The best decade for music?

[Ed62]

I'm sure they all had good music, but which decade would you pick to listen to most often?

Ed

[Bruce Cohen]

Actually, to be totally correct, I would have liked to be able to vote for the period spanning the late 60's - early 70's.

Now without badmouthing stuff from the 30's and 40's, I feel that this was the era thatgave us the best music.

Additionally, a lot of really old country (bluegrass) and Delta and Chicago blues were re-introduced to an entire generation of non-locals. This gave us in the North a taste of where the good stuff really came from.

Bruce

[Knottscott]

... I would have liked to be able to vote for the period spanning the late 60's - early 70's....

I'm thinking the late 60's to early 80's were pretty rich for rock n roll.

[cwithboat]

Heck with the decade. The best century was the 18th - Bach , Mozart, Beethoven

[dbhost]

I've got to vote '80s. But that is because I didn't get to pick from the 60s through the 80s. The rise in hip hop saw a fast decline in musical achievement IMHO...

[Pappy]

I went with the 60's although I listen to a lot of the music from the swing era of the 30's and 40's.

[sparkeyjames]

I had to go with the 70's even though in the early seventies the top music groups were formed primarly in the sixties. Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, The Who, Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, The Jackson 5, CSNY way too many more to list etc. etc. Then the middle and later parts of the decade you had The Doobie Brothers, ZZ Top, Van Halen, The Eagles, Aerosmith, Alice Cooper, Bob Segar, AC/DC etc etc. That mostly touches on the Rock and Roll side of the things. The R&B world was plenty hot then too. Plenty more in the Pop genre too. Of course you can't totally write off the 80's but the advent of *cough* disco *cough* in the late seventies and running primarily through the early to mid 80's pretty much puts it out of the running as far as I'm concerned.

[Alex Franke]

I think for a lot of people it will probably the the decade in which they came of age.

You left out the 30's though -- with the birth of swing and boogie-woogie. But I guess that style spilled over well into the 40's too... You can't help but tap your feet when that stuff comes on!

Edit: Ahh, yes -- now I see the "other" category! Doh.

[cgallery]

I placed my vote yesterday, but the system seems to have forgotten it. It displayed correctly at the time I voted.

[leehljp]

I voted the "60s" but my favorite is the late '50's through the mid '60s - that was Rock N Roll at its finest to me!

[cabinetman]

The sixties music got me through high school, college, and the Army. It had to be good.
.

[mschrank]

I think for a lot of people it will probably the the decade in which they came of age.

Maybe, but for me that would be the 80's, and I certainly can't vote for the decade of Loverboy, Duran Duran, and Whitesnake. I listened to that stuff at the time, but you won't find any of it on my iPod today.

[germdoc]

I had a great time last night driving home from Omaha with Pandora on my iPhone playing through the car stereo. My favorite "station" was Roy Orbison, followed closely by the Beatles.

Boy this is a tough one, but I'm gonna pick 1956-1970, from the birth of rock'n'roll to the death of Jimi and Janis. In the 60's you could and did hear anything on "Top 40" radio, from Aretha Franklin to Flatt and Scruggs to Jefferson Airplane.

While there was and continues to be great music out there, it doesn't have the freshness of people exploring new sounds for the first time.

Now if you asked me when and where I would want to be alive, I would say New York City in the late 1940's/early 50's when jazz was exploding and Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie were holding court. That was BEFORE we became cynical and disillusioned. Plus, great cars and hats.

[germdoc]

Maybe, but for me that would be the 80's, and I certainly can't vote for the decade of Loverboy, Duran Duran, and Whitesnake. I listened to that stuff at the time, but you won't find any of it on my iPod today.

How about Elvis Costello, Peter Gabriel, the Clash, U2, David Bowie, REM, Prince?

[JR]

Definitely the 50's. First, as germdoc points out, there was the revolution in jazz. Then the birth of rock and roll. Music was totally changed, even though there was sill room for Pat Boone.

The late 60's comes in second, IMO. Radical changes to the guitar-band motif, while incorporating blues and standards. All this with competitive/colaborative scenes in London and San Francisco.

Then 30's and 40's swing. Nothing ever inspired more finger snapping.

70's - corporate-rock boredom.

80's - white punks on dope complaining about not having anything to complain about.

90's - Gangsta. BFD.

JR