# What explains the persistent popularity of Ckassic Rock?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [March 7, 2016, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228 "2016-03-07T18:47:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Lamar\_Mundane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamar_Mundane)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/1 "2016-03-07T18:47:56Z")
It’s 30, 35, 40 years old. There were bands just as popular in the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s, but you never went into someone’s house when I was a kid and heard Glenn Miller or Louis Armstrong or Frank Sinatra on the stereo. They sure didn’t have radio stations playing old music 24/7 like now. Many fans were barely alive when these songs came (or not even born yet.) Don’t get me wrong - that’s some good music, but to still be listening to it all day 35 years later?
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### Author:  [@Rebo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rebo)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/2 "2016-03-07T18:51:27Z")
What, you expect us baby boomers to listen to the current dreck?
😉
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### Author:  [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/3 "2016-03-07T18:53:51Z")
Any revolutions or innovations in forms and approach have split off and are their own genre. Hip Hop, EDM, various Metals, etc.
The basic forms of guitar-based rock haven’t changed a bunch since then. I know a bunch of boys and girls in bands - kids playing guitar seems to have increased, if anything. And they all learn Black Dog, Crazy Train, Purple Haze and Voodoo Chile, etc. Alongside learnign Nirvana, REM, Blister in the Sun. And, to be clear, they also learn how to play The Lumineers, Plain White T’s, The Family (or whoever sings that song Hero) - so lots of modern stuff, but a grounding in Classic Rock. They play Foo’s covers, too.
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### Author:  [@Jim\_s\_Son](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_s_Son)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/4 "2016-03-07T19:00:58Z")
Because us Baby Boomers are self-absorbed and think everything we do is great and others will naturally like it, exposing our children to dreck like the Monkees and Crosby, Stills and Nash?
I suppose 1) we grew up with unprecedented prosperity so we could buy records and go to concerts. We maintain those habits as we age 2) in general there is evidence that your musical tastes are set when you are young. All kinds of baby boomers will rage and be as skeptical about Taylor Swift and Justin Beiber as our parents were about Elvis Presley and the Beatles. 3) As I understand radio laws before about 1945, you just couldn’t not play a bunch of Benny Goodman or Louis Armstrong records on the radio. ASCAP (are some such group to protect artists) felt radio play cannibalized concert sales, so they put restrictions on it. With younger people, record buying reinforced radio listening and concert going.
I know my parents, who grew up in the Depression, always considered “do we really need this?” before buying it, which is we they had very few records and went to few movies.
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### Author:  [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/5 "2016-03-07T19:13:06Z")
I’ve been listening to rock music since the 60s. I’ve seen the rise of most of the classic rock acts. I still like it after listening to it for more than 40 years. I’ve been listening to the same classic rock station for almost 35. Yes, their format hasn’t changed for that long. And yeah, when I was a kid, my parents had Frank Sinatra and Glenn Miller records.
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### Author:  [@stillownedbysetters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stillownedbysetters)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/6 "2016-03-07T19:19:12Z")
There was a vast chasm between the music my parents listened and anything I liked growing up. It was pretty much insurmountable, although as musicians themselves, my parents gave it a real go. Between myself and my two sons, there is very little gap. They aren’t really Beatles or Stones fans, but they love Motown, CCR, and Led Zeppelin, among others. Although our frames of reference differ, of course, we both share the guitars-drums-singers-high volume trope. Their music isn’t just incomprehensible noise to me, as mine was to my parents. And vice versa, they don’t like everything I grew up with, but they ‘get’ it.
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### Author:  [@salinqmind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/7 "2016-03-07T19:25:27Z")
I was just treated to a short video of a Skllrex concert that my 20-something just attended.
Srsly? You have to ask why this old baby boomer would still be listening to classic rock?
I managed to eeke out, ‘well, now, that’s interesting’! Later I took a ride in the car and listened to the Drifters, Petula Clark, and the Monkees to clean my ears out!
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### Author:  [@davida03801](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davida03801)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/8 "2016-03-07T19:33:59Z")
My parents had Glenn Miller and the likes playing all the time. I not see what is different.
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### Author:  [@Yodalicious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yodalicious)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/9 "2016-03-07T19:35:54Z")
Everyone my parents age, early - mid-70s, still listen to Doo Wop and rockabilly. You like the music you like. Lots of people still like classic rock.
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/10 "2016-03-07T19:39:50Z")
> [@Lamar\_Mundane](#):
>
> It’s 30, 35, 40 years old. There were bands just as popular in the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s, but you never went into someone’s house when I was a kid and heard Glenn Miller or Louis Armstrong or Frank Sinatra on the stereo. They sure didn’t have radio stations playing old music 24/7 like now. Many fans were barely alive when these songs came (or not even born yet.) Don’t get me wrong - that’s some good music, but to still be listening to it all day 35 years later?
