"The key to all good music criticism – to any criticism, I think – is to drop any pretense to being objective." And the key to reading music criticism is to embrace an author's biases, as long as they aren't obscuring the music or excessively hostile to common sense.
Thanks for this. Abe is 12 now and out of the blue "American Pie" has been resonating with him more than any other song. He's been singing along to it on his phone just about every day for the past two weeks. Just yesterday he was replaying the line "play that rhythm and blues" to try to get the high note at the end of "blues" and into the next verse." Maybe it does have something to do with his age. If anything, it's good brain-training to remember all of the words to it. It's long.
Interesting, Nick. Is there something about "American Pie" that specifically connects with people around that age? Obviously, it originally appealed to a lot more than just 10-13 year-olds - it sold a lot more records than that demographic could account for. But, who knows? The secret could lie in the line "Drove my chevy to the levee," which is just the kind of rhyme that I thought brilliant back when I was 13.
It's a very catchy rhyme. There are also a lot of lyrics that teeter back and forth between childish nursery rhyme and king and jester references against abstract and more curious teenager and adult references. Not to get too psychoanalytical, but it is the age just between child and coming of age. Most people that are hearing the song for the first time now and paying attention are probably close to that age. He also heard the "Weird Al" Star Wars version when he was about 8, but that doesn't necessarily mean he'd care much about the original now, unless he just likes the song. I think some older kids are singing it on the bus, too.
Nice piece, Steve. Maybe you all don't have this problem, but while the historical references for Don McLean's "American Pie"'s symbolic landscape went straight over my head at 10-11 yo, like Steve says, it was a total gateway drug for Dylan's landscapes just a few years later. True, I can't listen to "American Pie" anymore. I've got bother listening to MJ & Prince, too, both of whom I used to love. But by reason of my shallowness, I'm sure, Dylan remains in my ears all the time!
"The key to all good music criticism – to any criticism, I think – is to drop any pretense to being objective." And the key to reading music criticism is to embrace an author's biases, as long as they aren't obscuring the music or excessively hostile to common sense.
Thanks for this. Abe is 12 now and out of the blue "American Pie" has been resonating with him more than any other song. He's been singing along to it on his phone just about every day for the past two weeks. Just yesterday he was replaying the line "play that rhythm and blues" to try to get the high note at the end of "blues" and into the next verse." Maybe it does have something to do with his age. If anything, it's good brain-training to remember all of the words to it. It's long.
Interesting, Nick. Is there something about "American Pie" that specifically connects with people around that age? Obviously, it originally appealed to a lot more than just 10-13 year-olds - it sold a lot more records than that demographic could account for. But, who knows? The secret could lie in the line "Drove my chevy to the levee," which is just the kind of rhyme that I thought brilliant back when I was 13.
It's a very catchy rhyme. There are also a lot of lyrics that teeter back and forth between childish nursery rhyme and king and jester references against abstract and more curious teenager and adult references. Not to get too psychoanalytical, but it is the age just between child and coming of age. Most people that are hearing the song for the first time now and paying attention are probably close to that age. He also heard the "Weird Al" Star Wars version when he was about 8, but that doesn't necessarily mean he'd care much about the original now, unless he just likes the song. I think some older kids are singing it on the bus, too.
Nice piece, Steve. Maybe you all don't have this problem, but while the historical references for Don McLean's "American Pie"'s symbolic landscape went straight over my head at 10-11 yo, like Steve says, it was a total gateway drug for Dylan's landscapes just a few years later. True, I can't listen to "American Pie" anymore. I've got bother listening to MJ & Prince, too, both of whom I used to love. But by reason of my shallowness, I'm sure, Dylan remains in my ears all the time!