New York’s Empty Storefronts Are A Dark Omen For The Future Of Cities

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by JManc

Madonna debuted in 1983, prime time for older X'ers..those in their late 40's and 50's now and was a huge force throughout the 80's drawing in younger X'ers. The Madonna "wannabe" thing was huge with folks my age back then.

I'm not quite sure you can argue 1983 is "prime time." The youngest boomers were 19-23 depending upon if you use the 1960 or 1964 cutoff. High school students were obviously Gen X, but young people in the college and immediately post-college era are still massively influential in pop cultural terms.

[Busy Bee]

Originally Posted by niwell

For "millennial music" I've made the argument before that Animal Collective's Merryweather Post Pavilion is the Pet Sounds of its day.

Truth.
I love Animal Collective/Panda Bear. Brilliant.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by JManc

Not Gen-X'ers? They are/were absolutely Gen-X'ers rapping to other Gen-X'ers in the early to mid 90's.

Madonna debuted in 1983, prime time for older X'ers..those in their late 40's and 50's now and was a huge force throughout the 80's drawing in younger X'ers. The Madonna "wannabe" thing was huge with folks my age back then.

Many of them are Gen X'ers (Madonna is a Baby Boomer), but their music appealed to both Gen Xers and the older half of Millennials. Millennials started high school in the late 90s, when Snoop, Ice Cube, and Dr. Dre were still in their prime. Run DMC is an example of an act that is solidly Gen X, since they were has-beens by the start of the 90s.

[JManc]

^ yes. they're more examples of artists that transcended generations I spoke of above. I'm 45, my youngest brother is 35, we both listened to Dre and Snoop as teens.

Originally Posted by eschaton

I'm not quite sure you can argue 1983 is "prime time." The youngest boomers were 19-23 depending upon if you use the 1960 or 1964 cutoff. High school students were obviously Gen X, but young people in the college and immediately post-college era are still massively influential in pop cultural terms.

Prime time = teenage years when people really start to explore and appreciate music. The very youngest of Boomers and the oldest of X'ers were at that stage in the early to mid 80's.

[mrnyc]

Originally Posted by eschaton

I'm not quite sure you can argue 1983 is "prime time." The youngest boomers were 19-23 depending upon if you use the 1960 or 1964 cutoff. High school students were obviously Gen X, but young people in the college and immediately post-college era are still massively influential in pop cultural terms.

hold on be careful. the funny thing is the 1965 and up group you are implying there actually co-opted the gen x term. the cusp group just slightly earlier was the start of the so-called baby bust.

remember that although billy idol had a gen x band in the late 1970s and robert capa used the term long ago, it was actually douglas coupland's 1991 book that popularized gen x as an era we are all familiar with:

'Demographer William Strauss observed that Coupland applied the term to older members of the cohort born between 1961 and 1964, who were sometimes told by demographers that they were baby boomers, but who did not feel like boomers.'

so i take coupland as the true gen x definer and additionally those who had not yet graduated from HS when hip hop got popular as the start of the real gen x era. that influential book and the start of the death of the classic rock era are the two major cultural signifiers of change from the boomer era to the true start of gen x. at least imo. and yes that comes from late night substance fueled discussions about various eras