From the more rambunctious end of the 70s spectrum, Young and Bowie have both released first-rate albums in recent months. Happily, most of those musicians are still with us. And anyway, the Top 40 in the early- to mid-70s was graced not just by Bread and John Denver but also by Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, David Bowie, Carole King, George Clinton, Neil Young, and Elton John, all at creative peaks, so whatever the era’s music lacked in rawness and punch it more than made up for it with songwriting craft, sheer musicality, and a spirit of sophisticated adventurousness. On the other hand, in America, only five people who weren’t rock critics ever listened to the Ramones and the Sex Pistols when their records first came out. Like most received wisdom, there’s a wee bit of truth in that I graduated from high school in 1976, the year of Frampton Comes Alive!, “Silly Love Songs,” and “Afternoon Delight,” so I know. This is a somewhat heretical notion because, according to the thumbnail critical history of rock, handed down from Rolling Stone to Spin to Pitchfork, mid-70s music had grown pretentious and slick, sclerotic and boring-a sonic wasteland that could be restored only by punk’s raw three-chord punch. There’s been a boomlet this winter and spring in new albums from young musicians who have audibly been steeping themselves in 70s-vintage singer-songwriters and “soft rock” acts.
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