42 Comments

On Gen Z boys (I have two, 19 + 21) - mine love some current stuff (Kendrick being the big one and they both told me Brat was a brilliant album) but I’ve been really struck by how far their playlists are untethered from any particular musical era. Everything post-1950 is fair game. Older one listens to prog rock, Talking Heads/Tom Tom Club, Radiohead, lots of jazz, lots of Damon Albarn (but never Blur). Younger one has more mainstream tastes (takes after his mum) but similarly broad across 80s/90s to present day, plus quite a lot of Chuck Berry. For specific emotional man feelz they both really like Richard Hawley. Both will happily go to an ABBA night. It feels like they have no conception of any style being ‘old’ - they either like it or they don’t. And if you’ve got the whole of rock history to choose from you’re not going to be ^underserved^ for male representation… feels like Spotify and streaming shows (which often have soundtracks heavy on the 70s and 80s) have really changed how younger people approach music.

Expand full comment

Yes agree with this - there doesn’t seem to be a need to listen to “now” music. Though my Gen Z who does listen to music likes Badbadnotgood (who are good) and Hiatus Kaiyote (who are also good). But also music from any period including also video games soundtracks.

Expand full comment

Yes. I have two Gen Z boys. Both have eclectic tastes, and some of what they like goes back to ~192O. I was an old parent and my parents were old, and so I grew up with a lot of songs from the pre-WWII era and transmitted the so-called “great American songbook“ to my kids. (Kind of hate that term for its pretentiousness, but I didn’t name it.)

Older boy got really into Joni Mitchell on his own and transmitted that love like a virus through his friendship groups. He’s never made me prouder!

Expand full comment

I have two boys 18 and 16. Elder one has fairly mainstream tastes as far as I can tell, but draws from across the decades from the late 60s to now, with a spike in 80s pop (blame the parents). Doesn’t like Taylor Swift, but I think that’s because one of his friends is one of the slightly bonkers Swifties.

Younger one is a bit of an indie kid (Fontaines, Courteeners, Vaccines, etc) but seems to like some 90s stuff too. I think he also likes some rap too.

Expand full comment

My two Gen Z boys: 19yo is mostly hip hop, especially Lecrae and NF. Also loves Adele. 23yo listens to everything under the sun -- Kendrick, Charli XCX, prog metal like Devin Townsend, Australian psychedelic bands, jazz, classic rock ...

Expand full comment

Sorry to hear you're getting grief for the Buxton. I thought you were pretty good tbh. There's some things that are more or less baked into the format (the "be nice" stuff I see being criticized online... c'mon, it's Buckles), but it's rare to hear a conversation on *that* topic - between two people who I guess don't particularly agree - that doesn't descend into trench warfare.

Expand full comment

This might actually convince me to return to that podcast. I was sad to unsubscribe but after about the third episode of two blokes talking (I thought) fairly dismissively of any alternative views on gender, I couldn't keep listening.

Expand full comment

I wonder if that is why Buxton paused his podcast? These occasional episodes are so much more reflective and nuanced. Helen was great - such a good conversation - you must listen (also hey Tom).

Expand full comment

Helen - what a great newsletter. You are my Friday morning read over breakfast and I have spent far too long lingering over your links and sharing the local authority map outline quiz on WhatsApp. Until next week 🤗

Expand full comment

Great story of how a made up life online can be an outlet for people with severe health and mobility conditions. A friend was in a World of Warcraft guild with a guy with a spine disability. Kindest midwestern family guy, loved to help out newbies and chat about game lore. Sadly he passed away. The guild still fondly recalls his character and voice almost 15 years later. Despite all the stereotypes about young guy gamers, a lot, most?, WoW players are in there. 30’s to. 50’s. Old fogies.

Expand full comment

1. My Trump theories:

a. He perfectly melds the class clown and class bully personae.

b. The biggest thing he is selling is the luxury good of disdain. He is telling poorer people that they can afford to be assholes like him, when this has terrible consequences in their own lives and communities (ask anyone with MAGA family members, like me).

2. Pittsburgh is amazing and is called the Paris of Appalachia. To note:

a. Very hilly.

b. Eat pierogi and kielbasa.

c. It’s very hipster, but that is built on a base of Eastern European factory workers. Go to Mass.

d. Lots of great trails for biking and running.

e. Grocery stores have really odd and delightful arrays of local chocolates. So many things dipped in chocolate! That is definitely a micro trend.

f. It was the first Midwestern manufacturing city to crash and the first to recover, partly because the rich family stayed and helped fund the recovery.

Expand full comment

The popularity of long form rambling podcasts in the male audience goes some way to explaining why there is such a female skew on pop music at the moment, I think. There are only so many hours available for listening, and those which would once have been spent repeatedly listening to favourite albums are now being spent to favourite conversations being repeated at length.

I haven't seen any data on this, but would be very surprised if the ratio of music to podcast listening wasn't much higher in favour of music among the female audience. After that, it's just supply and demand.

Expand full comment

As a Millennial who remembers the utter insanity of female fan behaviour towards their boyband faves, I am rather bemused by these celebrities suddenly discovering obsessive fan behaviour and thinking it’s a new thing caused by social media.

Back in the 1990s Take That fans in the Manchester area found out where the members lived and used to arrange to meet up there after school. They would write ‘messages’ all over the any available surface nearby, steal stuff from their gardens, and just generally hang about singing Take That songs at the top of their voices and hoping for a glimpse of their fave. Coachloads of fans from Germany would turn up on every Thursday on a guided tour.

