Thank You, Jonas Brothers

Two months ago I didn't know who the Jonas Brothers were.  Then they appeared in Times Square on New Years Eve, looking all smug beside Ryan Seacreast.

"Who are those boys?"  said I to Steve.

"The Jonas Brothers".

"The Jonas Brother?  They don't look old enough to have directed Academy Award winning movies."

"That's the Cohen brothers."

"Oh, ok.  Then who are the Jonas Brothers?"

"I don't know.  Some singing group for kids or something."

I didn't really think too much about the Jonas Brothers until they were featured as musical guests on SNL a couple weeks ago.  It was then that I found out they have made chastity vows (symbolized by purity rings, no less).  They have also sworn to abstain from alcohol and drugs.  (Oh to be able to see five years into the future for a good laugh).  Suddenly, I became curious to hear their music, and made a point to stay up and watch the first performance.  A few days ago I heard another one of their songs, which confirmed the initial reaction I had doubted for the magnitude of its zeal.  

I am commonly accused of being a music snob, a label I resist because it's simply not true.  I literally listen to and enjoy everything from classic rock to nineties dance; Neil Diamond to Kanye West; Louis Armstrong to Patsy Cline.  It's just that I never paid a lot of attention to mainstream  music growing up.  I had my own 'musical phases', dictated by how I was feeling at a given period of my life as opposed to what the kids around me were listening to.  Thus I came to be a music snob.  I did, however, listen to Top 40 tunes enough to know who the Backstreet Boys were, and that I disapproved of their music ("our parents got The Beatles and THIS is what we get???  I KNEW I was born into the wrong generation!!!").

In light of all that, I'd like to say this:

Thank you, Jonas Brothers, for making The Backstreet Boys sound like The Beatles.  You make me feel a thousand times better about my generation.  Call me when those purity rings start burning your fingers.  Actually don't, I'm married.  And I think that might be illegal for at least one of you.