Another sign that I'm not as young as I once was: A little while ago, I heard an indie rock song on the radio. While it wouldn't be one of my favorite songs at any age, 22-year-old me might still have played it on the air, figuring others might like it. 52-year-old me, however, reacted less patiently to it. In the middle of an excessively long fade-out of guitar feedback, I said, "Oh, come on. Stop it!"
At 22, I might have given the group the benefit of the doubt, thinking, "The group is just expressing itself. This ending might benefit from some editing, but the artists must want this fade-out to linger in listeners' minds."
At 52, I thought, "This is self-indulgent noise. You're the creators of this song, and you have every right to record a fade-out like this, but how about being more concise--and melodic?"
In fairness, what's noise to one person is mellifluous to another. Hmmm...Apparently, my more idealistic 22-year-old self wants to counter me. I don't know that he'll change the gist of my 52-year-old reaction, but maybe he'll soften it a tad.
