Keeping up to date with the news cycles is exhausting…so much comes at us from so many different directions that it’s impossible to know if we’re in the middle of something important or not…everything seems urgent, threatening, and life-changing…there’s precious little time for careful consideration, study, and analysis.
Keeping up with technology and its effect on society is another big challenge…one moment everyone seems caught up with a particular gadget or app—but a month or even a week later, that’s old news and everyone has moved on.
Remember how the world was supposed to end when the planet’s computers melted down over the Y2K bug?...wasn’t the world supposed to end with the end of the Mayan calendar in 2012?...weren’t we supposed to have run out of oil by now?
When you mix technology with the news cycle, our ever-shortening attention spans, how the world is interconnected 24/7, and how we’re able to individualize everything that we take in, it’s easy to lose track of what the hell is happening…one of my favourite doomsday predictions had to do with the large hadron collider along the French-Swiss border…before it was switched on, people were saying that scientists risked creating an artificial black hole that would suck everyone into oblivion.
And don’t get me started on conspiracy theories…chemtrails…flat earthers…9/11 was an inside job…the U.S. government using a facility in Alaska to control the world’s weather.
This is why it’s important every once in a while, we stop and take stock of things…big picture stuff matters…long-term consequences matter…the knock-on effects of something that was once considered inconsequential and unnoticed matter.
It’s difficult enough to remember what exactly happened...it’s even more difficult to determine what really mattered over the long term...even so, what were merely transient distractions may have turned out to be groundbreaking in the long run…was that thing a fad or was it predictive of something bigger in the future?
And then there’s music…so much has changed in a very short period of time…and now that we’re a quarter of the way through the 21st century, enough time has passed so that we can look back with some clarity.
Welcome to a special “ongoing history of new music” series…these are the 100 most important moments in rock in the 21st century—so far—part one.
Songs in this episode:
The Police - Driven to Tears
Manskin - I Wanna Be Your Slave
Linkin Park - In The End
U2 - Vertigo (live at The Sphere)
Kate Bush - Running Up That Hill (live at Apollo Hammersmith 2014)
Blink 182 - Bored to Death
Silverchair - Tomorrow
Gorillaz - Feel Good Inc.
Pearl Jam - Animal (live in Montreal circa 2000)
Arctic Monkeys - I Bet You Look Good on the Dance Floor (Demo from MySpace)
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The 100 Greatest Rock Moments of the Millennium So Far - Part 1: (100-91) | Ongoing History of New Music podcast - Listen or read transcript on Metacast