Their streets literally had to be closed off by police at times.

There were hotels the band were blacklisted from because the fans who insisted on camping outside them used to defecate in the flower beds outside rather than risk leaving their posts to find a proper toilet to use.

And of course when Robbie left/the band broke up there were phone lines set up by the Samaritans.

Expand full comment

Wasn't this kind of mania generally reserved for boy bands and teen idols, though? Adoration is kinda baked into the marketing strategy there. Tracey Thorn's getting accosted by creepy adult men who should know better.

The Chappell Roan discourse is quite weird. Because she's knowingly used social media to help fuel her rise, this has been framed as some kind of faustian pact where she somehow deserves to forfeit her privacy. Surely the onus has to be on fans to respect boundaries?

Expand full comment

There were creepy adult men among the boyband fans too! Take That is particular started out playing gay clubs.

I think the only thing that has really changed is that more of the top pop stars are women now, so people are looking at the situation through a gendered lens. The behaviour hasn’t changed, the way people are looking at it and talking about it has.

There are One Direction fans who got hold of copies of Louis Tomlinson’s child’s birth certificate, because they believe a conspiracy theory that the pregnancy was faked to cover up the fact that he is secretly in a relationship with Harry Styles.

There was a conspiracy theory that Paul McCartney died and was replaced by a double in the 60s. And of course John Lennon was murdered!

The boundary-crossing behaviour of obsessed fans has always been deranged and dangerous. Chappell Roan is absolutely correct to stamp down hard on it now, because they will not get any less entitled the more famous she gets.

Expand full comment

Apteka is a Pittsburgh restaurant I love. Creative vegan food from eastern Europe. Just trust me on this

Expand full comment

Sounds intriguing!

Expand full comment

Do the men who write those artists songs count?

Expand full comment

Exactly! I’ve been following Dan Wilson’s incredible career - from Trip Shakespeare to Semisonic to now co writing songs with Adele, Mitski, Taylor Swift, Jon Baptiste, Chris Stapleton, etc.. big pop albums these days are a huge team production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Wilson_(musician)

Expand full comment

True that the girls do seem to be taking over the charts but on the other side, Ren does seem to be making a decent fist of single-handedly holding up the boys’ side. Hard to say what kind of artist he is - rapper, hip hop, pop, rock, reggae, crooner, multi instrumentalist, composer . I have never seen anyone with the ability to appeal to an audience ranging from his peers to people in the 70s. Take 9 minutes out of your day and watch “Hi Ren” on YouTube - you won’t be disappointed.

Expand full comment

I just read his wikipedia page and it is in dire need of some editorial attention. Reads like a fanzine info dump, for example:

"In a Q&A video that premiered on YouTube on 28 September 2023, Ren spoke about, among other things, his middle name. When asked this question, he answered "My middle name is Eryn. Like Eryn, E–R–Y–N. Eryn."[2]"

Expand full comment

My Gen Z boy is currently blasting Glaive’s new album around the house. Gen Z boy 2 is obsessed with Radiohead.

Expand full comment

Helen! I listened to your podcast with Adam Buxton. My only question: do you do kettlebells in your training? You might quite like the way they put strength and conditioning together (or just go straight to endurance without worrying as much about max strength)

Expand full comment

I do a mix — kettlebell swings and goblet squats as well as my barbell deadlifts and dumbbell shoulder presses etc. although I haven’t done much of anything because I’ve been travelling …

Expand full comment

You do KBs! And swings no less!!!

We are basically family

Expand full comment

Christ... I finally got to reading Mats' story... balling my eyes out in bed at at 2:17am. No cure for insomnia there.

Expand full comment

Hi Helen, I always look forward to reading your newsletter and I spend too long on it over coffee when I should be getting ready for work on a Friday morning. I really enjoyed your appearance on Adam Buxton’s podcast (which I haven’t listened to for ages and should probably return to).

As usual you had some really interesting takes and I was struck by two points on different issues.

I don’t disagree in principle with the idea that we should be nice but I wonder why it is that one side seems to get a free pass to be bitchy and hateful in an extremely unpleasant and personal way. Why *should* you have to rise above it and be nice when no one seems to expect the same of those on the other side of these arguments? Another example of people expecting women to sit down and shut up because it’s not nice to upset people, even if you get hurt as a result.

Secondly, and this is a point that so often gets missed when talking about GLP-1 inhibitors is that it’s so true to say that thin people don’t *need* willpower. I am currently taking Wegovy and now I don’t need willpower either. My husband and I have always been Jack Sprat and his wife - he can’t think of anything nicer than a big plate of roasted vegetables. Now, not only do I want or need to eat less, the foods that were so attractive to me before no longer hold the same appeal. And yes, I am drinking less as well.

Expand full comment

Yes, I hope it’s psychologically helpful for people who’ve always struggled with “food noise” to realise that their life (and weight) would be very different without it.

And yes, I did try to make that point about unequal demands for empathy. Contrapoints holds a soup can at one point in the video — an obvious mocking reference to the physical assault of Kellie Jay Keen. Not very kind.

Expand full comment

There’s a renowned restaurant in Pittsburgh, called Apteka (“pharmacy” in Polish), which serves modern Polish cuisine. https://aptekapgh.com

Expand full comment

Just seen it’d already been recommended.

Expand full comment

I really enjoyed wandering around grocery stores in the Strip: https://www.visitpittsburgh.com/neighborhoods/strip-district/ (We just don't have that kind of a selection of interesting and obscure foods down here in Richmond, VA—at least, not all in one place)

Expand full comment