We don't all remember the war

[seashaken]

I've just been for a walk and passed a pub with a notice up about a lunch with entertainment for the over 60s. The entertainment is a crooner singing a selection of wartime favourites. Now I'm 66 and the cultural movements that informed my youth were hippies, glam rock and punk. For people 10-20 years older than me it would've been Elvis, mods and rockers, the Beatles and there can't be many people in the target age group with clear memories of the war, many wouldn't have been born. Obviously I realise the audience will be self-selecting and anyone who prefers Led Zeppelin will give it a swerve, but I did find it depressing that this is still considered appropriate entertainment for people my age. I don't want to find myself in a care home in 20 years time being forced to listen to Vera Lynn.

My aunt is 65, Daily Mail reading type, was never particularly trendy. She loves WWII stuff, has a strong cultural connection to it. House has loads of WWII propaganda posters about making potato pie and stuff. So I guess it must draw crowds in, even if it was before their time? Either that or the performers have been going for 20 years and just don't know how to adapt now their audience have mostly passed on!

I quite like the idea of sitting in a care home with my peers (like there will be any money for that, pretty sure we'll have some kind of old age suicide capsule by then) and tapping our feet along to Nirvana songs.

@seashaken YANBU wrong age and era. Confused that people can’t do the maths

For the record my fiancé hates Vera Lynn with a passion so my final years wouldn’t be peaceful if that’s what we were listening to in the nursing home 🙈

I turned 50 this year and I'm suddenly very aware of advertising aimed at over 50s. FFS I play bass and guitar, I go to gigs, I still dress in the borderline goth way I always have, I go to clubs occasionally, I'm planning my next tattoo... I have no interest in over 50s holidays (what do they entail anyway? How are they different from other holidays?) or high backed chairs in tasteful shades. And I certainly can't imagine wanting to listen to wartime tunes in ten years' time. The 60+ people I know are still listening to The Clash, The Damned and The Smiths and, shocker, current music too.

Reminds me of that Lenny Henry sketch where he ponders on what our generation will be listening to in old peoples' homes, and suggests afternoon singlongs to Smack My Bitch Up 😂

Do you live on the south coast by any chance? I've always wondered if location has something to do with it.

There does seem to a creeping rise in the right wing eg Italy's recent elections and the antics of the American Republican party (which has a knock on effect on the rest of the world). I'm wondering when Farage is going to crawl out of the woodwork again.

Lord yes. And even my mum, who was around during the war, wouldn’t have been happy to have Vera Lynn sung at her, she didn’t want or need reminding.

Totally agree my DH is 60, he works out, dresses well, is slim - doesn't seem at all old - the music of his youth is Gary Numan but he also loves a lot of more current music. Even my Mum was born right at the end of the war, her musical tastes include lAmy Winehouse and Oasis - no Vera Lynn anywhere to be seen!

I said this to my friend the other day and she look horrified but honestly l think we need to move on!

My late mum was born in 1936 so 50s music was her era, although being a small girl in WW2 meant she would have heard all the music on the wireless 😉 also rationed didn't end till 1954.
When I'm in a carehome I will be wanting Duran Duran and Spandau ballet 😆

Also just because the war ended I 1945 doesn't mean it should be forgotten!!

It amuses me no end (I'm 52) that when my generation is in care homes, we'll want The Smiths, Pop Will Eat Itself and the Beastie Boys.

Exactly this. Mil has dementia and is in a care home but before she went in we used to play Cliff Richard songs non stop as they kept her calm.

I agree OP! My Grandma is 93 years old and she must be among the very last for whom those years formed her taste in culture and music.

If they are not playing grunge in the care home by the time I get there, I ain't going.

I dint think it should be forgotten and I don't think remembering it is right wing - they were fighting against fascism ffs BUT the music of that era isn't the music of my youth so in my care home (perish the thought) I'd be listening to 70s classics and singing along to David Bowie, the Rolling Stones, the Kinks and the Byrds. That's also the kind of music I want at my funeral.

In the UK? Hardly forgotten, quite the opposite. It's like some weird fetish.

So true ,i used to say this all the time when i worked in elderly care ,my mum and dad are both 80 they were three when the war ended! Vera lynnn etc waa their parents era not theirs!

Neither do I was an 80s teen.

My Dad was one of the younger people to see active service in WW2 having volunteed aged 17 in eatly1944 and then being sent to the far east at the end of that year. Were he still alive he would be 96 now. There is hardly anyone left alive who served in WW2 now. When you watch the Festival of Remembrance etc the Chelsea Pensioners are post war service men - when I was a child they were WW1veterans, then WW2 servicemen, but they are gone now.
I do like WW2 songs because he used to sing them to me as a child. In fact he used to sing WW1 songs too as his father had sung those to him. So there probably are younger people who enjoy a bit of WW2 nostalgia, but you're quite right OP, it's not music that very many people who are alive now actually remember, and it's not the music of the current "older generation". My in laws are in their 80s and the music of their youth is Elvis and the Beatles etc.

Exactly and all the 007 soundtracks and my Tudor music.

Yes! I often tease my dad(mid 70’s) that I’m going to put him in a care home where they regularly have wartime singalongs. It would drive him insane! He has way cooler music taste than me, loves finding new interesting artists.

My mum was born in 1943, was a Beatnik in the 60s and obsessed with new wave French Cinema, complete with a raging crush on Alain Delon and a wardrobe like Jean Seberg. She's been joking for years that when she's in an old people's home they'll all be singing I Can't Get No Satisfaction 😂.

Yes I've always thought this too and in 30 years time or so, the people in care homes will want to listen to garage music or drum and bass. Will they still be playing Vera Lynn?!

I was 49 last week i keep seeing over 50 funeral plans i have no plans to pop off .just yet

My mum is 84 so born during the war but in her early 20s in the 60s so a Beatles fan and also Bob Marley.
No one want to listen to their parents music,the war music was what her parents listened to.

Exactly. I'm 26 and I know, and like, all the 1940s music, though all my favourite music is much older than that. I have absolutely no idea what music was popular when I was in my teens because I never listened to any of it. Anything after about 1957 is too modern for me...

My grandad is well into his nineties. He was an evacuee in the war! The 50s had the music of his teens that he prefers