Today, I am grateful for music. It just makes life better. And the quality of music seems (to me) like it’s gotten better; or I suppose I should say maybe that my access to good music has gotten better in that time frame.
I recall in the 80s and early 90s when I bailed on pop radio because I thought everything was so awful. And I’m not exactly a man of discerning tastes. But, even for me, the hodgepodge of bubble gum metal, boy bands, and ballads was intolerable. I retreated to classic rock and enjoyed it well enough. I had friends who were into harder metal. I didn’t hate the stuff, but never really got into bands like Megadeath or Metallica, let alone stuff like Morbid Angel, Cannibal Corpse, or Slayer. Nirvana came along with “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” and while I wasn’t a huge fan of grunge, I was definitely thankful they shook things up in the radio world a bit. In the wake of grunge, some neo-punk bands like Green Day and Blink-182 got air play and caught my attention. Turns out, punk gave me the aggression of metal but with a stripped-down nimbleness that I liked better than the more cumbersome metal.
Nowadays, radio is not nearly the bottleneck it was for someone like me back in the 80s. True music enthusiasts always found the good music. I appreciated music, but wasn’t that active in looking for it. With sites like Pandora serving up a wider variety of music and like iTunes, allowing you to buy individual songs at a fairly nominal price, you’re not in for the major commitment of spending $10 – $15 on an album. Now, I have easy access to the 50s music my Dad schooled me in; the guilty pleasure of a few Neil Diamond songs hardwired into my brain by being on a loop in my house as a kid; the Johnny Cash songs I’ve discovered I love; Rage Against the Machine songs I would have wrongly thought were too heavy; the occasional really catchy techno song; Me First and the Gimmee Gimmes who put a speed/punk spin on old classics and pop tunes; and Jonathan Coulton, Internet troubadour among a lot, lot more.
So, hooray music!
Good one about bubble gum metal! I used to call it “Candy Chrome”, a cross between bubble gum and heavy metal.
And where would we be if not for The Pixies?
The music I am thankful right now is Joanie Madden’s “Song of the Irish Whistle, Pt 1.” Not too chieftain-y at all (as much as I like them, their sets really jumble into one big jig, at least for my ears.). Every piece on this CD pairs the whistle with a different instrument: piano, guitar, fiddle, Irish pipes, bodhran, one I can’t identify, and even tapping shoes, and so the arrangements evoke more flavors and moods and interest than are usual for “Irish” music.