This spring-- in a comment on the Reagan legacy--- I wrote that although the 1980s were miserable politically, the music during those years was pretty good. I couldn’t believe the ire, derision and bile that casual, off-handed comment generated.
I did my best to stick by my claim, pointing out that some fantastic music was produced during that otherwise oppressive era. It didn’t do me much good to point out that Hip Hop, Grunge, Trance, Electronica, and other influential genres were invented in the 1980s, much of it in reaction to Reagan, Thatcher, Bush, and Major politics. I got nowhere claiming that the New Wave explosion in the early 1980s was meaningful or interesting.
Every decade has its musical highlights and lowlights, some of which are differently valued though time. The 1920s saw the birth of jazz and quality recording; the 1930s saw the rise of swing music and new expressions of social circumstances in popular music; the 1940s reflected the emotionalism of a turbulent decade; and the 1950s bore Rock and Roll music. In the 1960s, the youth market and the Civil Rights movement expanded the bounds of Rock and Roll; the 1970s gave birth to Disco, Punk, and Heavy Metal; the 1980s saw the advent of music video, New Wave, and Hip Hop; the 1990s birthed Grunge, World, Alternative, and Gangsta; and the 2000s have seen an unprecedented mix of every previous form of music in a breakdown of categories.
Granted, I have my own bias. I was born in 1962, so the period of my most intense musical interest was between 1974 and 1986 or so. But I think I have a pretty good perspective on music. My great grandfather played piano for silent movies in Worcester, Mass.; my grandfather was a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music; both my grandparents played piano constantly at home; I worked as a disc jockey at major market radio stations from coast to coast between 1979-2003; my partner played symphonic bassoon and in the marching band of a major college; my iPod includes recordings over an 80-year span from 1929 to 2009; and I have a mediocre ability to play several instruments.
I have my own personal opinions about which decades had the best music, and it’s not necessarily the ones you might suspect. So let me ask in a poll (quantitatively) and in comments (qualitatively): Which decade had the best music?