How does one have time to explore?

[Madiel]

Take these songs, from an album I've recently been listening to. This is from one band in one recording session. You wanna tell me this is all just completely interchangeable with no loss of musical sense? That it all conveys exactly the same thing?

http://youtu.be/q2OmNmV3y4Y

http://youtu.be/nvYmxHN4z7k

[Jay F]

I didn't find Carly Simon listening to tons of folk artists. I have always liked her singing voice (e.g. the Bond theme) and decided to try her music. It turned out, not only do I like her singing, but also her music! So, there's sometimes shortcuts to the gems. We better use them! After discovering Carly Simon, I did check out some other "similar" folk artists. No luck. 

Who? I don't think of her as folk, but rather pop.

Have you heard this song, "How Can You Ever Forget"? It's my favorite new tune by her since the '80s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vA-spUnXtFQ[asin]B0015HZAOI[/asin]



My other relatively recent favorite CD is Moonlight Serenade[asin]B008DVJOHI[/asin]

[Ken B]

Well, labels are arbitrary to the point of meaninglessness.

In my case I found that I don't like any music that is based over a repetitive beat. I also seem to prefer instrumental music to vocal music, as a comprehensible text tends to undermine my enjoyment of the music (unless the text is in and of itself interesting enough, or it is manipulated in such a way as to take on a more musical aspect). There are exceptions to both rules, and I've been able to enjoy almost every other kind of music.

I really don't want to come across as some kind of snob here. But musically speaking, there is less difference between the entire genres of, e.g., pop and country&western than there is between any two Beethoven string quartets. For example, it is possible to graft the instrumental parts of a song in one genre onto the vocals of a song in another genre with no loss in musical sense, while even something so simple as replacing the continuo of one Bach cantata with a continuo from another Bach cantata in the same key will make nonsense. There are good artists in every genre, but equating classical with R&B or whatever as just another genre makes no sense; it almost makes more sense to consider rock, pop, metal, C&W etc subgenres of a single genre in a single time period, the way one could consider various national schools subgenres of the symphony in the Classical era.

Well I for one strongly disagree with Orfeo for calling you a snob. And your point about labels and genres is quite right.

[ibanezmonster]

it almost makes more sense to consider rock, pop, metal, C&W etc subgenres of a single genre in a single time period, the way one could consider various national schools subgenres of the symphony in the Classical era.

That's what I was thinking earlier today. You could just consider those all forms of popular music, maybe.

[Ken B]

That's what I was thinking earlier today. You could just consider those all forms of popular music, maybe.

Yes, that was one of my points. All the product of the same culture at the same time, with demonstrable similarities in many musical aspects.

They are all for instance more alike than Debuvel and Ravussy. 

[Madiel]

Oh yes. Because the culture that produced Rock Around the Clock in the 1950s is exactly the same culture that produces a piece of J-Pop in 2014. 

[Ken B]

Oh yes. Because the culture that produced Rock Around the Clock in the 1950s is exactly the same culture that produces a piece of J-Pop in 2014. 

Oh yes, they are more different than medieval Spain and 19th century Paris. 

You are holding a losing hand if your best play is citing different English speaking Americans born within a single lifespan.

Never mind the variety or similarity of the music.

[Madiel]

Now you appear to be completely ignoring what I've actually said, in favour of some imaginary person who said that all classical music is alike.

I didn't. I said that not all pop music is alike. I'm not playing favourites. That's the entire point. If someone came along here and suggested that classical music written 60 years apart was exactly the same, there'd be outrage. Yet you seem perfectly fine with suggesting that popular music written 60 years apart is all the same.

You also clearly have no idea what you're talking about, as J-Pop is in Japanese and comes from Japan. Talking about English-speaking American just demonstrates how spectacularly out of your depth you are. I don't even listen to J-Pop, but at least I know what it is.

[Ken B]

Now you appear to be completely ignoring what I've actually said, in favour of some imaginary person who said that all classical music is alike.

I didn't. I said that not all pop music is alike. I'm not playing favourites. That's the entire point. If someone came along here and suggested that classical music written 60 years apart was exactly the same, there'd be outrage. Yet you seem perfectly fine with suggesting that popular music written 60 years apart is all the same.

You also clearly have no idea what you're talking about, as J-Pop is in Japanese and comes from Japan. Talking about English-speaking American just demonstrates how spectacularly out of your depth you are. I don't even listen to J-Pop, but at least I know what it is.

Oh dear, I am so ashamed not to know that.  How can I face the world so, what was that snobbishness-free phrase you used, out of my depth.
*glub glub*

[Madiel]

You also appear to believe I brought the word 'snob' into the conversation. Wrong.

[Florestan]

If your taste is wide enough to include 10 centuries and all, why is it so difficult to step outside music labeled as classical?

We build these mental walls that keep us inside certain borders. Stepping over these lines is not really a matter of taste but attitude.

There is no competition of who listens to more genres. All that matters is finding the music you like. Staying inside mental walls keeps you from finding what you like.

