Top Ten Generational Performances

Sometimes, in any walk of life, be it art or sport, you see someone put in a performance that rivals the all-time greats, marks an achievement rarely touched before, and leaves you no choice but to say “fair play”. That is until you find out their age, and all you can muster is the words “oh f*ck off”.

In this article, I’ll use my limited understanding of the word ‘generational’ to count down ten instances of people both producing groundbreaking performances and having the audacity to do so at a young age.

10. BLACKPINK - “WHISTLE”

Endless attitude and starpower radiate from Blackpink’s debut single. A minimal drum-and-bass beat creates a very dreamlike feel and provides the backdrop for some very intimate and melodic verses from each of the four members. Jennie and Lisa in particular provide very strong vocals in their verses, while all four contribute strong vocals in the songs chorus.

The track perfectly blends many different sounds, delivers on the promise on some fine-sounding whistling, and features the group sounding perhaps as confident as they ever have. With two of the groups members still in their teens at the time this was released, that’s not bad going at all.

9. Buddy Holly - “Peggy Sue”

It’s unfathomable to think of how young Buddy Holly was when he left this world and how much of an impact he managed to leave in his time here. In the year that Holly turned 21, the singles he released (with assistance from The Crickets) included “That’ll Be The Day”, “Everyday”, “Oh, Boy!”, and “Peggy Sue”. All singles that have absolutely stood the test of time, the latter is perhaps the best showcase of Holly’s abilities. A cool, bouncy guitar riff, that you could easily listen to on an endless loop, with a brilliant guitar solo in the middle of the song, and Holly’s vocals are tender, often switching his delivery to a much more playful and even cartoonish style.

8. Jonny Howson - “Carlisle (2) 0-2 (3) Leeds United”

In his criminally short time at Leeds United, Jonny Howson, academy product and youngest club captain since Billy Bremner, was the club’s ultimate weapon in big games. He would go on to contribute a world class assist away at Old Trafford, and come off the bench to take our eventual promotion game from the scruff of the neck, equalising from outside the box within minutes. This performance was the most eye-catching however, with Leeds going into the second leg of the play-off semi final against Carlisle carrying a 2-1 deficit from the first leg.

Within ten minutes, a 19-year-old Jonny Howson drew Leeds level on aggregate, finishing off a nice team move by controlling the ball on his chest before volleying it past the goalkeeper. Later in the evening, the game looked to be ticking over into extra time before Howson received the ball, in the last minute of added time, and passed the ball from outside the box into the bottom corner of the Carlisle goal, to send Leeds on their way to Wembley. In an all-star Leeds side including the likes of Jermaine Beckford, Fabian Delph, and Bradley Johnson, it seemed like the sky was the limit for this Leeds side, with Howson as the captain leading them on their way. The tragedy is that this side would only get as far as the championship before being decimated by toxic ownership.

7. Chance The Rapper - “10 Day”

19 was the age Chance The Rapper was when he released his first full length project, a mixtape by the name of 10 Day, which as the legend goes, he wrote in its entirety during a 10 day suspension from high school. The rough charm and energy on this mixtape is to be marvelled and Chance’s talent is plain to see throughout. His delivery is passionate and his imagery is immaculate, painting vivid pictures of his family and of his childhood life, as this mixtape seems to be largely about Chance growing up, celebrating and refusing to forget the little things in his childhood and adolescence that made him who he is.

Essential listening for anyone entering early adulthood, 10 Day showcases exceptional rapping and some brilliant tracks; the playful ‘22 Offs’ and ‘U Got Me Fucked Up’, the insanely catchy ‘Windows’ and ‘Family’, the poignant ‘Nostalgia’ and ‘Hey Ma’, and the impassioned and heartfelt ‘Long Time’, ‘Long Time II’ and ‘Prom Night’.

6. Orson Welles - “Citizen Kane”

At the age of 26, Orson Welles co-wrote, produced, directed, and starred in Citizen Kane, a film that has gone on to cement its critical status as one of the greatest films ever made. I’m still 26 for a few months, I could do it you know.

This film that did groundbreaking things with the narrative of feature film. One of Hollywood’s first true biopics, the film details the life of fictional publishing tycoon Charles Foster Kane. While Kane is the main character, the story is told by several acquaintances of Kane to reporter Jerry Thompson, in his enquiries to find the meaning of Kane’s final utterance: “Rosebud”. The structure of revealing the end of the story first, and then telling the story front to back, with an overriding question needing to be answered, was revolutionary, and has re-emerged countless times in TV and movies ever since.

In terms of attitudes, the film was very far ahead of its time too. The ending of the film is a tragic one, with the origin of “Rosebud” revealed only to us and left to remain a mystery to all those in the Citizen Kane universe. The film is also very critical of its titular character, emphasising the dangers of a singular being being allowed such vast control over the news that millions of people receive. A particular scene in which Welles, while running for public office, plans a “MASS FRAUD AT POLLS” newspaper headline in the event that he should lose the election, foreshadows very heavily a real-life election some 80 years later.

His acting here isn’t to be sniffed at either, depicting Kane in his early adult life, his performance is bouncy and full of sleaze. When aged far beyond his years to play an elder Citizen Kane, Welles’ performance is very conflicted and very tragic, in the best of ways.

5. Kylian Mbappe - “France 4-3 Argentina”

Mbappe wasn’t exactly a new kid on the block when France faced Argentina at the 2018 World Cup. He’d already scored 6 Champions League knockout goals with Monaco the previous season, which impressed PSG enough to make him the second most expensive signing of all time the following Summer. He’d already netted once at this tournament, but there was still the suspicion that he might be the the next addition in a long line of attackers who burned bright at the start of their careers but never lived up to their initial promise.

