As a Deadhead and fan of many other musics… I’m very disappointed with the lack of vitriol foisted in the general direction of my favorite band. I live for that stuff!
Stuff that I want to like, and have really tried to like, but can’t get there. Hmmmmmm… Tom Waits comes to mind. Really appreciate him as a thoroughly unique artist, but can’t get there. Otherwise I can only think of 1 noteworthy album that I have really really really tried to appreciate but can’t… Pet Sounds. My loss probably. I do listen to it at least quarterly hoping the bell will ring. Hasn’t as yet.
Why?
If I don’t like something then I don’t like it: as I see it there is so much I do like I, that I don’t see the point of subjecting myself to the unpleasant experience of listening to something I don’t like in the hope that I might change - a bit like the reverse of the effect aversion therapy in Clockwork orange on the Alex character’s former love of Beethoven’s music.
Why you ask. Well… to me Tom Waits aligns with a lot of stuff that is in my wheelhouse… so I give it multiple shots. I never said the process was off putting, offensive, or unpleasant. Same with Pet Sounds. It’s considered a masterpiece. I want to get inside it and see what others see. No harm in that.
The Smiths are another band I just don’t get and imo their music has dated worse than most of their contemporaries. Also Morrissey is such a miserable prick.
Pete, as I’m sure you know, the Smiths have long been my favourite band. I simply adore their music. I suspect so much of what people like is influenced by being exposed to them at a particular time in your life and a particular set of circumstances. I first saw them play in November 1983 and Leicester Polytechnic. I was 22 and studying for my PhD and that night was the best concert of my life, beating even Joy Division a few years earlier. I saw them many times after that and somehow the lyrics and music just speak to me. I think they are a band that people just love to hate without really knowing why. I’m not sure that they have dated more than other bands of that time. If you listen to some of today’s indie bands you can easily hear the Smiths influences coming through and many young people seem to love them, despite the band breaking up long before they were born.
All this thread shows is that music is intensely personal. It lets a few old people moan about what they dislike and that’s fine. In a strange way it may actually help people to discover new music, as the stuff people don’t like is often well worth investigating.
Actually I thought of you after I posted, of course it’s not personal it’s just preferences. I bought their The Queen is Dead album a couple of years ago mainly cause of you and while it’s not a bad album it’s certainly not earth changing imo. I also felt that their music stuck to the 80s unlike XTC and a few others that imo sound timeless. Good thing is we’re all different and I for one welcome other’s passion in stuff that I don’t warm to. It’d be a pretty boring world if we all liked the same thing.
I’m not sure much music is earth changing, especially as one gets older and has heard it all before. Would anyone stand up and say ‘Dire Straits changed my life?’ I doubt it.
True but I guess I was expecting more. Dire Straits played at a decent clip through a good hi fi is rather satisfying for a lot of people, it all comes down to individual tastes.
It’s clear from the emotions music stirs up that it has been a big part of people’s lives, whether or not music itself is an agent of change. Club, dance, house and electronic music was a massive part of my youth and an agent of change in my life, and I guess at least part of the responses in this thread maybe highlight the passions that arise when genres or artists that have had that effect on others, are different to those that affected oneself?
I agree with @Pete_the_painter about Morrissey though. I do like The Smiths. Complicated world eh
“Changed my life” or “earth changing” are interesting concepts in this context. Beethoven changed my life because Egmont was the first oiece of music I really loved, and it gave me a desire for more. Pink Floyd changed my life because the Saucerful of secrets album, bought by my older brother, was the first prog rock I heard, and instantly loved. Led Zeppelin changed my life because Whole lotta love was the first rock /blues-rock I heard, broght by one of my older brother’s friends and one of the first records played on my first hifi system - and I wanted more! Deep Purple changed my life because they were the first band I saw, and my induction into live music gigs (with discovery of head-banging, and lots of other things). Puccini changed my life, his Turandot converting me to opera with the most intense emotional experience I’ve ever had in public. Other music has affected my in various ways, but as far as I can think at this moment none as distinctly identifiable as these.
I think it’s fair to say that the Beatles changed my life. Their music encouraged me to listen harder and to music that I might not have. It helped shape my political views and opened my mind to ideas and opinions that in turn are reflected in my outlook of life. Music can be earth moving imo and it can definitely change lives.
Who hasn’t reflected on George Harrison’s lyric “life goes on within you and without you”.
It’s hardly deep philosophy. Change comes from within and things carry on when you die. Perhaps because it’s ‘The Beatles’ it’s elevated to a level it wouldn’t achieve were it to be sung at Eurovision. Anyway, we digress.
I don’t think I ever have on that one, though I know the music well, and I have reflected deeply on, or prompted by, some song lyrics, I guess including by the Beatles.
