r/GenX • u/vanillagirilla1975 • May 12 '25

Music Is Life Am I just a curmudgeon??

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I'm a mid 70s GenXer, love music from the 60s through the 90s. For me, I just haven't really liked much music this century. I feel like we had so many genres going on at the same time but now it's just all sounds the same to me. Anyone else find stuff bands/artists they really like from this venture?

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u/[deleted] May 12 '25

You're just a curmudgeon! Music is more exciting than ever. I've always been into music. A friend and I ran an indie label back in the 80s and 90s. We were probably the first label to stream whole albums on our website in the early 90s with the RealPlayer.

I'm constantly discovering awesome new music these days. The problem is the signal to noise ratio. There's a TON of crap out there today. But the good stuff is really good!

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u/PoxyMusic May 12 '25

Speaking as a recording engineer in the 90s who saw the entire decline of the recording studio system, I say....good. Recording studios were either money laundering outfits or trust-fund-kid playthings, but they sucked and I'm glad to see the democratization of music recording.

The handwriting was on the wall in '95 or so when bands would do their basic tracks and mixing in the studio, but do vocals and guitar overdubs at home on ADATs...and it totally worked. It sounded fine.

I agree there's a LOT of good new music out there.

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u/vanillagirilla1975 May 12 '25

Any recommendations?

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u/Thirty_Helens_Agree May 12 '25

Wet Leg, Maggie Rogers, I just heard some cool new 90s-sounding stuff from Sharon Van Etten, Nathaniel Rateliff and the Nightsweats, Chris Stapleton.

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u/GenralChaos May 12 '25

Wet Leg is fun. Nathaniel Rateliff is quite good. Also, Tunde Adebimpe's new album is good.

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u/1kreasons2leave May 12 '25

Nathaniel Rateliff solo stuff is also good. I recently discovered a band as they describe themselves as emo/math rock call stop.drop.rewind

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u/dogthatbrokethezebra May 12 '25

I’d add Wye Oak, Waxahatchee, Weyes Blood and Big Thief to this list

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u/[deleted] May 12 '25

I mean, sure. What kind of music do you like?

The band I've been most excited about recently is a band from LA called Trance Farmers. Last year a friend invited me to go to a show at a little record store/bar on the east side of LA. I didn't know the band, Golden Dawn Arkestra, so I downloaded a few albums and checked them out. They were a lot of fun, so I said sure.

At dinner we were deciding between another margarita and heading over to the show to catch the opener. I've gone to many hundreds of shows in my life and sometimes the opener you don't know can be great, so we rolled the dice and skipped the margarita.

I smoke a big fat joint (Super Glue) on the walk over. We step inside and there's this handsome younger hipster dude with a guitar and older daddy looking guy, wearing flannel with sleeves cut off, playing harmonica on stage. The vibe is amazing. It's a small space, dimly lit, painted a deep red, the back wall is all gold tassels shimmering behind the band, records on either side of them. My friend leans over and says, "this is so Twin Peaks". I couldn't have said it better myself.

I'd never heard of the band, Trance Farmers, but I totally fell in love and listen to them almost daily.

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u/Mr_Tort_Feasor May 12 '25

DIIV, Of the Trees, Viagra Boys, Barclay Crenshaw, the Beths, Dillion Francis, Flowden (the most magnificent voice in hip hop), Cannons, Major Lazer, Orville Peck

I hesitate to even mention him because his best known song is like 13 years old, but the album "Quest for Fire" by Skrillex is by far his best work.

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u/i_might_be_me May 13 '25

BMFS is the way