Is it any different, though? We vaguely knew of bands like the Beatles and Stones but it was U2, Duran Duran, and so on that we embraced. Just as the Beatles and Stones were sometimes derided a "geezer rock" by our generation, so U2 and Duran Duran are given the same treatment by the new generation. We looking at the boomers' affectations and sayings ("groovy, man") as quaint and added our own to the vocabulary.

Thing is, we need to stop thinking that our generation's bands and fashions were the be-all and end-all of culture. That's the same thinking that rejects popular music because it isn't like Beethoven and Mozart. New bands and styles come and go. The next generation will have their sounds and bands and will think Green Day and Arcade Fire are "geezer rock" (actually, I think the former have already slid into that trap, to be honest). Or they will rediscover them resulting in endless reunion tours long after those bands have run their course.

Personally, I find most bands/artists tend to peak and then slide. That leaves the door open for new artists to take over the spotlight. The old bands may still be good but their best years are behind them. While I might prefer The Joshua Tree to American Idiot, I would take American Idiot over almost anything U2 has done since Achtung Baby!. And Arcade Fire may well be the most creative, musically talented since the Beatles. Certainly, I'd take any of their albums over U2's best (as good as U2 is).

The thing is, those new bands themselves often embrace and are influenced by the older bands even as they take those musical ideas in new directions. Look at Green Day. I can hear elements of everyone from John Lennon to The Clash to U2 in their music and yet it is quite definitely Green Day and they can be appreciated and enjoyed whether you know those influences or not.

There are artists who manage to keep their skill and creativity up over a longer term and do have "legs". Our friend Kate Bush is one. Leonard Cohen is another. But even they've had their ups and downs and, if pressed, I'm not sure that I would argue that 50 Words for Snow is really in the same creative league as Hounds of Love. And those artists are often ones who take long breaks (Cohen and Bush have both gone whole decades without putting out new material) or slave over their work for years (Bush is a notorious perfectionist and rarely puts out an album in less than 5 years), not the ones who put out an album like clockwork every two years and tour constantly in between.

In the end, I'd suggest that the kids of today will come to know Michael Jackson and Duran Duran in their time but will never embrace them as we did. This is not necessarily a bad thing. The universe evolves. So does human culture. I've come to appreciate that fact. I can go from a Beethoven sonata to a Lloyd Webber musical to The Beatles to Arcade Fire without flinching. It's all music and it all has creativity and beauty.

Mendalla

Every generation laments that the next generations aren't more like them. It's a universal constant that you can count on. The more extreme examples point to these differences as evidence that the world is about to end. Now that I've been around a few decades, it's easier to see the pattern.

I'm looking forward to people complaining that the new generation doesn't know what an iPhone is.

I didn't know the names of the bands my parents listened to, neither did I know who had their faces on the silent screens of theatres of their day.

I'd say it is normal for each generation to have its own news, sports heros, stars of the screen etc.

Sure seems to rankle some of us as we realise that we are turning into the older generation!

Well, I was saying it sort of tongue in cheek, shocked that my times have slipped away already, and playing on the things older folks used to say to me!

Yeah I remember thinking Robert Plant was geezer rock. This girl actually lamented that today's music is crap compared to my day, when Muchmusic actually played good music. Poor thing was embarrased she thought I meant New Wave was a band. We were lucky I think. There was a musical revolution in the 80's, and we had music video like today's generation just doesn't. 

True, and isn't it sad how the best years of a career slip away like that. Not always the case though. Thigns can be even more profound in maturity and make the younger stuff sound imature and naive. LIke the difference between talking to a teenage guy about things, then talking to a man my age who knows a whole lot more of the things I know and then some.

Yeah, Isn't it great when you can taste those influences, like knowing somthing the youngn's don't! It's totally like that with Muse. 

Yes, musical evolution is good. Let's hope that our music will be absorbed into the repertoire of the current generation too, like we have ammassed other musics. 

Yeah It all happens over and over. Didn't anybody pick up on my sarcasm? ; )  I'm not really rankled, just joking. Mostly.

I'm waitin' for a reply by Mike Patterson!   

I mean really? What young generation is complete without this?

I was just watching a early Duran slideshow and ya know, I think we are braver when we're young, less to fear, not set in our ways, open minded, and we create new things out of that. We venture forwards, a little bit more each generation. I am sad that it takes so much more for me to do something new now. 

I got your sarcasm Elanorgold! 

I was one of those weird kids who actually enjoyed "geezer" music (not just rock) - lol! I enjoyed the music so much that I actually bought some of CD versions of my parents Vinyl records - The Beatles and Peter, Paul and Mary, for example. I've also been known to belt out "Ring of Fire" and croon along with "What A Wonderful World" on occasion. I now cringe, however, at some of my own adolescent musical choices! New Kids on the Block - what was I thinking???

Ah, so you were a New Kids fan eh! chuckle...  I had a friend who was in grade 9. 

But yeah, we got into the 60's stuff as cool starting around age 16. I bought my first Beatles album when I was 16, and got into Pink Floyd at 15, and Zeppelin and the Doors at 16. When they were young though, not their older versions ; )   Robert Plant was pretty groovy in the 60's. It was weird liking the young PF, not the old one, and at the same time being attracted to them, yet feeling they were off limits because they didn't exist like that any more, almost like watching inspirational role model Uncles when they were young, knowing full well they were now in their 50's. But Gilmour, he was a role model for future crushes for me ; )   Now I find him hot anyway. 

So maybe the teens today look at our 80's groups, find them inspirational in that Uncle way, yet cant stomach their mature selves. When I saw Duran in Vancouver in 2003, the audience was mostly thirtysomething women, but there were some teenage guys. That was a hopeful sign.