Feel good music?

At any given time of day on the fourth floor of the Swarthout complex at Carroll, you are almost guaranteed to hear Disney's "High School Musical" soundtrack to come blaring out of some one's room. Worst yet, sometimes you hear such bubble-gum pop bygones like the Spice Girls or the Backstreet Boys. Of course if you ask any of these girls about this, and of course you get a response like "it's funny," or "I don't know I just like it, it's cute." We are at least eighteen years old, right? I understand the novelty quality that that these things hold, but with the frequency in which they are played it makes you wonder if they think they are "just funny," or it this is what they actually listen to. Well, if you look at the recent iTunes charts they seem to reflect the ladder. It is a fact that High School Musical 2 had one the biggest television debuts of all time and that soundtrack went to number one on the iTunes albums charts (and currently resides at #3). It makes you wonder what has happened to music, something that used to really thrive on college campuses. It seems we may have taken a step backwards from the "college rock" movement of the 1990's. No longer do artists start out gaining popularity among America's young; if they are lucky they gain a following on myspace. Does this mean that there isn't 'good" music out there? Absolutely not. However, it seems that a vast collection of my peers are more into music geared at the eight to twelve crowd than their own age group. It's been a long time since there has truly been a breakthrough movement in music in this country. It seems as though we hit a lull after Grunge. Rarely now do you find artists that inspire a whole new genre, or even try to create a new sound. I'm not saying that I haven't heard a good album since Nevermind, I'm just saying that I don't believe albums that top the charts now, such as High School Musical 2, will have as much as a profound effect on music or my generation. That's just my opinion I could be wrong...