Parenting & Family Quote by Kip Winger

Kip Winger’s line reads like an origin story and a defense brief at the same time. By planting the flag in “the 70’s,” he’s invoking a decade that functions as rock’s all-purpose alibi: an era when radio still tolerated left turns, when albums were stitched together from funk, prog, pop, hard rock, and whatever else the band had in its bloodstream. It’s a neat way to claim credibility without name-dropping. The decade does the work for him.

The key phrase is “albums that had a wide variety of style.” He’s not talking about eclecticism as a hobby; he’s describing a listening environment where the album, not the playlist, trained your attention span. That matters for Winger’s own career, shadowed by late-80s hair metal branding that flattened musicians into cartoons. The subtext is: don’t reduce me to the costume. I came up on records that treated range as the point.

It’s also a subtle jab at genre policing. In rock culture, “variety” can be code for sophistication - a way to distinguish craft from trend-chasing. Winger’s intent is to reposition himself less as a product of MTV’s narrow categories and more as a musician shaped by an older, messier musical literacy. He’s reminding you that his DNA is album-era ambition: songs allowed to change moods, players allowed to show their homework, and taste defined by curiosity rather than tribe.