Here are some things you
should know about being the voice of a generation:
1. You can't buy it, or beg for it. You can't even be elected. You can only be chosen.
2. There are only three of them.
Elvis Presley
Bob Dylan
Kurt Cobain
Presley OD'd at the age of 42, Cobain blew his brains before he was 30 and Dylan… Dylan got lucky and broke his neck. It is a lonely, deadly occupation with the words Judas plastered in blood right across it. And there hasn't been a Voice Of A Generation in 20 years and this is why:
We are living longer.
We used to work till we were 61, now we work till we are 71. We used to have children in our 20s, now it is our 30s… everything has a decade added to it. We live at home when we are in our 20s and you know how the new generation were teens? Now they are tweens. And tweens are listening to music that appeals to tweens, say, Justin Bieber, and Bieber isn't smart or old enough to be the voice of anything very much accept for swag swag swag.
15 year old girls could anoint Presley but 8 year old girls can't anoint One Direction… or anybody else. In a world without a center whose new generation is too young to unite, there is no one voice because there is no defining concept. The new generation (who started calling em by letters -ugh) is going to live in a world of longer lives and diminishing prospects. Perhaps they will be the first generation to exist in the shadow of their own country. Who may spend a life without a job, on government subsidies, a virtual lifespan on line… how can they be defined by music, by "0" and "1" in infinite progressions.
Perhaps, finally we will have a computer generated voice of a generation who will outlive everyone forever… and we will go from "Oh well whatever nevermind" to "whatever".