In This Issue
The radio doesn’t tell me what music to like anymore. That’s not to say I am not told what music to like—Paste Magazine tells me about the Decemberists and their chamber pop genius. WOXY, the groundbreaking and constantly-on-the-brink-of-being-shut-down internet radio station tells me about The Whigs and their return to Springsteen rock. Stereogum.com and MyOldKentuckyBlog tell me about Lupe Fiasco and his Muslim-influenced Chi-town message. The knowledgeable, intimidating and cute glasses-wearing checkout girl at LUNA records tells me about the melodical, foul-mouthed and cute British accent-having Kate Nash. But if I was a teenager today, radio would tell me about Seven Mary Three. And I’d probably love them.
That’s not to say the alternative music of today is as good as ’90s alt-rock. The ’90s was a rare time in modern music when the majority listened to good (both critically and popularly) music. I was fortunate to grow up in the last era of radio reflecting quality and quantity. Now everybody listens to terrible (critically, not popularly) music, but we can’t blame or praise the listener for either. I can’t take credit for Pearl Jam and Green Day’s longevity, and I can’t ridicule my students for waiting hours in line for Fall Out Boy and Panic! At the Disco. I mean, hell. While I love to tout discovering Wilco and Local H at X-Fest, I hide the fact that I also discovered Matchbox 20 and Sugar Ray.
Throughout the last 15 years, history has cut the fat of our alternative rock memories (see Cracker, Dishwalla, Offspring) and left a hefty portion of meat (see Pearl Jam, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Radiohead). Unfortunately for today’s angst-ridden teenage radio listener, there’s not much meat, so they’ll be chewing the fat for quite some time.
Reflecting on my journey as a music enthusiast being raised in the Midwest, the road bobs and weaves through genres, girlfriends and radio stations. Whenever I hear Foreigner, REO Speedwagon or Chicago’really, any of the TIME-LIFE Soft Rock Collection, featured on late-night television and promoted by the two oddly-accented gentlemen from Air Supply’I am transported to my mom’s wood-paneled station wagon as she runs errands and softly rocks to 97.1 WENS.
Motown artists and the Beach Boys take me back to my discovery of falling asleep to the crackle of headphones bent from starting the night on my head and ending underneath my pillow. As a grade-schooler, I was given a Walkman and would wear it in my top bunk, listening to the oldies station, GOLD 104.5. The high-pitched twinge of ’Gin N Juice’ takes me back to Bobby Heath’s basement, listening to Hoosier Hot 96! as a middle-schooler trying to avoid the social embarrassment of having no clue (a) who Snoop Doggy Dogg was, (b) what made his chronic so bubonic and (3) why his mind was on his money (and vice versa).
My high school existence revolved around our alternative station, X103. I would sprint to my car when the bell struck 3 in an effort to see if they had accepted my ’three at 3:00’ requests. My summers would kick off with X-Fest at Deer Creek (formerly named after the nature its construction destroyed; currently named after a telephone). X-Fest provided the alternative rock atmosphere necessary to make my first move on a girl. It was the old ’whoops, I casually plopped my hand down on yours...I guess I’ll just keep it there’ move.
In college while I was busy hosting ’The Big Dork Show’ at the University of Dayton’s college radio station, scavenging the College Music Journal and CD stacks for Modest Mouse and Wilco albums, something happened to radio. Only I didn’t realize that until I emerged four years later as a bright-eyed high school teacher when I returned to Indianapolis and was greeted by teenagers whose musical tastes were also being raised by X103. Only now, it sucked.
The early-mid-’90s era of alternative music was an odd amalgamation of bands who somehow achieved popularity and critical acclaim. Everyone listened to Nirvana and every critic slobbered over Kurt’s Converses and dirty hair. The praises of Seattle rockers Soundgarden, Pearl Jam and the endless list of JV grungers were being sung by mainstream media and the tragically hip (the turn of phrase, not the Canadian band). The Red Hot Chili Peppers were marrying grunge and funk, while Nada Surf was marrying spoken-word teenage dating etiquette with beautiful cheerleaders at football players.
But what’s considered popular alternative music now, at least according to teenagers’which is to say, according to radio’is rarely critically acclaimed. Nickelback is successful and they suck. Linkin Park is following in the gigantic missteps of Kid Rock and Limp Bizkit. Good Charlotte is dating Lionel Richie’s daughter, for God’s sake. But my students love Nickelback, Linkin Park and Good Charlotte. They love those bands as much as I love Weezer, The Lemonheads and Beck. So it makes me wonder: if I was a teenager in 2008, would I love shitty bands’
But first, a confession: I had planned for this article to rip apart the current generation of teenagers and their music. I was going to list the merits of alt-rock, flannel, long hair (without eye liner) and albums named Dookie. At the time, everyone agreed these qualities were awesome. And in retrospect, they’re still awesome. But as I tried to trace my fandom beyond what mainstream radio and TV told me was awesome to the bands that I discovered and chose to love rather than being told to love them, I drew a blank. It became quite clear: MTV told me what to like.
Now, I’m not going to pile on MTV. Though it’s popular to dismiss their program as an endless loop of teen porn and ring tones, it essentially serves the same purpose in the lives of young America that it did in 1984 and 1994’its level of influence today is no different than its influence when it told me about Green Day and Candlebox. What’s changed is the pacing of its musical dictation.
The ’90s featured an MTV that spent 120 Minutes each Sunday night exploring alternative music and exposing the audience to Dinosaur Jr. and Nine Inch Nails. Dave Kendall premiered the ’Smells Like Teen Spirit’ video in 120 Minutes, not a countdown show. Alternative Nation brokethe typical cycle of music videos with the Breeders, Spacehog and The Eels, assuring that if I watched for an hour or two, I was bound to get another precious glimpse of that bikini-clad chick with the lizard tongue in Soundgarden’s ’Black Hole Sun’ video. And if the fart jokes and bunghole references were blocked out, Beavis and Butthead could be heard featuring tastes of the ultra-alternative videos of the Juliana Hatfield Theory and They Might Be Giants.
But as we all know, MTV abandoned music videos as their bread and butter. In retrospect, inviting Jerry Springer to Spring Break was the sure sign they had abandoned ship on the idea of music television. MTV Spring Break wasn’t always about pranks and skanks. It’s ridiculous to think now, but Radiohead once played at the MTV Beach House. Yeah, that Radiohead. But when the co-eds started getting more camera time than the bands in an apparent effort to save film and improve ratings, they stopped inviting the bands to the beach house altogether. I think Don McLean wrote some really long song about this.
Here’s the point: just because MTV stopped playing music videos and filming Unplugged doesn’t mean it stopped influencing the music teens listen to. They consolidated 120 Minutes into TRL. They replaced Beavis and Butthead with LC and Heidi. Instead of kids discovering REM because of Michael Stipe dancing oddly in a wooden shack, they discovered Vampire Weekend because they hear 15 seconds on their song in between episodes of The Gauntlet. And as the attention span of teenage America decreased, so too did the ability for MTV, or any other mainstream outlet, to take a critical look at bands. They have to take Clear Channel’s word for it, just like I took X103’s word that Butthole Surfers would conquer the musical world.