The whole John Hughes death thing has brought an interesting idea to my mind and that is what we have decided to feel nostalgic for. Mainly that the early 90’s have yet to be a time period that has been taken advantage of for its nostalgia. Which is odd because we are talking a time period that is 15+ years ago and should fall under the realm of what we can look back upon but for some reason we don’t.
I’ll explain it this way. When I was in college you could go to a disco theme party celebrating a time that ended 15 years before that day. Well I mean you could theoretically go to a party. I was never invited to any so I am just going to assume that is what all the other students who were enjoying their college years were doing. Anyway, we could celebrate disco or hippies or punks and feel perfectly fine about it.
Today the late 80’s are fair game. It is why people go to Motley Crue and New Kids on the Block reunion shows. No one is there for the actual music. It is mainly an excuse to play dress up for the night. Break out the ripped jeans and the big hair and live in the moment of excess. But even though the early nineties and the age of grunge is just a few years later I don’t see anyone going nuts for that time period. I don’t expect that college kids today are breaking out their flannels and listening to Mudhoney songs ironically. In fact, I think that entire time period is almost ignored, which is a shame given that it was one of the prime moments of my life.
Even more so I just do not see a whole nostalgia industry being built up around that time at all. Maybe it is a little too recent musically in that Pearl Jam and Dave Matthews are still top acts and some other bands like Counting Crows still draw large crowds for reasons other than fond remembrance of the past. The movies they make from television shows can’t draw as was shown by The X-Files movie. The only pure nostalgia play that I can think of is Saved by the Bell and that actually skews younger than Gen X. Sure, we watched it because TBS showed it every single day but we weren’t the target audience.
That is the strange fate of Gen X and especially the people in my age range (their mid-30’s.) Their entire college era seems to have been forgotten. This is what happens when you are a small generation. The focus has moved on to the millenials or remains with the Boomers. (Yes mass media, I know it is the fortieth anniversary of Woodstock. No one cares. Outside of maybe the members of Sha Na Na who continually tell people “We played Woodstock. Really.” We might as well celebrate 10 years of Woodstock 99 and the fact that people no longer listen to Limp Bizkit.) In a way, I am happy that the highlight of my pop culture life remains my own. The media is not going to change what I remember and that is the way I want it to be. I’ll take my Dinosaur Jr. records and be on my way.
Wednesday Night Music Club: Can’t believe he salvages a par on this hole. Like I said, I’m on my way…
3 comments:
Maybe the Pearl Jam era is only a ways off. I prefer to think of the nostalgia terms of 20 years for mass consumption. When I first say the Beastie Boys' "Hey Ladies" video, I didn't get it and thought they looked like idiots. Fast forward five years and the same concept worked to a tee on the "Sabotage" video.
I spent an entire day on July 4th weekend downloading 90s songs from Hootie, Spin Doctors Buffalo Tom, Sugar, The La's every other middle of the road band that I at one time considered Alternative.
People pick and choose their nostalgia. There were entire songs that weren't so big in the late 70s/early 80s that somehow got gigantic on second viewing ("I Melt With You" barely charted in America). Whereas other groups that were seemingly on top of the world during the pre-Michael Jackson MTV days (Men At Work, Joe Jackson) have been virtually ignored.
When we look back at 1992-1997 people will latch onto Singles, Reality Bites, Pearl Jam, Pulp Fiction and Beck. It will be up to us to make sure no one forgets about PCU, The State, Dinosaur Jr., and Live.
BTW I have spent many nights watching Dinosaur Jr./J Mascis clips on youtube
Jeremy Piven (world's bigget a-hole according to Chelsea Handler) and Jon Favreau probably wish people would forget about PCU. David Spade is probably just happy to get the royalty checks.
Outside of constant "Seinfeld" reruns and the return of "90210" and "Melrose Place" I agree the early 90's has not been capitalized on.
I don't find this to be surprising. The grunge movement and the culture surrounding it was not warm and fuzzy and it did not contain any joy or nobility.
It's hard to sell and market the anger and depressing vibe of that period without defining a suitable antagonist to play it against.
Anger can be marketed if it is for good reason. In the late 60's folks were mad because they wanted social equality and the Vietnam War to end. They were fighting for something.
Generation X'ers have nothing close to that. Outside of the O.J. verdict what was there to be upset about? No generation had it better. We had zero obstacles in our way and we still insisted on crying in our Cheerios.
Unless you are 19 and just generally pissed it's hard to repackage that vibe and sell it to a mass audience.
Needless to say I don't think you'll find "Downtown" Julie Brown hawking Nirvana's "Rape Me" in a Time Life Music compilation any time soon.
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