a few questions for music lovers

[rick957]

Are you a music fan?  What I mean by that is, do you care about music, not only as background accompaniment, but as something meaningful that can potentially change your whole fucking life?  If you're in the background noise camp, actually, I wouldn't mind hearing from you too, but mostly this post is a question for people who care strongly about music.

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.
2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?
3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.
4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?
5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

I am a big music fan, and the questions above are great sources of curiosity to me, particularly because I'm no longer a young person by most estimations, so I feel out of touch with the lives of young people, especially those under about 25.  (Old fogeys like me are very welcome to respond too though!)

Thanks in advance for any responses, and a special thank-you to the first responder, whose initiative may help a lot to garner further participation.  :)
 

[kikideru]

1. I do not tend to favour any one particular musician, or band, although I certainly have a few whom make music which I like across most, if not all of their albums. I am more of an eclectic when it comes to music however and find myself preferring songs, rather than artists. However, rating songs for me is a very hard thing to do, since my fancy changes every so often. Here is the list of some of the songs that have stayed with me through thick and thin though:

a. Kansas - Carry on My Wayward Son
b. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky - Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy
c. Republika - Biala Flaga
d. Giuseppe Tartini - The Devil's Trill Sonata
e. Annie Lennox - Little Bird
f. Daft Punk - Harder, Better, Faster Stronger
g. Rammstein - Mein Herz Brennt

2. I don't look for songs neccessarily... Sometimes when I hear something interesting, or remember some tune long forgotten. I tend to find my songs by listening to the radio, watching youtube videos, listening to my mom's and friends' music, when I go to the bar, or even the movies.

3. I have no money (to spend on frivolities at least), so I usually just pirate all of my music, or copy it off of my mom's and friends' discs if they have something I want for my mp3 player.

4. I'm 19.

5. There hasn't been a single piece of music that affected me fundamentally in any way, but I do love music. I think it is very important, whether it's a background noise, or a source of inspiration, or a source of calmness and other emotions.

[rick957]

Sooo kewl.  :)  Thanks so much for your response!  I can tell already that this thread will be of enormous interest to me, at least, whether or not lots of other people happen by.  I'll probably say a thing or two in response to certain posts, but I'm gonna wait to do that, in the hopes that one or two others might contribute their remarks.  It's funny, though -- I must say, outside of this site, I would never be able to pick the brain of a 19-year-old woman about her musical tastes, for the simple reason that I don't socialize with any 19-year-olds, so it's unbelievably awesome to get a peek into a 19-year-old mind this way.  Props to the site for making it possible.  :)  Hope to hear from anybody else out there too!

[meikle]

polls!

here are some answers:

#1: I enjoy groups/artists/etc.  There aren't many situations where I only like a single song by a given artist (excepting cases where I only ever hear a single song or whatever), but I guess there are some (Spiderbait is probably a good example of a group with one song that I enjoy amidst lots of stuff that I don't.)  Here are some of my favorites (I was going to link to my favorite song from each of them, but apparently any link to Youtube results in it slapping the video right into the post :\ ):

Regina Spektor (probably my single favorite artist)
Cake Bake Betty (who became FIELDED and started making music that makes my ears bleed)
The Dresden Dolls (and also Amanda Palmer's solo stuff)
KMFDM(for a nice swing away from upbeat female vocals!)
Mindless Self Indulgence (for a nice swing away from music that has merit)

And lots more, naturally, but those are the musics I listen to the most.  It's not very inclusive; I also enjoy pop (Lady Gaga and Kesha get a lot of play lately), some country (everyone like Johnny Cash, right?), old rock (The Who and Rush have a place in my heart or at least my imagination for Tommy and 2112, respectively), etc.  Most of the rap in my itunes log is Lady Sovereign.

#2 www.pandora.com

#3 I listen to songs on youtube if I want to hear a particular song that I don't own.  Otherwise, I buy CDs or (more and more often) just buy albums on itunes or from amazon.com.

#4 I'm 22.

#5 Regina Spektor- The ghost of Coorporate Future

If I had to say that any individual song had actually impacted the way I think or behave, I have to say that this would be it.  "People are just people, people are just people like you."  It is so upbeat, and I love that.

