I cut my musical teeth on the "hard rock" of the 70's. At the top of my list was Led Zeppelin, with my favorite of their albums being Physical Graffiti. I was also into Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Aerosmith, AC/DC, Ted Nugent, Blue Oyster Cult and Rush to name a few. I expect that you are familiar with the releases of all of those bands. I was just getting into some newer hard rock such as Judas Priest when I moved to a new high school and fell in with a different group of friends. Under their influence, my tastes started to soften, so I never really became familiar with the next wave of heavy groups – Iron Maiden, Motley Crue, Metallica, etc. My older son is now listening to some of that stuff – his favorites seem to be the older groups. Specifically AC/DC and Kiss. I think that you’re right to classify this genre as puerile; the demographic to which it appeals is almost exclusively teenaged males. But I remember a few scattered scenes from my youthful days strolling down the street with friends while “Paranoid” or “Sweet Emotion” blared out of the speakers of the ridiculously large ghetto blasters that we used to drag around with us. My connection to that music at that time was probably more primal and powerful than any other musical connection I’ve experienced since.