As one who grew up on what is now classic rock when it was the new stuff on the air, I don’t understand it either: I’ve always needed infusions of new music to keep my soul from going stale. But most of my friends from high school and college stopped listening to new music before they turned 30, so when they listen to music, it’s the same old shit from 1964 to the early to mid 1980s. At best.
Don’t get me wrong - a lot of it is really _great_ shit, Mrs. Presky - but thanks to Classic Rock, I’ve heard too many of those great songs too many times; they’ve used up their listens AFAIAC. If there’s a song by The Who or Led Zeppelin I can stand to hear one more time, it must be a song that classic rock stations don’t include in their repertoire.
Anyway, there’s lots of good new music out there that someone who grew up in that era would like. If I could get paid to start a “Good New Stuff for Classic Rock Fans” channel on Sirius, I’d do it. Because I think your average classic rock fan would really get off on “[Ship to Wreck](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9v8jLBrvug)” by Florence + the Machine, or “[Sedona](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8wifV5RYr8)” by Houndmouth," or “[S.O.B.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iAYhQsQhSY)” by Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats, just to pick a few.
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### Author:  [@ElderSign](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElderSign)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/11 "2016-03-07T19:44:32Z")
My grandparents did not keep their victrola with Glenn Miller music. They did not collect pop culture artifacts. Baseball cards and comic books- thrown away. They relied on radio. In they 1970s they had Neil Diamond and Barbra Streisand records, and did not like what is now classic rock. They did not even like cassettes or Sony Walkman.
If you go to the Philippines in 2016 you will hear old acts from Sinatra to Bobby Vee, though.
Thanks to Pandora and other sources, I listen to music from the 1920s to 1980s, and prefer it to 2010s pop music. Believe it or not but I have liked trance/techno/dance/video game music (but not dubstep and hardcore house) since the 1990s to today, though.
I think 1960s-1970s music from Elton John, Simon & Garfunkel, Jim Croce, Beach Boys, Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Rod Stewart, and many others are superior to today’s talents and have no shame in blasting their songs instead of hip hop or Katy Perry or whatever the OP deems to be socially acceptable.
I daresay that the bubblegum oldies and doo-wop stuff from the 1950s is better.
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### Author:  [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/12 "2016-03-07T19:47:30Z")
> [@salinqmind](#):
>
> I was just treated to a short video of a Skllrex concert that my 20-something just attended.
>
> Srsly? You have to ask why this old baby boomer would still be listening to classic rock?
If the “best #1 song of the year” poll series I ran proved anything, I think it’s that most of the music back then sucked as well. These days, we remember the Beatles and the Who and Led Zeppelin and such, but we tend not to think about (or we _try_ not to think about) Gilbert O’Sullivan, Captain and Tenille, the Archies, and such. 🙂
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/13 "2016-03-07T19:57:31Z")
Nowadays, unconventional distribution channels are so widespread that today’s youth can be listening to almost anything, including the likes of Sinatra and Glen Miller.
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### Author:  [@Turpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turpentine)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/14 "2016-03-07T20:01:39Z")
> [@Smapti](#):
>
> If the “best #1 song of the year” poll series I ran proved anything, I think it’s that most of the music back then sucked as well. These days, we remember the Beatles and the Who and Led Zeppelin and such, but we tend not to think about (or we _try_ not to think about) Gilbert O’Sullivan, Captain and Tenille, the Archies, and such. 🙂
Wow, you completely nailed it. It’s unfair to compare the crappiest, poppiest stuff from today against the very best of the past. With modern music, most people can’t predict what will be here-today-gone-tomorrow and what will one day be playing on a classic rock station.
There’s plenty of good music today if you’re willing to search a little for it. And that stupid “yummy yummy yummy I’ve got love in my tummy” song makes my ears bleed.
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### Author:  [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/15 "2016-03-07T20:03:41Z")
> [@Jim\_s\_Son](#):
>
> Because us Baby Boomers are self-absorbed and think everything we do is great and others will naturally like it, exposing our children to dreck like the Monkees and Crosby, Stills and Nash?
Here’s the problem; it’s not just Baby Boomers.
My wife’s favourite band is Supertramp, and her favourite album of all time is “Crime of the Century.” It would be easy to attribute this to her being a Baby Boomer except for the fact that she isn’t one. In fact, she was born AFTER “Crime of the Century” was released. By the time she was old enough to buy her own music, Roger Hodgson had already left the band and I don’t think they were really making new music anymore (nothing anyone knows, anyway.) This isn’t to say she doesn’t like the music of her adolescence (huge G’n’R fan, too) but her heart’s really in the 70s.
