It’s official. I’m old. And not just because my wife just had a birthday. I’m old because the then-new music I listened to in high school is now Classic Rock.
Of course, they don’t call it “classic rock.” They call it alternative or progressive or something like that. But when a station plays “Lump” and “Vaseline” and “The Sweater Song” in their regular rotation, you know something’s up. That’s what happened with the new format for 104.1 out of Hartford. As I type, their most recently played songs are by Bush, All-American Rejects, Nirvana, M.I.A., Beastie Boys, Coldplay, Chevelle, (old) Radiohead, Soul Coughing, Stone Temple Pilots, The Killers, and Live. So yeah, they mix in some new stuff by Spoon or Plain White T’s, but they are clearly targeting people my age with the music we grew up with. (Wait a second, does that imply a grew up?) So I guess their target demographic are the people who look back with nostalgia on “Runaway Train” and “No Rain” the way that people older than me looked back on “Two Tickets to Paradise” and “Benny and the Jets.”
So this is what it feels like to be old.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Friar_Tuck responded // Aug 27, 2008 at 11:23 am
I am a bit older than you. How can the thriller album and video be 25 years old next year?
2 jeff O replied // Aug 29, 2008 at 9:24 am
worst day ever….
3 Andy responded // Sep 7, 2008 at 5:28 am
In my opinion (if you can swallow your pride) not the worst day yet: you know that you haven’t liked a great majority of all that new stuff (or you have just felt intimidated by it and overwhelmed since you don’t have as much listening time as you would like) and deep down you would like to hear a bit more of “Mayonaise” or “Spoonman” or “Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town” on the radio.
Well, maybe this would be more accurate if I replaced the “you” in the above with an “I”. But I am too proud to admit it.
4 Andy added // Sep 7, 2008 at 5:29 am
PS. I still stop what I am doing to listen when I hear “Benny and the Jets”. Should I be admitting this stuff for the world to read?
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