My guest for #MusicTuesday is author Keisha Page. In addition to being a great writer, Keisha is also my marketing person at Booktrope, and I’m so happy to be able to share her post today.

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I’m going to tell you a secret.

I’m a fangirl. Almost, but not quite, one of those raving lunatic women you hear about at concerts. While I’ve never thrown my panties up on stage, I did cry during a Queensryche concert in 1996. It was at Red Rocks (http://redrocksonline.com/about/photos), in Denver, and I was standing at front row center. I was feet away from the band I had idolized since high school. I sang along to every song, even the one from their EP. I looked like the women in those black and white videos of The Beatles’ first shows in America. It was a moment, people.

Today, I’m 42. My oldest daughter is 22, and planning her wedding. I have teenagers and pre-teens. And I have some type of music player in almost every room in my house. At any given time, one of them is probably playing Queensryche.

Queensryche has been the soundtrack to my life. It was literally the first sound one of my children heard, as he made his way into the world, kicking and screaming. It was the music I played at full blast, wearing headphones, trying to find the right way to mourn the death of my father. It’s usually what I dance to in the kitchen as I close the oven door, baking cookies for my kids or making a casserole for dinner. One of the first songs my son managed to pick out, on his Ebay special acoustic guitar, was “Silent Lucidity.”

Oh sure, there’s been other music. David Bowie and Metallica and Red Hot Chili Peppers have all been there for me in those moments, both ecstatic and miserable, when I needed something, anything, to grab onto. The music was there for me. But like a trusted friend, Queensryche was always the band I went back to. They were truly my first love.

Recently I was participating in a discussion on a thread on a band’s Facebook page. The topic of the discussion was “being too old” to still be listening to bands like Megadeth and Nine Inch Nails and, yes, even my beloved Queensryche. Apparently, somewhere between 35 and 40, your musical tastes are supposed to change from Black Flag to Lawrence Welk.

The thing is, though, many of those bands are still making music. And like we view those bands as beloved friends, they are trusting of their fan bases, that they’ve been working for twenty or more years to build. While every artist needs new blood to love and adore them, insuring future music sales, it’s the older fans, who were there from somewhere near the beginning, that shell out $20 a pop for every single album, and, sometimes (I’m looking at you, Kiss), hundreds of dollars for concert tickets.

David Bowie is 67, and his latest album was released last year. Alice Cooper is 66, and he released his most recent album three years ago. AC/DC released their first album in 1975, and their most recent this year, almost forty years later.

I kind of want to meet the guy who walked up to Alice Cooper and told him he was too old.

The point is, if these musicians are all still making music, and they’re a good bit older than I am, why am I too old to be listening to them? I’m not. There’s no too old, and there’s not really too young (age-appropriate lyrics aside). There are no specific ages that are allowed to listen to specific genres, and there’s no rule that says you can’t play Metallica in your minivan on the way to drop the kids off at pre-school. And thankfully, there’s no rule that says I have to stop listening to Queensryche because I’m old. Cause if you try to take my Queensryche CDs, I’m going to beat you with my cane.

———————————————————————————————————-Keisha Page has a music-themed story called “Rhythm of Love” included in the holiday anthology Unwrapping Love. She is currently working on a novel, which is scheduled for publication later in 2015. You can learn more about Keisha on her blog, or visit her on Facebook here. Her Twitter handle is @_WordMistress.