BY-NC-SA Jeff Beck, the rock and roll legend from The Yardbirds, played a fantastic show at the Fox Theatre last Thursday. But “fantastic” is a relative term and when it comes to music, the generational gap usually comes with an aesthetic chasm. I wanted to know what would draw the youth of today to see a 60-year-old man play a show.
Upon my arrival, my story looked bleak. My friend Max Walker and I were clearly the youngest in line by at least 20 years. I looked around and saw flecks of youth amongst the crowd of sleazy looking middle aged men.
Jeff Beck came on stage dressed all in white with a waistcoat and silver boots, radiating energy into the crowd. Standing 10 feet away from the rock legend, I was lost for words at miraculous spectacle that unfolded before me.
After the show, as we sat down a BART station packed with Jeff Back Fans, a man came up to Max and me and asked “What are two doing paying to see a 60-year-old play guitar?”
I spent the long ride back to Walnut Creek pondering. What exactly about a sixty year old guitar player is appealing to the youth? I contemplated this with the song he opened with, “Beck’s Bolero,” running through my head.
I considered what youth movements have been around since the 60’s--hippies, punks, goths, emos, hip-hoppers--and I began to realize what they all had in common. Musically speaking, they all shared a unique energy, played with the same deep feeling and emotion that drips from every dreamy slide down the fret board in any of Jeff Beck’s songs.
Jeff Beck is still relevant to my generation because he understands youth movement and plays with what Iggy Pop would call “raw power.”
Post new comment