Dad Rock

Reposting a Note for Dad's Day

This was a note I originally posted on Feb 9, 2025

#492 on the Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest Albums of All Time” (2020) is Nick of Time by Bonnie Raitt. My review of the album, and its worthiness in appearing on the list, got me thinking about Dad Rock, and how it changes or maybe doesn’t change with time - has there always been Dad Rock? It seems to me that it’s a newer term for rock music that has always existed, perhaps created in the 90s when millions of kids were listening to rock music, and so were their parents, but just not the same type of rock music. In the previous generation, kids were listening to The Beatles while their parents were into Frank Sinatra or Benny Goodman. Definitely apples to oranges. But in the 90s and beyond, kids and parents were listening to pretty much the same music, and now, the bands that were edgy and scary in the 90s, like Nirvana and Alice In Chains or Nine Inch Nails and Tool, are now Dad Rock staples, while bands like Wilco are continuing to make great music. firmly embracing their Dad Rock status.

Another change that I mentioned in a comment was a particular artist’s transition, much like Wilco or Neko Case. Tom Petty is firmly Dad Rock, but there’s a vast difference between Damn The Torpedoes, which is punk-adjacent, and Wildflowers, released 15 years later. Wildflowers was an album I gave my mom for her birthday that year, but now it’s something I listen to in a much different way. I am also, to my surprise, appreciating Sheryl Crow differently than I did in the 90s (Steely Dan, however, has always been, and will always be, Dad Rock).

Bonnie Raitt is indeed Dad Rock, and that’s okay. When I first revisited the album in 2020, I was aware of it, but always as my dad’s music, and I know now that’s because it was always great music but just not something I could appreciate then. My musical tastes are changing, but by expansion, not exclusion. I am appreciating more and more music, old and new, precisely because I am older. I am open to more perspectives in music, and appreciating more bands for more reasons. That’s something I learned from my dad, learning from him about John Lennon and Van Morrison, Joni Mitchell, Joan Jett and, yes, Bonnie Raitt. It turns out he was cool the whole time.

Now, my job is to encourage the same listening habits with my kids, encouraging them to keep an open mind when it comes to new bands and new music, and also to old music; their “Dad Rock” will be different from mine, but maybe not too different when it comes down to it. Maybe I’m cool after all.