Rock of Ages
Published: 7/27/2012 10:36 AM
Last Modified: 7/27/2012 10:36 AM
A young co-worker wasn’t so thrilled with me blurting out her plans to go see One Direction in concert recently.
“Thanks for blowing my cover,” she said. “I didn’t want everyone to know I was going to see a teeny-bopper band.”
That last part is perhaps a paraphrase, as I’m hardly photographic in my conversational memory, but the point is true blue gospel in my house.
My girls are all teeny-bopper fanatics, forget that they range in age from 15 to 21 in a few days. Forget, also, all that edgy music that supposedly fights the power or the corporate rock world, whatever that is. My babies love melody, fun and “cute boys,” as they would wholeheartedly admit without a trace of embarrassment.
I’m pretty sure my first records were things my dad brought home, like Charley Pride or Nilsson Sings Newman. The first records I bought myself, however, were the Jackson Five and Carpenters.
I didn’t think whether they were hard rock or “legit” but that they made energetic music that was sing-alongable, if that’s a word. Both Michael Jackson and Karen Carpenter, for all their tragic troubles, are legendary talents in my mind.
It’s not like I got into Donny Osmond or Bobby Sherman or Andy Gibb. I loved the Beatles, Billy Joel and Cheap Trick, but pretty happy to rock out with Led Zeppelin, AC/DC and zone out with Pink Floyd and “The Wall.”
Well, all that noise goes right over my kids’ heads. They love the Beatles all right – who doesn’t – but from even early years the girls gravitated toward Backstreet Boys, NSync and BBMak. I just had to Yahoo those names just to make sure I spelled them right.
Well, the times they aren’t a-changing. Nowadays my little princesses listen to All-Star Weekend, Big Time Rush and the aforementioned boy band, One Direction.
The biggest difference is they are older, have some disposable income which they dispose of by buying tickets to concerts of said musical acts. Long family trips are soundtracked by albums – can you still call them that? – by the darling boys from England or Los Angeles.
The common theme of these musical wonders is that they are created by an entrepreneurial manager, not the natural progression of John meeting Paul at a church fete and forming what is only the greatest pop juggernaut of all-time (well, the last 50 years or so). Of course, I sneer at punk rock legends noting that the Sex Pistols were a nasty variation formed first in the mind of manager Malcolm McLaren.
Now, about the One Direction-eqsue music itself: the boys are melodic, formulaic and, perhaps most importantly, irresistible to young, impressionable female minds. I’ve seen my otherwise shy children jump and dance exuberantly in front of their male peers, without a hint of shame, when “What Makes You Beautiful” starts with its first few bars of low guitar notes starts pumping through the speakers.
You just got to smile, because that is the way the mass market world turns around. And when the urge to hum along gets too strong, run to your quiet place and reverently start intoning the first few lines of “Strawberry Fields” or “Beyond Belief” by Elvis Costello. It’ll make you feel better, or at least superior to younger music fans who could care less.
Then again, music should be fun, above all else. My girls get that.
Written by
Rod Walton
Staff Writer
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