[Kuroneko]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  

I have favorite groups/artists and favorite songs, lol.  Favorite groups include:

Jethro Tull (absolute favorite)
The Beatles
Oingo Boingo
The Ramones
Rob Zombie
Marilyn Manson
Duran Duran
Rachid Taha
Linkin Park
The Eurhythmics
Annie Lennox
Brian Setzer
Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
Clannad
Smash Mouth
Daft Punk
Fluke
Flogging Molly
The Dead Kennedys
Siouxie and the Banshees
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
Green Day
My Chemical Romance
Nine Inch Nails
Ray Charles
Billy Idol
Big Pig
Sting
Tons of Irish groups
Tons or Arabic groups (I bellydance ;) )


2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

All of the above, but word of mouth and the radio are more influential, followed by browsing amazon.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I always buy my music, though I hvae downloaded free songs on amazon.  I do not participate or support pirating as I wouldn't want my own artwork or source of incoming stolen from me. 

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

I'm 46

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

I think that Jethro Tull had the most influence on me, as I am a flautist and spend many an hour practicing with the records until I could play my flute like Ian Anderson.  I'm not bad, if I do say so myself.  Irish music is also very influential as I play the tin whistle.  Finally, I am very fond of Arabic music because of bellydancing.  There is something about the beat and the exotic istruments of tribal music that I really love.

Favorite song: Cold Wind to Valhalla by Jethro Tull, followed closely by Eleanor Rigby, by the Beatles. 

[Haloriel]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?

A: I have favoured periods in music - though there are a few artists/composers that really manage the sweet spot for me.  My tastes run a long list as one whom has studied music for years - though tend to rest firmly in the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods - think Bach/Handel, Mozart/Haydn, and Beethoven/Brahms respectively.  However, I do have an enjoyment of Renaissance period music - the Englishman John Dowland is one that I adored.  I love opera very much, though general concertos, sonatas are something I also enjoy.  Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky are a couple of others on my long long list. 

As to more modern selections: I will listen happily to anything by the Beatles; I thought (and still think) that Elvis(early), and Johnny Cash were brilliant.  Marvin Gaye, absolutely anything in Gaelic - my favourite Irish groups are Clannad, the late Altan, and Cherish the Ladies.  I also enjoy some rock - though I haven't any favourites in that genre.  Swing and Big Band sorts are fantastic - and Ella Fitzgerald was one of my absolute favourite vocal entertainers.

Question 2:Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

A: Pretty much anywhere, and I always take suggestions to listen to new music.

Question 3:Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgement here, I really want to know.

A: Purchase, always.  And Itunes generally.

Question 4 (strictly optional):How old are you?

A: I am just turned twenty eight this July.

Question 5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony has great meaning for me.  I first discovered it - and my adoration of this genre at the tender age of seven.  My mother had a recording of it - and especially the third movement ... the Allegro con grazia.  It was during my parents divorce that I discovered it, having had difficulty being the stronger, older sibling and explaining things to my three year old sister about ... adults and their silliness.  It was this piece of music that granted me solace - and while I did not realise it then, strength.  Have a listen if you please - I hope that some of you enjoy it as much as I.  As a result of my own experiences, I have been singing art song and musical selections to my son since before he was ever born.  Every night, my husband and will sing him to sleep, together.  Presently my three year olds preference is Moon River, and Edelweiss.

Tchaikovsky's 6th; 3rd Movement

[rick957]

Holy shit thanks for all the responses.  :)  I'm going to say a word or two in response to various posts, and I encourage anyone else visiting this thread to do the same if you like (besides posting your own answers to the questions!).

@kikideru

It's almost too perfect, you are my conceptual idea of the modern music fan.  :)  Your tastes are ridiculously eclectic and sometimes obscure, you're comfortable focusing on songs as much or more than artists, you pirate rather than purchase (so many people do!  I've done it too), and yet, in spite of all those distinctive habits that have become popular with younger folks, you still are able to connect deeply with the music you love.  I only hope that the world is full of young music lovers like you.  I think people older than you had different ways of finding their music and thinking about music, but there's no harm in changing those things as long as the personal connection is still there.  IMO.  Also props to you for your stylistic diversity; I have met many music fans but can't think of another single person who would like all of the songs you listed!  I love it.  (I didn't recognize every song you mentioned, but enough to say that safely.  Rammstein and Annie Lennox!?!  Fuck yeah!  hehe)

@meikle

As with kikideru, your eclecticism thrills me.  :)  Any fan of Johnny Cash is already alright in my book!  (How is it possible that two Cash fans have already posted here?  Well, three, counting moi)  I had heard of Regina Spektor but had only heard one or two songs before, neither as good as the one you linked.  For me, she brings to mind her recent piano-playing pop predecessors -- (in reverse chronological order) Nellie McKay, Fiona Apple, and Tori Amos -- though she also had her own stylistic quirks that I couldn't place elsewhere, as any serious artist should have.  Everyone who has posted has mentioned artists I didn't expect to find other fans of -- in your case, those artists were Rush and Cash.  :)  May I tell you that I had the privilege of seeing the Dresden Dolls open for Nine Inch Nails?  They rocked (both bands).  As if the Dresden Dolls weren't awesome enough on their own, they covered a Black Sabbath tune to seal the deal and win my everlasting devotion.

