The year is 2008, and we’re still a generation searching for our definitive contribution to music history.  The 60’s marked the evolution of rock n’ roll into an art form, the 70’s were characterized by the rise of hard rock and prog rock, the 80’s gave us new wave, and even the 90’s were known as the decade that gave birth to grunge and alternative rock (however broad that categorization may be).  Each decade seemed to offer significant advances, or at least interesting deviations, in music.  Then came our current decade, seemingly a wasteland in popular music’s timeline. 

Our decade lacks a cohesive, identifiable contribution to music, but it is not due to any lack of effort.  If you’ll remember, about six years ago, the media attempted to usher in the age of the “garage rock” revival with their endorsements of the plethora of “the” bands that were littering the landscape (some dead on arrival, commercially).  The Strokes, the Vines, the Hives, the White Stripes, amongst others, were all lumped together in the same group, despite their extremely varying styles, because of their raw and simple aesthetic and the fact that their names began with the same article.  This “movement” quickly fizzled as each band (excluding the White Stripes and, to a lesser extent, the Strokes) failed to hold the attention of music critics and the general public alike.

Perhaps the 2000’s are not quite a decade in decline but a decade without a direction.  Undoubtedly, there have been some great records released in the last eight years; I would be lying if I said this decade was so miserable that I refused to buy anything released after 1999.  In fact, I’d argue that the early 2000’s were a vast improvement over the end of the 90’s, which was dominated by the likes of Fred Durst and his nu-metal disciples.  If the 2000’s are unmemorable, then the late 90’s were certainly a period that the human race would like to forget about.  What the 2000’s lack is any type of consistency or cohesiveness in its works; the collective output from this decade does not fit neatly into one canon. 

This could be attributed to the advent of the MySpace age in which all types of music are so much more easily accessed, word-of-mouth on bands spreads like wildfire throughout blogs, and the radio is, to a certain extent, losing control of what people can listen to.  The internet has somewhat liberated music listeners from being force-fed music that Clear Channel decides it needs to sell, destroying the ubiquity of certain styles and songs and putting the quality control of music into the hands of fans. 

When we look back at our decade in music, I wonder how our music will be remembered.  Whatever reputation our decade garners from a musical standpoint, I’m just relieved that we’re in control of how we’re represented in the way most people will learn about us – Wikipedia.

- Amorn