Nineties Brit-pop band Blur once proclaimed ‘modern life is rubbish’. Well, if the band will allow me to paraphrase them, I reckon modern cars are boring. As a devout, life-long petrol head, I cannot believe I just wrote that - but it’s true. And I’m not talking merely of ‘everyday’ cars but all cars - executive saloons, sports cars, SUVs, the lot. Even modern supercars don’t do it for me, not helped by the sheer proliferation of such vehicles.
I fully accept the need to cut carbon emissions and, as cars are a large contributor of CO2 into our atmosphere, it’s correct that the motor industry looks to alternative methods of propulsion. Electric seems to be the way forward, and I can see many advantages (as well as disadvantages) of an electric future. But here’s the rub: as an enthusiast, I just cannot get excited by EVs. They more than have their place, but they are as capable of tickling my erogenous zones as Margaret Beckett.
It isn’t just electric cars that are fuelling (no pun intended) my boredom of modern cars. Open any new-car magazine and you will be greeted by endless copy-cat SUVs with enormous grilles and dangerously-distracting touchscreens. Cars these days are stuffed with active safety aids that can - amongst other things - prevent you from veering from your lane on the road and ‘communicate’ with other cars and traffic infrastructure to warn of queues or accidents. Safety systems like these may be worthy, but don’t they take some of the skill and control away from the driver?
Salvation is at hand, though. Classic car insurance company Hagerty publishes what it calls its annual Bull Market - cars that they predict will increase in value over the coming year. Dominating these lists for years now have been so-called ‘youngtimers’ or modern classics; well loved and fondly remembered cars from the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s. Its 2021 list included the Audi TT, Lexus LFA and ’05 Ford GT.
As a child of the 90s, cars of this era hold fond memories for me, from watching them on Top Gear to seeing them parked in the school car park. But this is not merely a question of nostalgia; I genuinely think older cars are more interesting. They hold more appeal for me. They looked better, they featured a greater variety of body styles, and they were much better differentiated from one another than today’s cut-and-paste, copy-cat sea of beigeness. What’s more, they were much more analogue in feel - you could climb in and start driving without having to decide which mode you wanted the steering in or how loud or quiet you feel the exhaust should sound.
So while today’s Instagram generation whip out their smartphones to shoot the latest 2,000 horsepower electric hypercar, I’ll be admiring the boomerang tail-lights of a Maserati 3200GT in an issue of Classic.Retro.Modern. Way more enjoyable.
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