@Kuroneko

Aargh, I can't believe how diverse and refined your tastes are.  :)  You like some bands that I don't personally care for -- because I'm so opinionated about music, most people I talk to about music like something or other that I don't, and other things that I do -- but anyone who knows who Oingo Boingo even is is alright in my book!  Also I'm shocked that you're a fan of bands from so many different eras of pop music.  You know how to belly dance and play flute and consider Jethro Tull (of all bands!) your personal favorite group??  I am utterly smitten with your level of idiosyncracy and individuality.  I'm going to look up that Tull song you cited, if for no other reason than that I must hear any song that could be possibly be ranked above "Eleanor Rigby," for God's sake!

@Haloriel

Thank God there are still people becoming fans of classical music somewhere.  :)  Not to mislead you, I don't consider myself a fan of classical music, simply because I've had very little exposure to it, but I have enormous respect and even awe for those who have spent time with that genre and been able to connect with it on a very personal level.  I don't personally make a habit of watching videos online or listening to music online, but I loved watching your linked video (and kikideru's) ... God, what a complex and beautiful ritual that surrounds the performance of orchestral music ... The conductor's idiosyncratic gestures and facial expressions, I found terribly moving.  And, somehow, you're able to enjoy both Tchaikovsky and Marvin Gaye ... most charming!

I know a little bit about most of the artists mentioned by all the posters so far, mostly because I worked in a music store for a few years, and I must say, the variety of styles mentioned in this thread has been so pleasing.  When I was a young'un in the early 80s, it was unheard-of for the same person to listen to three or four different styles of music; nowadays it seems to be becoming just as rare to find people who stick to only one style, as most people used to.  Personally I've become a fan of one or two artists in almost every existing genre of pop music, and that used to make me seem unusually open-minded and erudite, but I guess I'm not so special any more!  It's great to see.

Anyone stopping by is welcome to post your responses to the questions or even participate in some discussion or remark on other people's answers (as I have here) ... It's huge fun for me, chatting and learning about all this interesting music.  Thanks for stopping by and sharing.  :)

[Lilias]

#1. I tend to be drawn into genres, and then, because I simply can't stay on the surface of something I like, I start digging beyond the big names. I have been a hard rock/heavy metal fan since my early teens; over the last decade I have gravitated towards the sub-genres of gothic/symphonic/female-fronted metal. On the other hand, I adore Celtic music, neoclassical/neofolk acts, medieval (or at least medievally inspired) chant, and some modern instrumentalists. If there is one single element that can make or break my enjoyment of a kind of music, that is the voice. Non-vocal music tends to bore me, while a superior voice - preferably female - can draw me into pockets of musical reality where I wouldn't have ventured by myself.

Favourite bands/artists include Blind Guardian, Nightwish, Epica, Whitesnake, Savatage, Within Temptation, Shadow Gallery, Paradise Lost, HIM, Clannad, Loreena McKennitt, Kate Bush, Yanni, Vangelis, Blackmore's Night, Secret Garden, Mylene Farmer, Dead Can Dance, The Mission, Lacuna Coil, Shinedown, Qntal, Adiemus, Anonymous 4, Indica, and a gazillion more, according to my Last.fm.

#2. I used to listen to the radio a lot, keeping a notepad and pen close to jot down names and titles I liked, to look them up later. Now I rely mostly on the 'similar' feature and suggestions on Last.fm and Amazon.

#3. I download anything I can get my hands on for free, legally or not, and proceed to buy what I like most. I still like having the artist's complete vision, artwork, booklets and all.

#4. I'm 39.

#5. Whitesnake's self-titled 1987 album was a major landmark for me. I was 15 the summer it came out, a very eventful summer for me and mine. It was the first album I came across that I loved as a whole - not a single duff track on it. I finally was fluent enough in English to understand effortlessly what the lyrics said. Most of all, it introduced me to an amazing singer, who remains my favourite of all time, regardless of genre, to this day. It was the combination of all those elements that made this work hit me so hard, and 24 years later, it still hasn't palled. I doubt it ever will.

