Category: aging

Neil Young previews new song from his new album

Neil Young Previews “Rock Starbucks” From Monsanto-Themed Album


Kendrickmusicfreak: Aging and music

Old vs New

Do you find that once you hit a certain age you struggle with new music. The average for this is around 35 where people start to stop looking for new music and start listening more and more to their current favourites. Even for me, it is a struggle to capture that new music and give it a good listen.

There has been various studies into music and ageing and when your music taste come to a stand still.

Spotify has done research that suggest that on average most people’s listening habits become firmly entrenched by the age of 33 years old.

The following graphs illustrate the timeline in musical tastes.

Graph One shows that musical taste evolves thought out a person 20’s and when they reach their mid 30’s starts to

Timeline of musical taste evolutions.
Timeline of musical taste evolutions.

Graph Two shows that men move away from the mainstream sooner than females listeners do.

Men's musical Evolutions
Men’s musical Evolutions

These changes can happen for many different reasons.

  • Changes in musical genres over time, Grunge to Emo to pop to Taylor Swift.
  • People leave Study and start to work, less time to explore new music so they stay with what they know.
  • The age of Children is until them. Kids listen to nursery rhymes and The Wiggles. Later they then listen to whatever is popular at the time (One Direction, Taylor Swift)  that the kids want to hear at home or in the game.
  • Nostalgia starts to kick in and they start to yearn for the good old days, and music is a good way to relive these moments.
  • There is just crap being made today. This is of cause very subjective as for many crap bands out there, there are just as many good ones. It just can take time to find what suits your taste. And time is a limited commodity.

One thing that I have noticed is that While Gen X-ers like me in their late 30s and 40s may think of the latest Pearl Jam record  or Grunge reissues as a great rock ‘n’ roll album, Millennials might see it as a collection of ‘Dad Rock’ songs made to appeal to an older generation.

With so many ways to listen and discover new music, Spotify , Pandora and Tidal… well take Tidal off that list now it has failed. There are many avenues to discover new and old music. At the moment I am continuing to find many bands from the early 90’s grunge period that I missed as a teenager.

In conclusion, I think that musical evolution or lack of it is down to the individual. A person who has a true love of music will always seek out what is new and modern. The more general music listener i.e. the  I like what is on the radio and I like everything will find that they will tend to lean to what they have known before.

There will also be a a certain sense of nostalgia associated with music. When you hear a song it takes you back to a certain time and place. That is one of the magical things with music is that sense of time and place.

In the end with music all that matters is : Seek and you will find.