In dredging up my 1970s college newspaper review of the Ramones last week, I got to thinking about why I liked them. A big reason was because they played fast, and at the time I liked fast music (I still do, although not as much). Judging by the large number of well-informed comments on the post, a significant fraction of my readers have not wholly dissimilar tastes.

Above is a 1945 recording of “Anthropology” by bebop pioneers Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. This was another example of a style of extremely fast music, although bebop seems otherwise quite different from “Blitzkrieg Bop.” And yet bebop’s key fan base was demographically almost identical to punk’s a generation later: smart young male New York City music critics.

What kind of factors seem to influence whether musical fashions tend toward fast or slow? Drugs? Dances? Demographics? Generation gaps? Boredom?