Hi, Gen X here (54) with a Gen Z kid (17). I remember very vividly that for all of my teenage years and maybe into my early 20s, there was a lot of tribalism among the people who liked particular musical genres, and the battle lines were very clearly drawn. The metal people would not associate with the punk people, who would not associate with the goth people, and so on and so forth. It was very intense, and there was really no crossing those boundary lines. Today, it seems like Gen Z (as typified by my son, his friends, my nephews, etc.) doesn't care about any of that stuff at all and will listen to anything. They will listen to Rush, then Bruce Springsteen, then Echo & the Bunnymen, then Supertramp, then Ghost, etc., etc. They appear to have no use for any of the labels or boundaries at all, and I have to say that if what I'm observing is indicative of a more widespread phenomenon, then I think that's great. There are people I went to high school with who I became friends with in adulthood, and the only reason we weren't friends in high school was because they belonged to a different musical "tribe" than I did. It strikes me as kind of a shame to miss out on worthwhile people over something like that. Has anyone else observed this? I hope so because I think it's very healthy and music itself has no boundaries. There's no reason human beings should create boundaries around it in my opinion, and I really do hope it's a relic of the past.
It's not so much that the youth today are more evolved/enlightened than we were, it's more that music is so unimportant that creating bonds/drawing lines over it would never occur to them.
I don't know about that. They listen to music all the time. I think it's more that they're not deriving their whole identities from it.
In my limited experience, only a certain percentage of teenagers way back when defined themselves by music first. The kids who listened to only metal were outcasts first, and metal became the soundtrack to being an outcast, vs the other way around. But there’s no doubt that kids today listen much more widely. I’d barely heard a pop song that wasn’t in English until I was well into my 20s, now many of the biggest artists and genres come from countries that don’t speak English.
Well, some things are just unforgivable! I had already graduated high school by then, so I had a lot less exposure to that music.
I think you're probably right, but those examples you cited aren't that diverse. All but Ghost could at this point be considered classic rock. Also, music camps when we were that age were mostly about new groups at the time not bands that had been around for decades.
Just because you listen to music all the time, it doesn't mean it's important to you. It can be background noise while you're preoccupied with other tasks. Can you honestly say that your kids care about music as much as you did at their age?
Yes! That's correct. Again, I think that's great. Some of my favorite music is not sung in English and it saddens me when people reject certain music just because it's not sung in their own language.
Pretty sure not many people in the US were even listening to or fans of rave and techno music! I think only UK and Australians will get this comment, considering the historical context.
Actually yes. He runs into my room all the time to play me some new thing that he's heard, and since he was just in the high school musical a couple of months ago and totally crushed his performance of "Highway to Hell," I have to conclude it's important to him.
True. Your musical tastes are bound to be more diverse when you have a little machine in your pocket that can dial up anything that pops into your head. Can't imagine having that during those formative years.
I was in high school in the late 90s/early 2000s and I don't remember any tribalism like that at all, aside from the male/female split over the Backstreet Boys.
I think you have to consider that Albums are no longer of much significance to younger listeners. I am basing that on talking to Gen Zers over the past 4 years. They all listen to playlists instead. I found precisely one Gen Zer going to college who admitted to listening to a particular album repeatedly as a 16 year old but it was her brother's CD. The distinctions become less when it is is just some impulsively organized playlist vs an entire album constructed by a band.
This was the music favoured by tracksuit wearing chavs. Never had an issue with punks, metallers, indie kids, goths ect....
That's absolutely true. They don't care about albums at all. And since I relented and listen to music on my phone all the time, I caught the playlist bug too.
I would submit that the percentage who care about albums may not have changed all that much, but now, you don’t have to care about albums. Once upon a time being able to hear the music you wanted to hear meant buying albums. That was the primary unit of sale and what most hardware was oriented around. That’s no longer true. But there are quite a few Gen Z kids collecting vinyl too, and I mean going into record stores and flipping through the bins. It’s just a different pursuit.
I'm a Gen X'er and consider myself lucky that I have always seen it as a music or non-music binary. If you like music, you win. If you like politics, sports, religion, well - you win less in my book. If you like bluegrass, you win. If you like gospel harmony, you win. If you like rap, you win. If you like Django, you win. If you like Dimebag, you win. If you like Dvořák, you win. I love it all. As someone with the incredible good fortune to work with Gen Z, and soon Gen Alpha, I do think that some of the tribalism has broken down - but there is still conflict between kids who go out of their way to indulge in the obscure, and kids who gleefully enjoy what is popular.
I think that's one big reason why. I'm the same age as the OP. My friends and I would all listen to music together. In the car...in our rooms...on the boombox out on the porch..where ever. So, people did connect over music more back then. These days, from what I've seen, most younger folks listen to their own music on their phones. I didn't hang out with my kids all the time, but I don't recall hearing them listening to music with their friends nearly as much as I did when I was a teen.
It was only more tribal for Gen X because we didn't have the greater exposure to diverse knowledge that we now have today. Gen Z has more access to this than Gen X did back then.
I think they still listen with friends, just more in private now. Although some of them do blast their music for all to hear.
Physical media is a niche market whether vinyl or CD. So yes some very small percentage of Zers listen to Albums while some very small percentage of all listeners listen to classical or jazz or bluegrass etc.
It's not a judgement on the kids. They just don't care about music like we used to. And why would they? The entire way you consume music has changed. It's not good or bad. It just is.