[Kuroneko]

@Kuroneko

Aargh, I can't believe how diverse and refined your tastes are.  :)  You like some bands that I don't personally care for -- because I'm so opinionated about music, most people I talk to about music like something or other that I don't, and other things that I do -- but anyone who knows who Oingo Boingo even is is alright in my book!  Also I'm shocked that you're a fan of bands from so many different eras of pop music.  You know how to belly dance and play flute and consider Jethro Tull (of all bands!) your personal favorite group??  I am utterly smitten with your level of idiosyncracy and individuality.  I'm going to look up that Tull song you cited, if for no other reason than that I must hear any song that could be possibly be ranked above "Eleanor Rigby," for God's sake!

Not only do I know who Oingo Boingo is, I've met them, I've seen them three times in concert and knew them when they were the Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo ;) .

LOL, I left out a lot of other, more obscure bands like Abney Park, Beats Antique, Meat Beat Manifesto, Adam and the Ants, Echo and the Bunnymen, A Flock of Seagulls, The Waitresses, Romeo Void and The Escape Club, along with some other faves like Salt N Pepa, Hoobastank, Finger Eleven, Aerosmith, Evanescence, Cyndi Lauper, Godsmack, David Bowie, Heart, The Kinks, The Cure, The Cars, Rage Against the Machine, Fatboy Slim, Queen, Kate Bush, Lorenna McKennit and Jen Titus ;). I also adore a variety of classical music as well as bagpipes, as my dad was an excellent player.

I'm happy to be a musical conundrum :P

[meikle]

May I tell you that I had the privilege of seeing the Dresden Dolls open for Nine Inch Nails?  They rocked (both bands)

You may, but I might kill you out of envy. :(  I haven't seen many bands live that I, personally, wanted to see -- mostly the live shows I've been to have been because my friends wanted to see them (so that covers shows like Mudvayne, Slayer and Hatebreed, Local H (which I enjoyed pretty well, really), and so on.  I did see Kittie live with a friend and that introduced me to Coheed and Cambria, who opened for them (and that was awesome), and I saw Mindless Self Indulgence live and it was awesome, and introduced me to The Birthday Massacre (who opened for MSI), and that was awesome too.

I am rambling because nobody ever asks me to talk about what kind of music I like. :p

[Kuroneko]

You know, I forget who opened for NIN when I saw them, lol.

[Aiden]

Are you a music fan?  What I mean by that is, do you care about music, not only as background accompaniment, but as something meaningful that can potentially change your whole fucking life?  If you're in the background noise camp, actually, I wouldn't mind hearing from you too, but mostly this post is a question for people who care strongly about music.

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

1. Social Distortion
2. Rise Against
3. Incubus
4. Frank Sinatra
5. Jay Z
6. Metallica
7. Slipknot
8. Justin Timblerlake
9. Marron 5

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

I jump between radio stations, in my area it is Star 94.1, Rock 1053 and 93.3 (So cal radio stations)

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

All my listed artist, I have bought their CD's, but I do pirate music to put onto my phone as well. Itunes can blow me.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

26

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

"This Time Darlin" By Social Distortion
I had a girl I thought I loved cheat on me when I moved home with my parents for about a year after high school. I would commute to visit her and my friends until I found out she was fucking my alleged best friend behind my back. I got violent (with him) and told the slut to fuck off and fell into a wicked depression. (I was pretty stupid and in love with her). I heard this song on the radio and it healed my soul, found out who they where and just became a massive fan for over five years now.

"Ghost Town Blues"- Was the "rebirth" I guess, it was me clawing my way out of my depression and a pretty personal song to me now.

I am a big music fan, and the questions above are great sources of curiosity to me, particularly because I'm no longer a young person by most estimations, so I feel out of touch with the lives of young people, especially those under about 25.  (Old fogeys like me are very welcome to respond too though!)

26

Thanks in advance for any responses, and a special thank-you to the first responder, whose initiative may help a lot to garner further participation.  :)

[Oniya]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

Styx is probably tops on my list.  In no particular order after that, in the classic rock field: Kansas, REO Speedwagon, Damn Yankees, Night Ranger, Ted Nugent, Triumph, and Yes.  Outside classic rock, I'll add in Loreena McKennitt, Dar Williams, and Jason Becker.


