MY MUSIC TASTE: A MEMOIR

     I love music. That's definitely not an overstatement. Music is one of my favorite parts of being alive. I love to listen to all kinds of music, and my only problem with it is finding enough new songs to satisfy my ever-expanding tastes. My Spotify library grows every day, with new playlists constantly popping in to encompass more new genres that I discover a fondness for. Music is great, to be honest. 

    Lately, I have been delving much deeper into the iceberg that is music. I felt myself getting tired of the repetition of the same songs, the same artists, even the same genres. This filled me with the desire to try and test out new genres of music that I had never even considered. I had previously felt a need to conform to the music taste vehemently, an urge started by my unfathomably miserable music taste when I was in Middle School. I had gone to each end of the spectrum, from over to under-conforming with my peers and now that I have grown more, I want to explore more of the musical landscape.

    Anyways, as far as actual music go I'll sort it out by the playlists I usually use on Spotify. My main genre is rap, by and large. Rap is what my friends listen to, what the world expects me to listen to, so I listen. And I truly do think that even if the whole world hated rap I'd still find it hard to not enjoy it. Fascinating wordplay layered on top of highly thought out beats makes for an incredibly broad genre that has a low barrier to entry, but because of its looseness allows for completely experimental albums to still put up massive numbers. For an example, Kanye West's new-ish album VULTURES contains many of these experimental aspects. The album, despite completely defying usual rap convention in most aspects is still topping charts globally, which is a testament to the versatility of rap.

    Completely aside from rap, I've also discovered a fondness for Jazz that I never knew existed beforehand. The complex polyrhythms of music around the world, especially jazz, are fascinating to listen to and give a new perspective on music as a whole. Even for someone who typically listens to somewhat mainstream genres, jazz and world music are definitely both worth lending some time to for a listen, even if it's something you believe you'll hate entirely, which is how I initially went into it. One of my favorite albums that I have discovered while looking for new music was Bismillah, by Peter Cat Recording Co, a New Dehli based jazz band who's airy sounds are spectacular to listen to. Some of the standouts on the album, if you choose to listen to it, would be Memory Box, and I'm This.

    Another genre I've really enjoyed is early 2000's and late 90's rock music. My brother was mostly who made me open up to the genre
initially, but since then I've taken a very strong liking to the music of the period. It feels nostalgic, probably due to despite the fact that I wasn't alive during the time that the music was made, lots of it appeared in the typical 'high school' movies I saw as a child. A few of the standouts for me are Blink-182, and Teenage Dirtbag by Wheatus specifically. Blink-182 was introduced to me by my brother, and I associate a lot of the songs with him. My favorite song by them, by far, is 'What's My Age Again?', which was introduced to me by Tristen and not TJ, but is still one of the songs that I greatly enjoy. Thematically, it has a lot in common with Teenage Dirtbag, both essentially being about youth itself, which is perhaps why they speak to me so much.

    These aren't all the songs I listen to, of course, but I think it's a pretty decent picture of the scope of music I listen to. I hope that if you were curious about the music I listened to, for whatever reason, you understand better now. Thanks for reading.