http://www.wsc.co.uk/features/13711-fro ... over-youth

I still thoroughly enjoy a Pools win and there are some great new records around but he does have a point.

Aye, I think it all begins when your first grown-up friendship group starts to disperse. You seemed to need them to orchestrate things. They all move to different parts of the world/country and the new people you meet are more and more people 'who aren't like you' so you have to compromise, thereby slowly losing the magic. (Sob....)

I'm determined not to go down his path. I get the thing about saturation coverage of games on TV, but I don't have Sky and I don't really care. I can go to the local if there's a match I really want to watch.

When it comes to music, I hear new stuff on radio 6 all the time that inspires me, I go to plenty of gigs and take the bairns to festivals.

My grandad retained a cheery disposition right up to his death aged 90, which is exactly what I intend to do. He wasn't downloading Prodigy albums or whatever, but he embraced the internet and used to marvel at new gadgets and inventions.

As well as reminiscing about some good things from the olden days that are long gone, he also used to say how shite a lot of it was. And how great it was now that he could afford to have the heating on, go for a curry, have a hot shower, phone up for a taxi on a mobile and choose what snooker match to watch via the red button.

I'm thoroughly looking forward to taking my youngest to his first ever Pools match on Saturday, if you can't enjoy things like that you might as well give up now.

You might have a point there Grabec. I hadn't thought of it like that but finding Pools supporting reggae fans isn't easy round here. I was the most excited person in Toulouse when Adrian Sherwood played here last summer but nobody else was too bothered and it just took the edge off things a bit. I can think of a couple of old mates who would have been very much up for it.

Kind of agree with you as well Mr Nottingham, you can certainly still enjoy life but things like football and music don't have quite the intense thrill as they did. The pleasure you get from doing stuff like their first Pools match with your kids is a different kettle of fish though. Hope we get a great result for you both to remember but I bet it will be an excellent day whatever happens on the pitch.

If the writer isn't in seventh heaven at the prospect of Lincoln in the FA Cup Quarter Finals he needs to check his pulse - he may have already bored himself to death with ennui.

Honestly, I have no time for 'back in the day' and never have had. It might all end tomorrow - crack on!

The only live sport I never miss is 6 (formerly 5) nations rugby, and that has always been broadcast live, so no real change there for me.

But the article points to the subtractive side of progress, and I do feel a lot of that, even though I probably embrace modern technology to a far greater extent than the man in the street, regardless of age.

It's mindfulness, dear boy. One needs to keep a check on where things are going wrong.

I must say that, for whatever reason, I got more things right 'back in the day' that I do now.

well ive never bought a Jam LP,so i ve no idea what he`s talking about...however,i did once own a single by marmalade

Great read that and I clicked on the link for the Blyth Spartans cup run....another great read and watch via the YouTube link!!!!

Is it, dear girl? I'm afraid I don't do introspection either - I had to google mindfulness because it's one of those words that 'one' hears a lot these days, without paying much attention.

Hmm. Really must take up yoga though - my spine definitely needs some work!

Well then you're lucky, but there's no need to boast about it.

Aye, good read. I like WSC, been reading it on and off for years. Subscribed for a while but it's not really a magazine I can read month on month, all gets a bit samey and I got bored of reading the same style of writing every month. That said, I still like it, just not every month

Although I'm a bit older than the author, I found I concurred with the gist of the article, but weren't things always like that? Didn't our parents and grandparents yearn for those "golden" years between, say, 16 and 30 ish? I have a friend in his fifties who's always trying to latch onto his 21 years old son's current musical infatuation, much to his son's annoyance. If my Dad had done that in the early '70s my record collection would, most likely, have been chucked in the bin. I still, generally, like the stuff I listened to then but rarely listen to it now. As you grow older your musical tastes widen as there is less desire to identify with a particular musical tribe.
As for football - despite the flailing Doc Martens, overt racism, rolled mud pitches (yes, I mean you Derby County) and medieval bogs, footy was better in the seventies. FACT.

Football was definitley better then for the fan. It was certainly more fun. Apart from the racism and retarded hooliganism.

But Football to play is better now,once you reach a certain level. Pub level seems to be stuck in soem sort of time warp.

And despite the obvious advantages of the Mobile and the internet, there was a amgic about getting on the bus, and trying to sit near the only person with a radio getting the other results.

Or, as has been said on another thread, rushing out to get the footy mail. Seeing the rsults, the way they were printed, and those pesky league tables. As well as the brilliant junior football section wich would have been over at least two full pages.

Not all progress is good.

The worst thing that ever happened was the decline of vinyl records and the rise of the fucking awful CD's. Followed even worse, in many ways, by downloads.

And I know there are many ggod things about downloads.

But if you really wanted to listen to music, you had to go and find it, and when you got it, you were proud as fuck, and couldnt wait to read the sleeve cover. You were buying into something special.

