I finished the last section of Let's Talk About Love: A Journey To The End of Taste, and I took some interesting points from it. One main one is this: musical discourse might be more open and "democratic" if we have conversations that are less about whether or not our musical taste is better or worse than other people's. If the conversation is framed more in terms of, "Wow, we have completely opposite musical taste. I wonder what in our backgrounds lead to that?" it might result in more engaging, and less dismissive and misguidedly pretentious dialogue. After all, one man's Meat(loaf) is another man's Poison. (groan?)This all sounds so lovey-dovey, group therapy-ish that I could almost puke (say that last line in a Holden voice), and I don't expect to turn into some kind of weirdo music socialist ( ;) ), but it made me reflect back on the origins and shaping of my musical taste. A somewhat recent influence arose around the year 2000, when I started going (borderline living) on the internet and researching music through various methods, such as discussion boards, reading about bands or albums, and downloading all sorts of music. But if I really go back to the beginning, I'll probably find myself in a cluttered basement in Westhampton, New York.
Before the age of eight or so, my experiences with music were limited to Kasey Kasem's top 40 on the radio, and Solid Gold, the weekly top 40 program, on the television. My Dad gets about seventy-five gold stars for liking Prince, but other than that our music-related conversations were something along the lines of, "Dad, why is Crystal Gayle's hair so long? Does she trip on it? Is it used for Rapunzel purposes?" We watched whoever happened to be on that week, be it Kool & the Gang, Laura Branigan, or Hall & Oates.
My step-brothers were the ones that introduced me to the concept of obsessing about bands and listening to more than just the songs that happened to be playing on the radio at the time. When I would come over to their house, I would inevitably end up in the basement, a young boy's wonderland that consisted of a pool table, a dart board, and a foosball table. They were about eight years older than me, so of course I thought they were way cool. When Robert Plant started braying over the stereo about squeezing lemons (a pretty bizarre metaphor in retrospect), and Roger Waters started moaning about "one of [his] turns coming on," I was immediately hooked. Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, and The Doors were of course fm staples, but my brothers fostered in me a maniacal love in these bands that has since filtered over into other groups like Radiohead, The Beatles, and Brian Eno. The latter artists have more "music nerd" cache to them, but most people don't even know who the hell Brian Eno is, much less get to hear his music (which is kind of a bummer, cause it's not all as out there as some people assume).
I'll start with Pink Floyd. It's much "cooler" to be into Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd. It's more artsy sounding, less bloated, and seems to take itself less seriously. And Barrett totally lost his sh*t on acid and went crazy, which is mega cool!!!! Don't get me wrong, I definitely enjoy Piper At the Gates of Dawn and some other Syd Barrett stuff, but i definitely have much more of a connection to Roger Waters-era Pink Floyd. Sure, some of the lyrics are insufferable, and some of David Gilmour's guitar solos are about as emotive as aluminum siding, but there are still a bunch of great songs. And the memories each of these songs conjure up are endless. Take the song "Sheep" from the album Animals (my favorite PF album). I love the plaintive intro, then the way Water's vocals are eaten alive at the end of each line by the synths and the raging guitars. The surprisingly unrestrained guitar solo at the end is also perfectly in line with the lyrics.
My step-brothers and I knew ever Zeppelin song by heart. Well, almost. I butchered some lines, and never heard the end of it. "IIIIIIIIII'm not trying to find it" from "Misty Mountain Hop" somehow turned into "llllllllaaaaaaaaaatrafayeeeeeeeeeh." Phonetically it almost worked. Needless to say, we loved Zeppelin, and when we heard that there were going to be two non-album tracks on the then-new box set, it was almost too exciting to handle. When those two songs turned out to be "Traveling Riverside Blues" and "Hey Hey What Can I Do," our seemingly unrealistic expectations were exceeded. Two great songs, one a rollicking blues rocker (I had to say that corny phrase once in my life), and the other a sad acoustic number about a guy that's... uh, dating a prostitute? The naivety of youth made me think they were just arguing over cereal preference or something. To this day I don't really look too deeply into Plant's lyrics (good thing-cause most of them, "TRB" for one, aren't even his.) I left out the "HHWCID" YouTube and threw in "How Many More Times," because it's my favorite Zeppelin song. It's just monstrous. I don't care if the section from 6:38 to the end of the song is the most c*ck-rock, over-the-top thing ever, it still rules. And John Paul Jones, ever the underrated Led Zeppelin member, anchors the whole song with his rolling bass line.
"Strange Days" is probably my favorite Doors song. I can't really escape the fact that Morrison's lyrics are really corny, but the bass playing in this song is awesome. At 2:04 it sounds like there's psychotic rubber bands flying all over the place. Not quite sure what's up with this video, though. MIDGETS AND JUGGLERS ARE STRANGE! And then there's Ray Manzarek walking behind them, who's about as strange as a public accountant shopping at Best Buy. Anyway, the imagery in this video is as bang-you-over-the-head as many of Morrison's lyrics. Oh, wait. Am I lapsing back into music snob mode? NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Jim Morrison is a talented musician with many things to offer a diversified modern audience. Gosh darn it, I like him!
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