The youth is taking over music! The youth is coming! The youth! OMG, MGMT said so.
Ok, no, not really. But they do say “the youth,” a bunch in the song which brought it to mind. More than likely there are a normal number of young performers ascending to a usual position in cultural zeitgeist. These are just two that I happen to know of. Hardly a revolution.
The thing that makes them special to my perspective is that I’ve actually heard of them and they actually sing catchy songs that don’t seem like they would come from the youth.
Jake Bugg:
Declan McKenna:
But it’s not like their relevance signals the coming apocalypse for elders. There are plenty of other young and talented performers performing. I think Lorde is like really young and also good (I mean the Boss did cover her so she must be). Likewise, Bo Burnham does comedy music very well.
In addition to youth, they’re talented too. And I’m sure that fails to even scratch the surface. I'm somewhat happy to think that we exist in the same world and these youths have so much time to impact it. Time creates more opportunity and being so skilled so young provides a lot of opportunity.