Yóur reasoning is deeply flawed. Let's use an analogy to prove it.

I have been digging in this gold mine for 25 years. I found in it about 10 main leads which, every single time I digged them, were full of pure, solid gold. There are also dozens of smaller leads and hundreds of minor ones, but each and every one of them contains gold, not as pure as the main ones but gold nevertheless. There was not even a single time that I went out from this mine without any gold whatsoever.

Then there is the other mine, from which I extracted every now and then some gold, but nowhere near as pure as even the least pure of the first mine, and from which I came out more often than not my hands empty .

Now, you come and tell me to go deeper and more often in the second mine because there is solid gold there too.

Not quite logical, isn't it? 

[Karl Henning]

The distinction between clay and gold is an arbitrary label!  It's all gold!

[Madiel]

The distinction between clay and gold is an arbitrary label!  It's all gold!

To someone. One man's trash is another man's treasure.

And really, that's why 2 things going on in this thread are equally silly. One is to say "you have some kind of obligation to listen to my treasure". The other is to say "the thing that I'm not interested in listening to is inherently trash".

There's nothing wrong with saying "you might be interested in hearing this thing that I liked", nor is there anything wrong in saying "sorry, that thing doesn't interest me". The problem is all these objective assertions.

And the reason the objective assertions, about why 'my' treasure is so much better than 'your' trash, are so problematic is that the entire reason we even know about any of this music is that someone, somewhere likes it and gets something out of it.  Music that absolutely everybody hates doesn't get passed down, or recorded (in several senses of the word). It doesn't get bought and sold. Absolutely everything that we're talking about here HAS been bought, shared, enjoyed, appreciated, analysed, over and over.

In fact, Karl, yours is about the only music discussed on this board that has come to us direct from the source, without relying on some previous person's appreciation and enjoyment in order to get to us.  And we seem to like that pretty well, too.

[Karl Henning]

There's nothing wrong with saying "you might be interested in hearing this thing that I liked", nor is there anything wrong in saying "sorry, that thing doesn't interest me". The problem is all these objective assertions.

Agreed.

[Florestan]

And really, that's why 2 things going on in this thread are equally silly. One is to say "you have some kind of obligation to listen to my treasure".

Exactly the position of the OP.

The other is to say "the thing that I'm not interested in listening to is inherently trash".

Exactly the position of nobody else in this thread.

[Madiel]

Exactly the position of nobody else in this thread.

Ah. I see. I must have imagined all those posts that set out to tell me how uniform and dull popular music is.

[Florestan]

Ah. I see. I must have imagined all those posts that set out to tell me how uniform and dull popular music is.

Wait a minute, you mean it ain't uniform and dull? 

[DavidW]

I disagree with the points made in this thread.  I don't think that anyone should feel superior for listening to a broad range of music.  Life is short, I'll listen to what I like whether it is an eclectic mix or just a single composer.  I don't care, and I don't know why I should be made to care.

[Florestan]

Here's my personal story.

From the 7th grade up to the second year in University I listened to nothing but classical music. I was even sort of a snob and professed only disdain not only for any other genre, with the exception of jazz, but also for their fans.

Then I accidentally discovered heavy metal, and it's a fun story. My neighbor from the floor just below me was a big death metal fan and listened to it with the volume turned uppermost. Of course, those barks and yellings pissed me off big time and I asked one of my colleagues in the University, whom I knew to be a big rock music fan, how can one enjoy such barbaric noise. Oh, he replied, I don't like that genre either, but if you want something really good, try Metallica. I did, with the result of turning instantly into a heavy metal / hard rock fan. Not that I gave up classical music, but now my listening sessions mixed Beethoven and Metallica, Mozart and Slayer, Brahms and Manowar aso. I was even growing my hair long and wearing army boots and heavy-metal-themed t-shirts. I still have Metallica and Manowar's complete discography in my shelves (okay, back row tbh).

It all lasted a few years and then it went away just as suddenly as it came. There came the day when listening to a whole heavy metal album became boring; then there came the day when I did not feel the need to listen to the music at all; and finally there came the day when I placed all my heavy metal CDs in the back row of my shelves. I haven't played a single one of them ever since. Now, if you ask me why, I can't answer. I don't know. It just so happened.

As for popular music in all its genres, my snoberry softened a lot with the passing of time and I have listened to a lot of them, on CD or on radio. I can't say I dislike it, but I can't say I like it either. As background music, especially when I drive, is perfect and I actually prefer it to classical music in that circumstance. But, and that sums it up, it is my feeling and conviction that had I not listened to any popular music whatsoever in my whole life I wouldn't have lost anything of value or importance, while I can't imagine my life without Schubert, Mozart or Brahms.

That's it. Of course, it is just my personal experience and it says a lot about me and nothing at all about the quality, or lack thereof, of popular music.

[mn dave]

That's what I was thinking earlier today. You could just consider those all forms of popular music, maybe.

No maybe about it.