Because they have no musical culture per se. And most of them don't really like music, but use it more like a sonic wallpaper.
Not sure how this is different from past generations, to be honest. Listening to BBC's Desert Island Discs over the years the numbers of guests who are genuinely interested in and informed about music - as opposed to using it as the "sonic wallpaper" you mention - is miniscule. Most people in the world aren't that deeply engaged with music and never have been.
A lot..... JB: 76 million monthly listeners on Spotify #7 worldwide BS: 40 million " " outside the top 50 1- The Weeknd 113.25 2- Taylor Swift 104.84 3- Ariana Grande 90.61 4-Rihanna 85.92 5- Drake 80.97 6- Beyoncé 78.09 7- Justin Bieber 76.38 8- Dua Lipa 76.06 9- Kanye West 75.68 10- Coldplay 74.08 11- Bruno Mars 72.61 12- SZA 72.37 13- David Guetta 72.12 14- Ed Sheeran 71.70 15- Eminem 69.12 16- Bad Bunny 68.48 17- Miley Cyrus 68.16 18- Marshmello 68.00 19- Travis Scott 67.60 20- Calvin Harris 67.26
My cousin is in her 40s and has two kids - a teen and a soon-to-be teen. She told me that there are times when she cranks up the music at home, does the air guitar thing and making music faces as tunes blast away. The kids are dumb-founded - they don't understand why she's playing the music so loud and why she's strutting around like an idiot. The whole social/cultural reason for that kind of ritual doesn't exist for young people anymore. (My wife and I don't have kids so I have no first hand means for comparison)
surely it’s just that people can appreciate music, without the need to be involved in the associated culture. I’m in my 40s, and will go and see metal, goth, rock and rap. I enjoy the music - it’s the music that’s important, everything else is largely irrelevant to me. I’ll go to a goth gig, and lots of people will dress up - but no one bats an eyelid at me who doesn’t. Music is still important.
As an older Millennial myself, I've long since moved away from any kind of musical tribalism. If anything, my music tastes has continuously evolve and expanded since I was a teenager as I still discover new and old bands alike. But I'd argue that those like myself are a very small subset of die hard music listeners.
Generations are largely ******** Some events in common sure but applying personality labels to millions of people is... .. A tactic used by less salubrious types. Racists use stereotypes for example. Don't fall for this. You may spot trends but they are no more meaningful than your fart in the wind. Get to know Gen Z and you'll find they're simply human: all alike in that they're all different Nonsense concept
What's ridiculous? Perhaps you don't understand the phrase "deeply engaged"? Or, more charitably, chose to ignore it all the better to bloviate further.
Gen Z also had more to say and more to rail against: the boomers who dried up the planets resources and fed themselves fat on land and the spoils of war, with no vision for an ethical, clean future, dooming their offspring. The Internet has opened all doors for all people Gen X were too early for it. In some ways it didn't matter.. But they were not as able to escape their predicament. Nowadays a youth can get entirely lost in the black mirror living their "real" life as some trendsetting star. Would you prefer it they were lost in records instead, perhaps. As I've said though this is labels and stereotypes. I don't believe in generations. I do think music used to be better. You don't seem to get a lot of people with a lot to say now. A certain democratisation of music technology has not let to a creative boom. As, indeed, most people have nothing truly original to convey. I don't think originality is the be and end all either, but I think there's so much music available now you have to be selective else essentially become formless, a blank slate.
Gen X here... reportedly. I never drew lines in the sand, still don't. Do I therefore assume nobody else did? No, obviously.... it existed, but it wasn't really the rule. Nothing has changed. K-pop fans from my experience don't generally dig metal... but it isn't a line in the sand it's an aesthetic preference.
Most any song is available anytime on your phone. "Classic" songs are being recyled in commercials, TV, movies and on social media clips. Today's kids have much more diversity in music available to them. Because of this, they don't to use their disposable income on purchasing albums with their money and potentially waste it on a crappy album.
Anyone lining up at midnight in 1974 for a new release LP sounds like they were an outlier for that year, not the "norm"... Never read a music history book that ever claimed people lining up at midnight for new releases in the 70s.
There is no taste, merely preference shaped on what you have been exposed to before, as well as other factors such as personality, empathy for the music's message, setting, your day, your brain chemistry The squares would love to rank music The charts are an affront to God, I think Music is mathematically and touches the divine by simply existing and making sense I believe not in a God but in that music of all forms can be sufficiently understood to the level of deep appreciation. Of course, I myself do not have room in my life to devote exactly equal time without bias I've always gone my own way I broadly prefer music of the past, though between me and my client we are enjoying rock music he's created as if it never left. Frankie me boy will sell himself two million copies or more
Those figures are the compiled totals. I'd be interested to see totals compiled of repeated listens or at least listens to more than 1 song from the same user in the same month. Spotify might not share those figures but I'm sure they are compiled internally.
I'll admit my experience in high school in the early to mid-'80s there was what you're calling tribalism. There was tendency to listen to a style of music and hang out with others with similar tastes. But going to a smaller private school, we really didn't completely diassociate ourselves from others because of musical tastes. I'll also state that I grew up in Florida where there was always new students who moved from other states. If you liked a kind of music nobody cared much as with people exporing different styles by sharing cassettes. We'd ask about what people were listening to and borrow cassettes in the morning and listen to them during study hall then return them at the end of the day. If we liked it, we made a trip to the record store to get our own copies. By the time I was in college in the late '80s being more exposed to different music in college the experience differed drastically. I also became more tolerant to the newer stuff because I was around new people in a new town. I was going to school in the Midwest with people from every state and heard a lot music that was new to me. I tend to think the Midwest was a lot different from Florida where there were distinct musical boundaries when going outside our campus. I honestly didn't care about genres at that point. I had already started to listing to what would be more widely known as Alternative music in the '90s which was completely different than the more Rock influenced stuff I stuck to in high school.
Yeah, I brought up Nirvana because those T-shirts remain all over the place. I visit a semi-local theme park like 8 times a year, and I constantly see teens/20-somethings in Nirvana shirts. Went last week and betting I saw a minimum of 10 over the day. No other band or artist comes close. Those shirts are really popular. I even found one accidentally left in the parking lot a couple years ago. In great shape and my size so I took it!
I think also the instant gratification means you invest far less in an album. A friend sends a link to a full album on YouTube (this was how I got into the Minutemen)... No obligation there If you had days traipsing thru sno just to get a particular cylinder, my own experiences mean I treasured my own hauls that way. Sometimes the story is as good as the product. How did you get into this album? "saw it on a meme" doesn't have the same ring to it There is good and bad. I remember buying u2's "all that you can't leave behind" on the same day I bought "kid a". The sunk cost fallacy lead to me giving them both exactly the same playtime. For every Kid A listen, let's fire up u2. After all I spent money on it. That policy didn't last long. I had invested, but that shortly wore off and I realised I bought a turd along with the classic. Totally invalidated in the streaming era.
I have observed the same with my kids and their friends. It’s all just music, new or old, regardless of genre.
