I know this is something every generation will say, but what happened to good music? It’s like I’ve been in a coma for the last two decades. I don’t listen to the radio and I don’t want to watch Rage; I’m totally out of the loop when it comes to new music. There’s a reason for this… it all seems to suck. Every now and then an okay group pops onto the scene and I’ll give them a few spins, but before long they often become rubbish to my ears. Of course some of the older bands still tour and release new music, but outside of those dinosaurs there’s almost nothing for me to sink my teeth into. Everything feels like recycled crap.
I’m not a seventies or eighties kind of guy. For me, music really came alive in the very early nineties. Sure, there are brilliant tunes and groups from the sixties, but my musical watershed was the grunge scene of the 1990s — bands like Nirvana and Pearl Jam, Mudhoney, Sonic Youth. Those groups, especially Nirvana, killed off the awful era of hair bands like Kiss, Aerosmith, Motley Crue and Guns N’ Roses. Nirvana singlehandedly changed a generation and inspired countless other bands. Then came Nu Metal in the mid-nineties — Korn, Deftones, Limp Bizkit, System of a Down, Linkin Park, Slipknot and the like. Though not as groundbreaking as some grunge acts, Nu Metal lingered and still gets flogged on alternative music radio stations.
I tended to be interested in other genres, but I still have a soft spot for Korn — a band I haven’t seen live yet. Nu Metal persists to this day, with many groups still together, releasing new albums and touring. This era was when music started declining for me and I lost interest in the new-music world. Nowadays you’d more often find me spinning sixties records — The Doors, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Jefferson Airplane — before I’d put on something like Linkin Park. For the first time I lost touch with new music and felt disconnected from what’s being released. It all sounds the same to me now. I used to be a dedicated Triple J listener, but these days when I occasionally tune in, usually in the car, the station is dominated by one‑hit wonders and electronic tracks laden with synthesizers, with very few songs that showcase rock or the older alternative sounds I once loved.
Triple J hosts the Hottest 100 every Australia Day, playing the previous year’s new music for listeners across the country. It has been running this tradition for at least the last twenty years and grown into the world’s biggest music poll. Every ten years they compile and play a Hottest 100 of all time, which is particularly revealing: the tracks that surface in those all-time lists tend to be the older groups. That suggests the oldies still hold more sway with audiences than much of the new material. Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” has famously taken the top position in multiple countdowns — it’s widely regarded as the song that changed everything. I used to vote when I was a teenager; I knew all the bands, the new releases, and their rankings, and I took the whole process very seriously. Today, the only other station where you might hear some of these songs is Triple M, but they typically play only bands’ biggest hits, not the B-sides or less-commercial tracks that never quite made it into mainstream culture.
My favorite group is and always will be Tool. They were formed in 1990—36 years ago now—and they’re still touring with the same intense presence. They tend to release an album roughly every ten years or so. I first started listening in 1996, and their music has stuck with me ever since. They have a devoted, almost cult-like following, and I happily count myself among that crowd. I’ve seen them live more than half a dozen times and even have a few tattoos to show my dedication. I could write a whole blog about Tool, but who really cares? It’s just music, right, Dave!
I also listen to and hold dear bands such as Rage Against The Machine, Radiohead, A Perfect Circle, Puscifer, Nick Cave, Marilyn Manson, Korn, the Foo Fighters’ first album, Spiderbait, Placebo, Pixies, Porcupine Tree, Chemical Brothers, The Smashing Pumpkins, Johnny Cash, and a whole heap more artists that span many genres and eras.
The next big thing will be AI music. It’s already happening, though much of it still lives underground and continues to expand quietly. Take a look at subscriber counts and play numbers on YouTube — some creators are already drawing hundreds of thousands of listeners and building devoted followings. This shift will provoke lively discussion and some heated debate, especially since AI in general is still feared or misunderstood by much of the public.