Rock Anthems Fill Generation Gaps.

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Every decade seem to have it musical anthems. Songs that are sung and played not only by the generation of its origins, but 2 or 3 generations later. I was at a "battle of the bands" at one of the local high schools a couple of months ago. The musicians competing played everything from The Beatles to Silverstein. The kids all seemed to know and love the old stuff as much as middle aged and new. As a guitar teacher, I encourage my students to bring songs they want to learn. We talk about the song, what they hope to gain from learning it and the things they'll have to learn and improvements they will have to overcome to master the song. It never ceases to amaze me how often these teenagers bring songs that I grew up with (sometimes liking, other times wishing they would fall into the scrapheap of forgotten mistakes). I also like when they bring new song, from bands I don't know about, because I make it a point to learn the songs they are working on also. Kid Rock is far from a relic from the distant past. However, his latest (and possibly his biggets) hit is based on 2 songs from the stone age. The original "Werewolves of London" only made it to 21 on the US Billboard Charts. Of course "Sweet Home Alabama" is almost the poster child for rock anthems, but even it never climbed above 8 on the charts. Rock Anthems are those songs that we can't seem to get enough of, no matter how old the song is, or how young we are. "Rock Around the Clock", "Jailhouse Rock", "Rock & Roll", "Born To Be Wild", "Sweet Home Alabama", "Free Bird", "Dream On", "Detroit Rock City", "Don't Fear the Reaper", "Smoke On the Water", "Walk this Way" (either version), "Bohemian Rhapsody", "We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions", "Jump", "Eruption", "Born in the USA", "Mony Mony", "Welcome to the Jungle", "Sweet Child of Mine", "Enter Sandman", "Fuel", "Black Hole Sun", "Smells Like Teen Spirit", "Don't Speak", and even generations later, "My Generation... Of course, I could go on for awhile and not even really get started. Most can be found on various versions of Guitar Hero, SingStar or Rock Band. If you bothered reading this far at all, it is probably because you already know the songs that have achieved Anthem status. So, what songs of today will be sung and loved by the kids and grandkids of the class of 2008?