So it’s either already obvious, or about to be so, that I know very little about programming. I was a graphic designer and animator for a very long time, so I know just enough programming to be good at that. But I’m no expert. So please do not take this post too seriously. Scratch that. Definitely don’t take this post seriously at all.
So, programming. I’ve got this pet theory (I’ve got all kinds of pet theories. When you get to be of a certain age you’ll find that your calcifying brain has developed a great many of them, and they’re all probably a little bonkers). The theory is that laying about amidst all the billions of lines of code generated over the last few generations are millions of bits of forgotten and leftover code that behave in strange and unintended ways. The Ghosts in The Machine.
Our brains are like that.
So here is the lede that I of course have buried: Every generation, probably since the word “generation” was created, thinks the generation that follows them is clueless (or weird, off, strange, lazy, entitled, impatient, irrereverent, disrespectful, unambitous, …). Huh, there have been times in my life when I’ve been all of those things. Interesting.
Shit. I did it again. I buried the lede again. Here it is for real: I read a post the other day about how music today is awful. The complaint hit all the usual notes (see what I did there?). The poster wrote that today’s music is lazy, overproduced garbage with no soul. That the artist didn’t even make the music, their computer did. They wrote that today’s music couldn’t compare with the music of his childhood. Boring, and wrong. My theory is that no matter when you were born, what era you grew up in, no matter how much you love or don’t love music, every generation’s music was 10% great and 90% crap. That’s my pet theory, and I’m sticking to it.
When someone plants a flag and proclaims that “music today is garbage compared to the music when I was young”, their little Ghosts in The Machine have revealed themselves.
Here’s an example: I love ‘80’s music. Love it. I started the ‘80s at 10 years old, and I turned 21 in 1990. The 80’s were my youth. I’ve spent years curating an ‘80’s playlist. I also listen to music everyday. It’s a huge deal to me. So when I think about the year I graduated High School, 1987, those memories have a soundtrack. But if you were to go back and look at the charts from 1987, most of the songs would at best be forgettable, and at worst undiluted trash. Some of them so embarrassing it makes me ashamed to have graduated that year.
Ugh. It’s awful. For every “Luka” by Suzanne Vega there were nine “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now” by Starship. F$%king embarrassing.
I’m not going to wade into personal tastes, though if you’re a grown human who loves Starship and thinks “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now” totally deserves it’s #5 spot, you’ve made some very weird and probably off-putting life choices. Anyway…
10% great, 90% crap. I think as we get older we memorialize the songs of our youth. Our Little Ghosts have attached themselves to our memories and taken on the warm glow of nostalgia. The music from everyone’s childhood is anodyne. It’s human nature.
But most of it sucks. Are there songs made today by people who didn’t play their instuments? Yep. But guess what? That’s always happened. Hell, look up Leland Sklar’s discography. He’s a session bassist who played on hundreds of famous albums. Hundreds.
Have some artists today become famous with songs they didn’t write? Yep. But that also has always happened. In 1987, the #4 song of the year (right above Starship’s opus “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now” was “I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)” by Whitney Houston. Written by George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam.
10% great, 90% crap. But don’t get me wrong, I’m not naive nor particularly judgemental. As long as the artists aren’t taking credit for other people’s work, it’s fine if they’re sampling someone else’s work, or employing one of the greatest bass players of all time, or hiring a songwriter. A great song is a great song. It’s just that nine out of ten songs are decidedly, empirically, aggressively, not great.
Meh. Whatever. I’m going to go make some ramen and listen to some Billy Idol. Yeah, I know that most of it is crap, but that 10% is so, so good.
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