.

Robert Plant? Please. Chuck Berry will always have the Jackie Robinson treatment -- that respect of being the first, the father of rock 'n' roll.

But I do love this Plant song.

 

Your opinion of Bob Dylan is duly noted.

 

The classic rock station in my market has started incorporating Pearl Jam into the rotation. I don't listen much so I don't know much about others. They play U2 but nothing from Achtung Baby through Pop.

 

Middle-aged moment: Is there ANYTHING from today's instant-information, everything-is-disposable culture that will be remembered in 50 years? Maybe the smart phones will be laughed at the way we laugh at rotary phones today. But music, movies, "books"? It all literally goes away with the push of a button by individual users, or YouTube moderators wary of licensing rules or profits.

Consider that all of the computer technology from 20 years ago is completely obsolete. You can't get anything that was saved on "floppy" disks. Do new computers even have CD rom slots anymore?

We've never had a moment in human history when so little care is given to preserving our ideas or culture.

 

Perfect timing for this

Which Rock Star
Will Historians of the
Future Remember?
The most important musical form of the 20th century will
be nearly forgotten one day. People will probably learn
about the genre through one figure — so who might that be?


http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/29/m...nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share&_r=0

 

Wow. It's like Klosterman was reading this thread.

Rock — or at least the anthemic, metaphoric, Hard Rock Cafe version of big rock — has become more socially accessible but less socially essential, synchronously shackled by its own formal limitations. Its cultural recession is intertwined with its cultural absorption. As a result, what we’re left with is a youth-oriented music genre that a) isn’t symbolically important; b) lacks creative potential; and c) has no specific tie to young people. It has completed its historical trajectory.

 

It's a reasonable conclusion. But I think he's wrong. I think it will be either the Stones or Zeppelin.

Klosterman's premise is that culture will need an individual artist to carry the banner. But I think this particular genre is really about bands, not necessarily individuals. It's kind of a novelty of the art form.

 

If it's between the Stones or Zeppelin it's the Stones 99/100.

 

In my world it is. But as this gets passed on from generation to generation, the fact that Zeppelin didn't grow old together works in their favor. This will be remembered as music for rebellious youth. Of course, the Stones were that at one point, in spades. But they've papered over that legacy, in many minds, by choice. The lasting image of Zeppelin is of youthful, hard-charging showmen. They are frozen in amber in a way the Stones are not.

 

Your poetry aside -- frozen in amber is pretty good -- it's about the range of great rock music, and nothing against Zepp, but the Stones have chunks of Zepp in their stool.

 

Again, and I want to make this exceedingly clear: I agree with you.

 

I'm not saying you didn't, just pointing out I don't think Zeppelin's image is everlasting.