Up.
When I was a boy, I looked up at people older than me and shook my head.
Because they didn’t understand my music.
Morrissey waving Gladiolas around is part of what he is, OK?
It’s fine.
I looked up at the oldies and winced.
When Morrissey wrote and sang about a ‘punctured bicycle on a hillside’, these are amongst the most stunning and poetic lyrics ever written.
And this:
Why pamper life’s complexity
When the leather runs smooth
On the passenger’s seat?
It’s just bloody perfect and unique and pure.
I remember looking up at the oldies and thinking – you just don’t understand.
Down.
Sometimes, I look down at people younger than me and shake my head.
Because they don’t understand my music.
Morrissey waving Gladiolas around is part of what he is OK?
It’s fine.
I look down at these young things and wince.
When Morrissey writes and sings about a punctured bicycle on a hillside, these are amongst the most stunning and poetic lyrics ever written.
And this:
Why pamper life’s complexity
When the leather runs smooth
On the passenger’s seat?
It’s just bloody perfect and unique and pure.
I look down at the young and think – you just don’t understand.
Here it is: http://www.50odd.co.uk/up-down/
4 Comments
I think that whatever floats your boat between the ages of about 12 and 21 is what you carry around forever.
You can come to appreciate your parents’ music, especially if you have young parents like I do ( my Dad is only 19 years older than me).
You can also love new music, but I feel it never quite gets as ingrained as the 12-21 stuff. Play me a melody from that era and if I was into that band I can probably still make a reasonable fist of the lyrics. Plus, I’ll remember who in the band wrote it. What the name of the drummer was. Etc, etc, etc. Because then it was really important.
Perhaps for us 50odds it was even more important because back than we had tribes, real ‘if you’re not in my tribe I’ll punch you in the head’ tribes. Your music helped to define who you were and you’d be willing to defend it with violence if necessary.
Then we all went raving and danced ourselves into a loved-up frenzy.
But now I rather like the fact that my daughter plays non stop grime and other unfathomable variations of rap. I love my old school Eric B and Rakim and Afrika Bambaataa records, but I can’t abide the stuff that spews from her speakers, and even when I think its good, I pretend to her that I hate it, because that is how it should be.
Hello Shaughan.
That’s all really personal.
I think music is isn’t it.
I ‘hold on’ to ‘my’ music and I think that’s what his little tale is about.
The fact that I have held music from my youth with me.
Rain by The Cult I as listening to the other day.
When I was younger my mum thought this was bonkers.
Now younger people think it’s bonkers.
I think it’s sublime.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RD5b_0QB0wI
M.
I can certainly relate to that, growing up listening to ELO, where I’d “borrow” my dad’s floating UFO cover album when he was at the pub! I can still hold the lyrics to Mr Blue Sky in my head some 35+ years on!
Then as Shaugn points out the music changed massively and where before I could share a poignant moment with my dad, suddenly became lost in 120bpm repetitive thudding acid house music! Oh the time was glorious and everyone lived for the weekend in the Madchester scene and travelling to clubs far and wide became the norm.
Now as my 2 young daughters get a little older and are beginning to embrace new things, that poignancy is resurrected between a dad and their child, but only until Miley fuckin Cyrus comes on!
OK.
This is important.
We need an ELO-off.
I know their songs as I had a lot of their tapes (yes tapes) which I could rewind like a magician, with my HB.
(Some people won’t understand that sentence. You will).
M.