Music: The Age/Cool Meter?

Me and a college friend had this conversation before: that music can indicate of how "cool" or "old" a person is. Being 10 years older than me, he said that by the time you reach 30 you'll eventually fail to track cool new bands. Then you'll embrace mellower music such as Jazz and/or listen to the music you had when you were still in high school. The reason I remembered and shared all this is because I have the symptoms mentioned above.

I'm not 30 years old, yet, and I can still track new bands. But the number of bands I can find in a month is dwindling. I mean 8 years ago, before emo went full on mainstream, I'd have known 5-10 different bands (mostly unsigned) by the end of the week. Now, however, I'd be lucky enough to name 5 new bands in a month. And naming 10 bands has already become an impossible feat for me.

In addition, the bands that I usually discover are not "loud" anymore. For the past 7 months I've only listened to 5 metal/hard rock bands, 3 of which I didn't like at all, and all of them aren't that new. Nowadays, my usual find would be an indie folk band, the likes of The National or Sun Kil Moon. I even ditched Steve Vai and Joe Satriani in favor of contemporary Jazz guitarists like Norman Brown, Pat Metheny and Chuck Loeb.

As for listening to old school music, well I've bought a lot of old CDs to expand the "hard copy" of my music library. It started by buying Anthrax's The Sound of White Noise. Then Sonic Youth's Daydream Nation and Dirty. Before I realized it I've already spent more than $200 buying 90's music alone. Plus, I've been also listening to my old CDs more than my new ones. Hence, as a result, the slow updates of music reviews in this blog.

I've thought about this before, that musical deterioration happens when you get older. I've heard my Dad listen to The Eagles day in and day out. I've heard old musicians banter about how music suck nowadays. But I dismissed it as a myth, and that I'm impervious to such deterioration. But now, I just don't know. I don't want to admit it. I'm scared.