I know a great many people who love the Beatles, Zeppelin, and other acts of the 60s and 70s who were born after those acts broke up or weren’t very relevant anymore. It’s strange, really.
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### Author:  [@Turpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turpentine)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/16 "2016-03-07T20:04:14Z")
> [@Chronos](#):
>
> Nowadays, unconventional distribution channels are so widespread that today’s youth can be listening to almost anything, including the likes of Sinatra and Glen Miller.
Funny you said that- I’ve gotten tired of most music so about two years ago I started listening to the 40s station on Sirius a lot. I love it! Well, most of it- I like Glen Miller and Charlie Barnet and Kay Kyser, but the Pied Pipers are awful- not a big fan of Sinatra either, which makes me a 40s music hipster, I guess. Back then there was some great stuff, but there was a lot of crap, too. Just like…well, every other decade in music.
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### Author:  [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/17 "2016-03-07T20:07:41Z")
> [@Lamar\_Mundane](#):
>
> It’s 30, 35, 40 years old. There were bands just as popular in the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s, but you never went into someone’s house when I was a kid and heard Glenn Miller or Louis Armstrong or Frank Sinatra on the stereo.
Actually, many of us did. _Somebody_ was buying up all those Big Band and vocal classic collections advertised ad nauseum on TV. Frequently there’d be a declaration by fans that the Big Bands were coming back, yessirree.
There was a similar but not as intense or drawn-out marketing campaign and radio playlists aimed at '50s/doo-wopper aficionados.
That said, I can’t understand how people can listen to a very restricted “classic rock” playlist on the radio for years on end.\*
_It is well-documented that after the 3,500th playing of “Layla” or “Stairway to Heaven”, one’s brain degenerates into mucoid goo._\*
\*\*uh, can you play “Layla” and dedicate it to Marcie?
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### Author:  [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/18 "2016-03-07T20:12:46Z")
Back in 80s and early 90s, the “Oldies” station still included stuff from the 50’s so it stands to reason that music from the late 60s & 70s hasn’t really rotated out yet.
My teenage son manages to intersperse his dubstep and electronica listening with artists like Billy Joel, Elton John, America and Crosby, Stills & Nash. Interestingly, he’s never shown interest in stuff like Zeppelin or Pink Floyd.
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### Author:  [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/19 "2016-03-07T20:19:39Z")
> [@Chronos](#):
>
> Nowadays, unconventional distribution channels are so widespread that today’s youth can be listening to almost anything, including the likes of Sinatra and Glen Miller.
This.
My daughter has vinyl albums of Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Celtic tunes, One Direction, the Beatles, and Boston’s first album, and this eclectic selection isn’t unusual among her friends (14yo’s).
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### Author:  [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)
#### Post date: [March 7, 2016, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-explains-the-persistent-popularity-of-ckassic-rock/748228/20 "2016-03-07T21:07:15Z")
> [@JohnT](#):
>
> This.
>
> My daughter has vinyl albums of Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Celtic tunes, One Direction, the Beatles, and Boston’s first album, and this eclectic selection isn’t unusual among her friends (14yo’s).
> [@Jophiel](#):
>
> Back in 80s and early 90s, the “Oldies” station still included stuff from the 50’s so it stands to reason that music from the late 60s & 70s hasn’t really rotated out yet.
>
> My teenage son manages to intersperse his dubstep and electronica listening with artists like Billy Joel, Elton John, America and Crosby, Stills & Nash. Interestingly, he’s never shown interest in stuff like Zeppelin or Pink Floyd.
I shoot concerts for various locations of the _School of Rock_, an after-school program for kids age 8 -18, and I concur that young musicians today have incredibly wide taste in music. There are any number of reasons why this is so, but I think the main one is that, unlike their parents and grandparents, they aren’t forced to choose between a handful of radio stations. Instead, the entire history of recorded music is instantly available to them. A 14 year old has as much access to Glenn Miller as they do Katy Perry.
In contrast, when I was a teen, we were divided by our allegiance to a station, and we had to accept what we were given. I knew that there had to be better stuff than what I was being fed, and started prowling record stores and staying up very late to watch the _Midnight Special_, _Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert_, _Rock World_ and _Saturday Night Live_. (The last is where I discovered Kate Bush.) Most of the music I love, I had to search for - I own a CD that it took me 14 years to acquire after hearing the song on a cassette compilation produced by a friend.
But these kids can just jump from song to song, and from genre to genre, all without worrying about when it was recorded.
I envy them.
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