We've all heard the age-old adage, "Music isn't what it use to be." For me, as I listen to the radio these days, I find this statement to be true. Lets be honest, no matter how talented Chris Brown is, he can't hold a candle to Michael Jackson and no matter how "nasty" Tre Songz wants to be, he can't make panties drop like Prince did in his prime.... or can he?
The more and more I think about it, I realize that I am biased. I'm biased just like our parents are when they say that James Brown was a better entertainer than Michael or that Prince could never get a woman in the mood like Marvin did.
It has become obvious to me that there's more to music than just music.
The thing that really makes us excited when we hear, "Doo-Doo Brown" by Luke or "Knockin Da Boots" by H-Town, are the memories. We are instantly taken back to the time when we first heard those songs and what we were doing when they hit the airwaves. We remember a time when we didn't have a care in the world and we had our whole lives ahead of us.
To a certain extent, we were naive and our views on love and lust were untainted. Some of us believed in love at first sight and the word "forever." We actually thought that a fresh pair of acid wash jeans and some shell-top Adidas with some fat laces would make a girl want to "Go with us." Even now, we still get excited when we hear "Candy Girl" by New Edition because when it came out, we were still passing those "I like you, do you like me?" letters in homeroom and we miss that feeling.
Now when we hear a song by Mindless Behavior, (Who are Mindless Behavior? Exactly) it doesn't do anything for us because "Young kids have so much to learn," and there isn't a memory attached to it. But still, there's probably thousands of teens who have a song by them in their Ipods.
Maybe we have so much to relearn. Maybe we should listen to the radio with teenage ears. We need to see it as the artistic form of expression it is and not the logical think-piece we want it to be.
I know it may be hard to imagine, but in about twenty years, there will be a mother telling their son that he was named Drake after this rapper who was kind of a big deal back in 2010. And more than likely, we will look at her, the same way my uncle looks at my sister when she talks about my nephews Devante and DeAngelo and my nieces Mary, Faith and Lauryn.
D, nice article. However, I look back at the music we were listening to and shake my head. I have friends and family that will look back with me on music that we heard as children (not even teenagers) and some of the songs were straight wrong. As kids we had no idea the song was about sex, getting high or suicide. As for today's music, I think if I listened I would definitely shake my head right off. Music is progressively turning into inappropriate word pictures over the radio waves. I don't need to envision other people's sex lives or their lustful desires. So for me, I don't want to "turn on my past teenager ears." I have new sight and would not want to taint it with what being played.
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