X/Z Song Trader: "All The Young Dudes"
A Gen X Rocker Discusses Music With His Gen Z Daughter
About X/Z Song Trader: Steve is a music journalist, author and musician. Lucy is a diehard music fan and college student. They have always enjoyed a father/daughter bond over music. Each week one of them picks a song and they both share their perspectives. These are casual conversations based on musical connections. Opinions are their own. Keeping it positive.
Check out the whole X/Z Song Trader series.
“All The Young Dudes”
Steve’s Perspective
I’ve always been fascinated by how you and your sibling discover music.
I think a lot of that has to do with how few options my generation had growing up compared to what’s available these days. My main methods back then were commercial and college radio, MTV, record stores, music magazines/fanzines, the odd John Hughes film and, most crucially, mixed tapes my friends made for me.
Your generation still has many of those valuable resources, but streaming services and social platforms like YouTube and TikTok have added more immediacy. With pretty much the entire history of recorded music at your fingertips, your ability to quickly time travel across different eras and musical genres is astounding.
Even though I use many of those tools as well, I’m still occasionally surprised by some of the tracks that pop up on your playlists—especially when a particular song is a favorite of mine, but I’m not the one who originally introduced it to you.
Such was the case with Mott the Hoople’s “All The Young Dudes.”
I think the four of us were driving back from a vacation in Northern California when it came on the car stereo. I’m sure I looked like an excited puppy when the mournful guitar melody kicked in. Your mom was the first to notice how much I was geeking out and rightfully teased me about it. Do you remember any of that?
I’m pretty sure I immediately launched into a diatribe once the song ended, all about how David Bowie had written it specifically for Mott the Hoople after they incredibly turned down “Suffragette City.” Can you imagine declining one of the greatest rock songs ever by one of the world’s most talented songwriters when he was at an early career peak? What a crazy era for rock and roll collaborations.
While we’re on the subject, have you heard any of Bowie’s versions of “All The Young Dudes”? I always liked this live recording. It’s got very different energy, but retains all the original majesty.
Musically speaking, I think Mott the Hoople’s version—produced by Bowie—is magnificent.
My favorite part is probably the call-and-response choruses with lead singer Ian Hunter’s semi-nonsensical calls-to-arms in the background:
Hey dudes!
(Carry the news) Where are ya?
(Boogaloo dudes) Stand up, c'mon
It’s funny to think how many times I’ve sung along to this song without really considering whether or not the lyrics made any sense to me. But I guess it ultimately doesn’t matter because the romantic and nostalgic feelings it evokes are undeniable.
I’m sure I asked you back then, but do you remember how you first heard this song? An episode of Gilmore Girls? A friend’s playlist? Either way, I’d love to know.
Lucy’s Perspective
Although a lot of the music that I listen to is discovered virtually through social media and some of my friends, this song in particular began the surge of new types of music I was exploring.
I think that 2020 was a rough time for everybody, but especially people my age who had spent their whole childhood being socialized and trained for human interaction. To have that chance pulled out from under us the second we really became conscious enough to exist in society forced a lot of unnatural reliance on social media and media in general. I met some of my favorite people during that time—all online—because that was the only way for somebody as social as me to get by.
It's funny that you also remember listening to it on that homeward bound car ride. For me, that moment was significant in its long-awaited musical approval from my rock-loving father. It had taken me years and years to shock you with a song I was playing in the car, but in that moment I had finally done it.
I too recall the long ramble about David Bowie and his exciting role in the making of this song, though my take on it was with much more admiration than you seem to remember. I was just happy to know that I had found a song that you liked without having to even ask you. This was a trend that began to carry through with the other songs I was listening to at the time, such as “O’ Children” by Nick Cave, one I got from a Harry Potter movie.
Listening to the David Bowie version of “All The Young Dudes” above, I am even more in love with the melody and feel of this song.
I have always adored how melancholic and emotional it felt. For me it is connected with a time in my life that left a sour taste in my mouth. I blasted this song while I sat through Zoom classes and missed human connection.
It is reminiscent of a time when even going outside to exercise felt dangerous and it played in my headphones while mom did laps around the house. But more than all of that, to me it is reminiscent of loneliness. Although I have always had an easy time making and keeping friendships, being far away from people that I cared about was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do.
I first learned about this song from a video on social media and then continued to love it as it grew in popularity online for a few months.
Songs like that often fall out of rotation almost as quickly as they pop up, but this one stuck in my playlists for years—I tend to get attached to songs that I love in a way that it seems like most people don’t. It’s almost annoying how long I can love a song.
“All The Young Dudes” has always meant a lot to me. It holds a melancholic connotation because of the wonderful lyrics and melody spilling out of my phone as I listened. This is probably my favorite line from the song:
And my brother's back at home with his Beatles and his Stones
We never got it off on that revolution stuff
Mainly because I get a kick out of it, but also because it holds a sort of nostalgia for that era of music—one that I obviously didn’t get to experience in the ‘70s, but appreciated as I grew up.
One of my favourite songs (I'm old enough to remember hearing it on the radio when it first came out). I think there's always been an element of nostalgia and melancholy to Mott's own songs: Do You Remember the Saturday Gigs, The Golden Age of Rock and Roll, etc.
I really like the concept of this series, would love to have something going like it with my own son, especially as his exploration right now is heading into areas I don't identify with as much as I once did. (From Placebo to Ugly (UK).) But, to All The Young Dudes.
This is a seminal song in my own musical education, I was 8 at the time and all over pop music. I write about it my memoir.... for me, it wasn't just the music but trying to make sense of the lyrics. I was 8. "Mum, what's a dude?" "A cowboy." Confusion reigns. (I grew up in London, my mum in the Shetland Islands. Can't blame her for not understanding the reference!) The song has never aged, it still has the same power to affect people as evidenced by Lucy's reaction.
But on the subject of lyrics... For over 50 years now, I have heard a line you quote as "HE never got it off on that revolution stuff," which to me always made sense and sat fine. It is indeed referenced on lyric sites as "WE never got it off..." and that verse has taken on new meaning to me. I quite like the idea that I have songs I have misheard all these years - believe it or not, there are still lyrics by The Who that I am learning.
Anyways, I love the exchange. And thanks for the additional links because great songs always leads us to other great songs - or just evrsions of the great song in question.