There is nothing special now, not like that. Everyone wants the moon on a stick, and usually gets it.

Fuck me most people go to gigs now, and spend most of their time videoing the fucker, or worse videoing themselves dancing. In the obscene belief that their "friends" actually like to see them doing it.

There was good musc about then, that was never as original as we all used to think, anf there was a lot of shite.

And its much the same now. Some great music about and some appalling shite.

The one thing about the good old days that is appalling now, is that you never saw blokes in their 20's pretending that they is black.

Oh and one of the worst things of the modern era?

Football freestyle

Just fuck right off.

Thing is Mr Colonel, I agree with your full post but the highlight above makes me think........ how much music did I miss by not finding/knowing about at the time? I suppose modern technology does have its uses.

Great read and Cup Final day was massive regardless of who played, playing footie up to kick off and straight after till dark, another major event was the new chart introduced by Johnnie Walker in school lunch break wondering whether T Rex had toppled Slade or vice versa. Classic.

Aye, the Cup Final really was the dog's bollocks. Me and ar kid used to play football in the garden at half time. Everything about it....the whole day centred around that game.

Time is the issue now. We are all just far, far too busy.

Egg-fuken-zactly. If I hear something I like on the radio I can listen to it again whenever I like. Not get the bus to Boro and schlepp to Alan Fearnley's, hoping they have a copy.

Needless to say, I couldn't disagree more.

I'm loving finding new music at the moment - through Youtube or 6music and then instant download into ITunes. Of course it's not the same as owning a full album with artwork etc, but I like not having records everywhere, and being able to burn discs to play in my car. I've recently discovered podcasts in ITunes as well, available for free. There's loads of great music around and its instant accessibility is great with such a busy life.

Time is not the issue, the FA cup has been downgraded and no longer has that feel it used to have, that excitement no matter who was playing.

loved the Wembley board game too, we used to play that if is was pissing down.

I think maybe some are missing the point here.

Of course the way the modern music industry is downloading is essential and allows situations described by madjohn.

But it lacks the whole romanticism of searching for records and then owning them. That whole feeling that you were buying into that band, and it was special.

Just because the modern way is instant access to every bloody thing, doesnt make it better, not in all ways.

Those records I bought were mine, and they were there for me to look at read and listen.

Oh, and they sounded so much fucking better than CDs and downloads.

And thats a fact jack.

I'm really not having the best of times when it comes to putting thoughts into words....to elaborate...I wasn't referring to the FA Cup's demise being down to time.

The FA Cup's demise is because there isn't the money in it or a Champions League place at stake so clubs in the Premiershit couldn't give a fuck. Premiershit survival is the be all and end all. Then for those clubs fighting for promotion to the Premiershit it's just another game they could do without. It is a fucking terrible situation but whilst the game is run as it is with money being king, it's fucked. That's why I really enjoy non-league football.....don't know how I'd feel about Pools in the Premiershit...not that that will be an issue for me anytime soon.

The time thing was more a statement about life now compared to when I was a kid playing football in the back garden with ar kid.

I think MJ has discovered the secret of eternal youth! After thinking about it, the article might have gone a bit overboard. I certainly don't want to agree that 'there'll be no more really glorious moments' just because youth is a distant memory.

But I do think he has a point in saying that intensity is lost when you can do/have things all the time. That's the whole point of the concept of rarity value, after all. Things just make more of an impression if they don't happen often.

I agree about the music.

There wasnt a lot more better music around then, and there is some fantastic stuff around now.

But I stand by the Vinyl point.

For the record I never got excited about finding a worm in the garden. Ever.

I'm not going to argue that easy access to music is a bad thing, but when it comes to quality moments, spending an hour in Hoggets or Bruce Moores flipping though and listening to the LPs beat the sh1t out of sitting in front of a website for an hour.

but those too young to have ever done that will never understand or believe it.

They demand instant access to everything now,as they have such busy lives.

When I say busy, they seem to spend shitloads of time, just scrolling through their phones looking at facebook, and reading about what someone they barely know has had for the lunch.

FTR Mr Colonel a fact is not a fact unless on the Bunker it's spelt FACT! FACT!

I used to spend hours and hours in record shops fruitlessly trying to find stuff.

Then ebay happened, and I manged to get tons of records I never thought I would find in my lifetime.

And then downloads happened, which made things even easier. Suits me, although you can't beat the sound quality of vinyl.

That last bit is the bunker surely?

Ah, there's the problem! You were trying to find music instead of letting it find you.
With my limited student's budget I was spoilt for choice and usually ended up like the monkey with two piles of bananas.
I remember at one time Binns started selling imported LPs cheap, by loads of acts I'd never heard of. The albums had a notch sawn in a corner, which made me suspect they might be a bit dodgy. That was where I discovered Talking Heads among others, and it was time I didn't regret spending.
Same with bookshops. Most of my books these days are digital, but if i do go into a bookshop and start browsing, it's never for less than an hour.