This game would be a showcase of all of Mbappe’s strengths. He received the ball in his own half in the twelfth minute and unleashed his pace, gliding past the entire Argentina side before winning a penalty which Griezmann converted. With the score locked at 2-2 in the second half, he controlled the ball in the box and dragged it away from several defenders before firing it under the keeper to put France 3-2 up, and just 4 minutes later, he surged into the Argentina box to get on the end of a Giroud pass and calmly slotted past the goalkeeper, extending their lead.

Later in the tournament, he would become only the second teenager ever to score in a World Cup Final, but this game was the greatest exhibit of all his strengths and showed the world exactly how seriously we should be taking him.

4. Margot Robbie - “The Wolf of Wall Street”

Now one thing I wouldn’t want to do is discredit the great franchise that is American soap opera Neighbours. I wouldn’t dream of it. However the facts are that for many of you, the first time you would have heard the name Margot Robbie would have been upon the release of 2013 Scorsese epic The Wolf of Wall Street, a role that earned her her first of several Oscar nominations.*

Even in a career glistening with fantastic displays, Wolfie still stands out as her finest work. This is a film in which the legendary Leonardo DiCaprio gives arguably one of his greatest performances of his career, and Robbie goes toe-to-toe with him every step of the way. She nails the Brooklyn accent in this film, producing a raft of quotables and enhancing every line with her delivery. She has energy to match the excess of the film, never once being dwarfed by her more established co-stars, and her emotions shine through as she steals some of the films more tense scenes in the films final act.

* I assumed this was the case, because obviously, but in fact-checking this article I learned she wasn’t nominated at all? Please join me in querying this with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and get in touch to let me know what size pitchfork you’d prefer.

3. Mary Shelley - “Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus”

Ooh well done, you know who wrote Frankenstein, points to you, aren’t you so special. I bet in the whole time you’ve been flaunting this wisdom however, you haven’t once acknowledged the insane fact that she wrote it in her teenage years. At the age of eighteen, she conceived the idea of Frankenstein, which she used to win a short story competition against her future husband, her stepsister, and her stepsister’s lover, while the four of them were stuck inside one Summer due to poor weather conditions.

With the encouragement of Percy, her future husband, she would spend the next two years expanding Frankenstein into a fully-fledged novel, a story-within-a-story, told through a string of correspondence between several key characters, a scientist named Victor (Frankenstein), the artificial, sentient creature he creates (Not Frankenstein), a sea captain (also not Frankenstein), and the sister of said sea captain (may or may not be called Frankenstein, further research needed).

The legacy of Mary Shelley’s novel goes without saying. It has been argued to be the first true science-fiction story, and has sparked ethical and existential questions that have continued to be posed some 200 years later. And the fact that this was published when Mary was 21? I think the moral of this story is that if you have a good idea that you believe in, you should take it as far as you can cause you may not yet realise just how impactful it could be. Or the moral could be that if you’re a writer aged 22 and over, it’s time to give up. Honestly, whichever works for you tbh.

2. Kylian Mbappe - “Argentina 3-3 France”

Argentina must be absolutely sick of this man and you dread to think what he’ll have up his sleeve they next time they face each other.

This time, they played in the final of the 2022 World Cup, with club teammates Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappe unrivalled as the star performers at the tournament thus far. It looked to be sailing out to a fairytale ending for Messi with Argentina holding a comfortable 2-0 lead. Then things changed in the blink of an eye, Mbappe converted a high-pressure penalty in the 80th minute to give France a fighting chance, and just a minute later, they were level, as Mbappe swivelled on the edge of the box to fire an acrobatic volley past the goalkeeper.

Messi would score again in extra time, but Mbappe would have the chance to equalise from the penalty spot in the 118th minute, which he did comfortably, completing the hattrick. It wasn’t just the goals though, Mbappe caused absolute havoc in extra time, threatening to score every time the ball came near him, and nearly dribbling through the whole team at the end before being denied by a scurrying back Dybala.

There are big-game players, and then there are hat-trick-in-a-world-cup-final players. Just to give an example of the bottle shown by the 23-year-old, he took three penalties on the night, went the same way for every one, scored every one. He was no longer trying to earn his place among contemporary greats, he was staking a claim to be the best of all time, and in doing so, produced an all-time great attacking performance.

1. Michael Jackson - “I Want You Back”

Right, realistically, where to start with this one. Generational doesn’t do this justice, this is recording one of the best songs of all time at ten years old. All love to your Titos and Jermaines, your Marlons and your Jackies, and their vocals help make this track to complete package it is, but at the centrepiece is an unreal singing performance from Michael Jackson, as The Jackson 5 scored a number one hit with their first national single.

I Want You Back is an ultimate Motown track, with a beautiful arrangement of tambourines, pianos, and bass and rhythm guitars, and Jackson doesn’t just suit perform the track well, he makes it. The fact it’s a child singing doesn’t dent or hamper the song’s meaning one bit, in fact, the rawness and the rasp in his vocals help add to the passion in the song.

One of the songs of the decade and one of the greatest pop songs of all time, and its hard to imagine anyone else singing this, let alone any adult voice on this track.

On that note however, Michael Jackson would perform this song at shows several times later on in his career. If you’re wondering how this song sounds being sung by an adult Michael Jackson, the answer is, very good, because of course it is.