"These kids and their-- uh, MY-- friggin' music!!"

I work in a college library, so I see a lot of 17-24 year old kids, and I've noticed more than ever that music that was popular back when I was that age (adolescence, roughly 1977-1988, also known as the Golden Age Of Music, haha) is still popular with kids that age.

To wit: as I sit here at my desk on the library floor, there is a 19-year-old girl sitting in the lounge area, her bookbag emblazoned with a PINK FLOYD patch... in other words, she's a fan of a band that not only made its last meaningful record and (for all intents and purposes) broke up several years before she was even BORN... but a band with band members who are old enough to be not only her parents, but her GRANDPARENTS.

I mean, have you seen a picture of Syd Barrett lately?

When I was that age (ahem!) most kids my age didn't listen to ANYTHING that our parents were into... there were a few weirdos (most of them my friends) whose parents were into classical and passed THAT along to them... but we really didn't know anyone whose parents were cool enough (or young enough) to have caught even the first wave of rock and roll. To most of them, rock 'n' roll smelled phony and false... a music sung, played, and written for the most part by cretinous goons and by means of its almost imbecilic reiteration, and sly, lewd, in plain fact, dirty lyrics managed to be the martial music of every sideburned delinquent on the face of the earth.... the most brutal, ugly, desperate, vicious form of expression it was their misfortune to hear. And we didn't much care for THEIR music either. It wasn't until I got into college that I actually started listening to my Dad's favorite, Frank Sinatra.

Contrast that with today. If you're my age (35-50) you can pretty much name ANY band or artist you were into at that age (13-24) and you'll see kids that age sporting the gear, clothes and swag and, if you were to pry into their iPod playlists, you'd probably hear some pretty familiar stuff... Beatles, Ramones, Black Flag, the Doors, Led Zep, Bob Marley... all acts that (again) were pretty much HISTORY before most college kids were even born.

This was their PARENTS' music and yet they in their youth have taken ownership of it. Which is cool, but in a way, it seems kind of weird to be sitting here seeing kids still listening and relating to artists and bands I was into before they were even born.

What gives?? More thoughts on this as they come to me...