Music

How the Baby Boomers Stole Music

If you follow music and pop culture at all, you’ll know that the Baby Boomer generation has been mythologizing the music of their youth for the past couple of decades.  

This is not to say that the music of the Beatles, the Stones, Zep, Sabbath and all the rest of those acts who now fall under the umbrella of “classic rock” weren’t any good.  They certainly were.  And they deserve all the praise they receive.  But there’s something beyond that.

Check out this article from The Quietus on the subject:

One of the lead stories on Radio 4’s Today programme at 8am on June 12th, 2013, concerned an interview given by Bishop of London Richard Chartres. In it, he said that his generation – the baby boomers born and brought up after the Second World War – were hoovering up an unfair proportion of our resources.

“Much of that is absorbed by the fortunate generation to which I belong in ways which raise questions – severe questions – of intergenerational equity,” he said. Shortly before the next news bulletin, listeners enjoyed an extended, eight-minute report on a new eBook of former Beatles drummer Ringo Starr’s “never-before-seen” photographs.

There followed a discussion, heavy with the fug of nostalgia, on the importance of these photographs and what they told us, before it broadened out to encompass the important cultural legacy of Starr’s infamous hair salon.

It wasn’t hard to grasp the irony of the bishop’s words being juxtaposed with this report, for it’s not just fiscal and state resources that the post-war generation have greedily consumed at the expense of those who have come since, but cultural oxygen too. 

It’s worth the read.  Keep going.

Alan Cross

is an internationally known broadcaster, interviewer, writer, consultant, blogger and speaker. In his 40+ years in the music business, Alan has interviewed the biggest names in rock, from David Bowie and U2 to Pearl Jam and the Foo Fighters. He’s also known as a musicologist and documentarian through programs like The Ongoing History of New Music.

Alan Cross has 38019 posts and counting. See all posts by Alan Cross

One thought on “How the Baby Boomers Stole Music

  • With respect, us boomers own the music of the 60’s and 70’s which has influenced everything that followed.

    Reply

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