I was around in that time frame but don't remember McKuen, but I do wonder what happened to Zamfir Master of the Pan Flute
What Happened to Rod McKuen?
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Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#12I was around in that time frame but don't remember McKuen, but I do wonder what happened to Zamfir Master of the Pan Flute
He's still alive and even still active at 81, but yes, I don't see those TV ads with him playing incongruous songs like "The Yellow Rose of Texas" on his traditional Romanian instrument like you used to in the 1990s.
Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#13> The Spotify algorithm, Amazon’s recommendations, they’ll never, ever show you Rod McKuen. Those are designed to direct you towards things that other people like right now. But thrift stores, used bookshops, and Goodwills are, accidentally, perfectly designed to show you things that people liked decades ago, then stopped liking. I've often thought of and lamented the former idea. That the serendipity of the algorith…
My mom (died in 2019 at 76) left behind 60GB of her digital music collection, along with hundreds of playlists drawn from it.
I plan to do the same, but about 3-4x more stuff.
And if my kids response to that is anything like mine to my mother's music, they will barely ever listen to any of it.
Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#14If you ever saw the first full-length Charlie Brown movie -- "A Boy Named Charlie Brown" -- it was Rod McKuen who wrote all the songs.
Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#15See also "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25063677"
"What to make of Rod McKuen?"
In fact, it's a much more interesting read.
Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#16This guy reminds me of Jordan Peterson, whose shmaltzy content made him instantly popular but is criticized as being too diluted and dumbed-down.
Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#17> The Spotify algorithm, Amazon’s recommendations, they’ll never, ever show you Rod McKuen. Those are designed to direct you towards things that other people like right now. But thrift stores, used bookshops, and Goodwills are, accidentally, perfectly designed to show you things that people liked decades ago, then stopped liking. I've often thought of and lamented the former idea. That the serendipity of the algorith…
My mom (died in 2019 at 76) left behind 60GB of her digital music collection, along with hundreds of playlists drawn from it. I plan to do the same, but about 3-4x more stuff. And if my kids response to that is anything like mine to my mother's music, they will barely ever listen to any of it.
> And if my kids response to that is anything like mine to my mother's music, they will barely ever listen to any of it.
I think this is more of an issue with headphones than with the inability to inherit digital files. (Which, as you note, doesn't exist.)
When I was small my mother would play CDs on a home stereo system. So if she was listening to music, I heard it.
This means that I'm familiar with and like some of her music. If she left me a pile of CDs I'd never heard, I would most likely not bother listening to them.
Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#18> The Spotify algorithm, Amazon’s recommendations, they’ll never, ever show you Rod McKuen. Those are designed to direct you towards things that other people like right now. But thrift stores, used bookshops, and Goodwills are, accidentally, perfectly designed to show you things that people liked decades ago, then stopped liking. I've often thought of and lamented the former idea. That the serendipity of the algorith…
Generally, your kids won't want your stuff. I've had a few friends who've had to deal with parents who left a lifetime of crap for their children to deal with, and it seems kinder to get rid of as much of it as you can before you die.
https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/your-kids-dont-wa...
Of course, there are always a few exceptions in the form of sentimentally- or actually-valuable objects that your children have expressed a specific interest in.
> Records have character. Worn dust jackets, scratches. A physical human held and cared for these. It's a snapshot of a point in time. Newspaper clippings, ticket stubs, it's all going away.
Yep. What works well for me is to KonMari that shit — reflect on it, express your gratitude, say goodbye, and let it go.
Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#19> The Spotify algorithm, Amazon’s recommendations, they’ll never, ever show you Rod McKuen. Those are designed to direct you towards things that other people like right now. But thrift stores, used bookshops, and Goodwills are, accidentally, perfectly designed to show you things that people liked decades ago, then stopped liking. I've often thought of and lamented the former idea. That the serendipity of the algorith…
Generally, your kids won't want your stuff. I've had a few friends who've had to deal with parents who left a lifetime of crap for their children to deal with, and it seems kinder to get rid of as much of it as you can before you die. https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/your-kids-dont-wa... Of course, there are always a few exceptions in the form of sentimentally- or actually-valuable objects that your childre…
You're speaking in generalizations that are not true, and also in extremes ("a lifetime of crap for their children to deal with" is not what was meant).
Personally, I find it incredibly fascinating to come across those kinds of breadcrumbs that give an insight in how a life was lived decades ago. Be it from my parents or even from more distant people.
I came across a personal office ones that was long abandoned, complete with decades old wall calendar, magazines, wrappers of old snacks etc., and it just had a certain magic.
I, too, lament how much of the "physicality" of life has been taken away, and enjoy the little mementos that I kept from both my own life and my family's.
Re: What Happened to Rod McKuen?
#20What happened to "Life's little instruction book"? What happened to "Don't sweat the small stuff (and it's all small stuff)"? Every so often some "nice" but vapid book or fad comes along and makes a lot of money from people in that literate but dull IQ range of 104-106 and while it's never fun to smilingly fend off recommendations from well-meaning friends ("You should read this! It's really inspiring!") it's all pre…
> Every so often some "nice" but vapid book or fad comes along and makes a lot of money from people in that literate but dull IQ range of 104-106 and while it's never fun to smilingly fend off recommendations from well-meaning friends ("You should read this! It's really inspiring!") it's all pretty harmless.
While I'm not defending McKuen, if you are going to be a critic at least be an interesting critic. To quote the linked article:
> Even the critics who weren’t quite so overtly snobby clearly disdained McKuen’s fans for the crime of merely being ordinary. Hentoff witheringly describes the crowd at Carnegie Hall as “contingents of thirtyish women who might have come from the airline offices, the telephone company, innumerable typing pools.” Future Hollywood writer Nora Ephron wrote a McKuen takedown in Esquire, called “Mush,” that observes the audience at a D.C. show: “You won’t see any of your freaks here, no sir, any of your tie-dye people, any of your long-haired kids in jeans lighting joints. This is middle America.” When Nora Ephron calls you middlebrow: sheesh!
That at least is at interesting.
> He's really easy to hate though. I hated him before I even knew his name. Fuck you, Rod McKuen.
Hating on something easy to hate - how dull and vapid.
Try - instead - hating on the faux-intellectualism of HN or its even more explicit intellectually snobby brethren (looking at you lesswrong). Criticism of easy targets with few defenders is as forgettable and boring as the material it seeks to attack.