There comes a time in life when one reminisces about the past and disapproves of the present. Music, being so embedded in our lives and memories, is frequently the subject of this reminiscing/disapproving phenomenon. Usually this phenomenon arises when one is well past 30. The fact that I’m 23 and already reminiscing leaves me worried that I’m becoming a conservative old fogey, condemning everything made after a certain point in time.

Yet I feel I have good cause for concern about music today. I think most people would agree that the 90s and early 00s were a golden era for music. We rocked out to amazing bands like Sublime, Nirvana and Smashing Pumpkins and bobbed our heads to the addictive sounds of Dre, Snoop, Tupac and Biggie. And this is just a sampling of the legendary music produced during this era.

Up until 2007, great music was still produced — though I’d say it still pales in comparison to the 90s. I think the true value of this era is its emphasis on danceable music with faster paces and more catchy beats, like Lil Jon’s “Window to the Wall” or Justin Timberlake’s “Sexyback.” Timbaland’s “The Way I Are” marked the peak of the second era, after which we descended into this current music era.

I can’t even identify an average song from today’s music since most blend away into background noise. Sean Kingston, for example, who isn’t even the worst of the bunch, sounds like a Jamaican version of a monotone, robotic-voiced text-to-speech computer programs. Lyrics have taken a nose-dive, too. Now, I think main role of lyrics is to channel the overall musicality of a song — I’d find it difficult to find someone whose music selection was based on lyrics rather than musical qualities. That being said, however, I really do feel like stopping the music when I hear “Please don’t stop the music” repeated a thousand times. Flo Rida’s “Low”, whose main chorus is “She hit the floor, next thing you know, Shawty got low, low, low, low, low, low, low,” always gets me thinking, “So?” If I called up a friend and told him “Yea man, I was at this club, and there was this girl, and she got really, really low!” he would slap me in the face.

Maybe it’s natural to write off music outside of one’s formative years. After all, our grandparent’s generation wrote off great rock’n’roll as noise pollution. But, it seems good music only comes around every other era. Although the 90s and early 2000s were great, we could live without the 80s (exempting Prince and MJ, of course.) The 70s were amazing, but the 60s needed some work. And so here we are today, in the cycle of another lackluster era of music. From what I’ve heard, we’ve got another long 10 years ahead of us.

What music captures your soul? Email dirtycalstudent "at" gmail.com.