As a Gen-Xer, the 1980s is My Favorite Musical Decade

But My Musical Tastes Span Back to the 1960s

See the previous installments in this ongoing discussion on music between this publication’s Publisher/Editor-In-Chief David Swindle, Art Director/Associate Editor Mike Kilgore, and now senior columnist/author Alec Ott is joining us:

1. What's in your wallet... er... music library?

2. Who Is Generation X's Greatest Black Musician? Here's My Vote

3. Generation X's Greatest Black Musician? Rihanna, In My Humble Opinion.

4. Rihanna is an Xer-Leaning Millennial! Try Again, Mike!

5. I Didn't Do My Due Diligence, or How I Have to Pick a Favorite Black Gen X Musician For Real This Time.

6. Why Rap & Country Are So Challenging and Why I Much Prefer Tupac Shakur to Will Smith

7. Music. The GotD Frontier

8. The Inaugural "Mike's Music Morning" post

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I suppose the decade a generation can claim is that one in which we had a coming of age. That seems to be the standard for claiming a decade in our culture. I claim the 1980s. Let me identify myself first as an early member of Generation X. I was born in 1966, which is at least a year into the range for this generation, generally described as 1965 to 1980. (A more general range has been said to be the mid-1960s to early-1980s.) I was four years old when the 1960’s ended, and I spent the 1970s in elementary school, graduating the 8^th Grade in 1980. I was in the class of 1984 for high school, and 1988 for college. The 1990s and beyond for me are characterized by grown-up married life and fatherhood, and my “career” employment.

One important attribute of a being a Gen-Xer is that we are proudly not Baby Boomers. This is especially important for one whose birth year is alarmingly close to Baby Boomer territory. For that matter, my parents were not Baby Boomers either, firmly at the end of the Silent Generation. I know plenty of wonderful Baby Boomers—most of my in-laws are in that generation—but basically, the stereotypical “Hippie” Baby Boomer is everything that a Gen-Xer does not want to be. I’ve never liked or been attracted to the Hippie culture; Prep, probably because it was the opposite of the Hippies, was the thing in my day. Not that I’ve ever been much of a follower of fashion.

In spite of all that, the 1960s and Baby Boomers’ music have a strong pull on me personally. Many of my all-time favorite bands are from the 1960s. With no older brother to set me straight, my first favorite band was the Monkees. My longest-standing, never to change from that place, favorite group is the Beatles (who, we must remind ourselves, were not Baby Boomers, but of the Silent Generation). And yet, while I may have been born in the 1960s, I do not claim it as my own. For one thing, I have very little personal memory of the 1960s. But perhaps even more importantly, the Baby Boomers claim the 1960s as their own. And they are welcome to it.

My musical tastes were formed by listening to Rock & Roll stations. Back in the 1980s in the Washington, D.C. area, I listened to WWDC 101 (DC/101), and they played all the greats from the 60s until the then present day ‘80s. My favorites then and still are (although not an inclusive list):

• The Beatles

• The Alan Parsons Project

• Rush

• The Who

• Yes

• The Cars

• Blue Oyster Cult

• Duran Duran

• Led Zeppelin

• Pink Floyd

• Genesis

• April Wine

• Peter Gabriel

• Paul McCartney and Wings

Today it’s Classic Rock, then it was simply Rock. Although admittedly we also had Classic Rock stations by the mid-80s, these stations were playing 1960s, 70s and very early 80s stuff only. DC/101 was also playing Progressive Rock back then, so I heard bigger alternative acts like The Fixx, Tears for Fears, Gary Neuman, The Alarm, The Clash, Flock of Seagulls, Simple Minds and Midnight Oil. My other long-standing favorite from this period is The Alan Parsons Project, often played on that station.

My wife, helped by having older siblings, got into 1980s alternative and new wave before it was cool. With her help, I learned to appreciate this music more during the 1990s. I can add as favorites now alternative bands, such as China Crisis, Big Audio Dynamite, Echo & the Bunnymen, Icehouse, Joe Jackson, Level 42, Talk Talk, Naked Eyes, The Psychedelic Furs, Thomas Dolby, Spandau Ballet, ABC, The Church, just to name a few.

To be sure, I have several favorite artists from after the 1980s, but I must admit that most come from the 1960s until 1990. So while these acts came from the 1960s, 70s, and 80’s, the 80’s was chiefly the time that I got to know them. So, the 1980s are it for me. I claim them!

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