I respected his talent and enjoyed his music, but didn't always see eye to eye with his lyrics. In particular, I was troubled by a line from his track "Everything Louder Than Everything Else":
"A wasted youth is better by far than a wise and productive old age"
I had already passed through my own youth by the time I heard this track but had yet to reach old age. Even so, the line troubled me.
The squandering of one's youth is not a policy that is endorsed by Pirkei Avot. Rather, it is advantageous to learn while one is young (per Elisha ben Avuyah, Avot 4:25), when it is easier to absorb new ideas and skills. Time that is lost is time that cannot be recovered
The notion of an old age being wise and productive is however quite consonant with the Ethics of the Fathers, where intellectual maturity begins at 40, and the ripe old age of 80 is cited as the age of gevurah, "strength" (Avot 5:25). We are encouraged not to be adversely judgemental of the way youngsters spend their youth, being advised to judge others favourably (Avot 1:6). However, if we have survived our teens and twenties, negotiated the perils of middle age and are now edging toward what Frank Sinatra calls the "final curtain", we should make an effort to say something positive about being old, to reassure the young that they should look forward to joining us when the time is ripe.
As an aside, old age doesn't usually get a good press in rock lyrics. One of the most famous lines in any rock number -- "I hope I die before I get old" -- was composed by British band The Who and features in their iconic number "My Generation". That song was launched in 1965. Could the band have known that, as old men themselves, they were still going to be singing that self-same song to audiences more than half a century later?
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