2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

Pandora has been useful to me.  Also, co-headliners and other 'degree of separation' chains.  For example, Tommy Shaw left Styx for a time and released a couple albums with Ted Nugent and Jack Blades, bringing Night Ranger into my auditory circle.  Dennis DeYoung released an album of Broadway songs, which added Chess and Les Miz to my collection.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I have purchased copies of each album up through Cyclorama, including solo albums from DeYoung, Shaw, Young, and Burtnik.  I have also bought t-shirts and concert tickets.  The little Oni got a hand-painted (by me!) 'Brave New World' onesie at 7 weeks.  That concert was viewed from the lawn.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

Shan't answer ;)

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

The song would be Styx's 'Come Sail Away'.  Mr. Oniya and I (before he was Mr. Oniya) were attending a concert, and had 2nd row seats (Hershey Park, PA - Kansas opened for them, and we were close enough for Steve Walsh to sweat on us).  There had been a number of 'harder' songs, and everyone was on their feet.  As Dennis DeYoung headed for the piano and started the slower song, everyone sat down.  Feeling that this was unfair, I not only stayed on my feet, but hauled Mr. Oniya up with me.  He couldn't help but see us, and I'm sure that the smile I saw as we sang along was a reaction to that.

I later learned that was the moment that Mr. Oniya decided he was going to ask his grandmother for the ring he'd been promised for his fiancee.

[Hemingway]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

Definitely bands/artists.

Tom Waits ( my favorite, hands down )
Turisas
Dropkick Murphys

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

Finding new groups is actually a problem for me. I often discover new bands by looking at "related artists" to what I listen to, but more often than not I stop listening to what I find after a while. Only rarely do I discover something I actually like and continue to listen to for more than a few days. There's no particular way through which I discover new music.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I listen to most of my music through Spotify, a service that ( either for a fee or through ads - I pay, but not much ) lets you listen to all the music you want. The selection is limited to what they've been able to license, but it's good.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

21.

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

I would have to go with Tom Waits' first album, Closing Time. It's infused with a lot of loneliness, and I listened to it through a very lonely year. One song in particular, Martha, echoed fairly well my situation with a girl I knew, who that year became my girlfriend. It didn't last, for reasons outside our control. That just made the song even truer.

[Tsais]

Music! My favorite thing to talk about!

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

I tend to have favorite groups. I'll first hear a song, then start listening more to the artist and discover more in their style that I love (generally). Very rarely do I have a favorite song instead of a favorite artist.

Here's a list of some artists that I'd all rank as my number 1 favorites with songs in parentheses after the artist name:
Opeth (Harlequin Forest, Ending Credits, Serenity Painted Death)
3 (Trust, These Iron Bones, You've Been Shot)
Orphaned Land (Halo Dies, Bereft of the Abyss, The Beloved's Cry)
Porcupine Tree (Bonnie the Cat, Stranger by the Minute, Arriving Somewhere but not Here)
Scott Joplin (Solace, Swipesy Cakewalk, Peacherine Rag)
Cynic (Evolutionary Sleeper, King of Those Who Know)

Some other artists I love, but not number 1 ranking:
Korpiklaani
Tool
Finntroll
Daath
Mt. Eden
Symphony X
Alkan
Mastodon
Novembre
Katatonia
Strapping Young Lad
Los Lobotomys
Pink Floyd
Rush

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

I actually live with a person whose music tastes run very similar to my own, but on top of that, he also enjoys music much the same way I do, so I get a lot of suggestions from him. I also get some suggestions from my cousin and my dad. I get most of my bands from the intranets, whether it is through word of mouth from official band forums (which can be a great place to get music), checking out some of the favorite bands of my favorite artists, or sites like Pandora and youtube. I used to get suggestions from Music Choice, but my tastes diverged from what is popular, and I no longer find much I like and haven't heard anymore from Music Choice. I have found three bands I now love due to co-headliners. I've loved Opeth for years and have gone to see a few of their concerts. At the first I fell in love with 3 and in like with Dream Theater.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I spend money. I've been playing music for 14 years, so I understand the struggle to play and produce music, but I also know that musicians get very little from record sales. However, I feel that my legal purchasing of music is a strong way of showing companies that I like these bands, please give me more and you can have more of my money. I vote for more Opeth, more 3, more Orphaned Land with my dollar. I also feel that it is just the right thing to do.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

20

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

Opeth's Ghost Reveries changed the way I perceived music. I was 14 when I got it and it blew my mind. At that time I was into pretty standard metal and straight death metal. I bought Ghost Reveries thinking it was just another death metal album, if a bit more melodic than most, due to the HORRIFIC cut of The Grand Conjuration that is paired with the terrible, nonsense video. I got it, listened to it, and found something totally different and so much better than what I'd originally thought I had gotten. The songs were long, longer than I'd ever listened to before and the music woke so much emotion in me. I resonated with the music, it didn't matter what the subject matter was, I was there and I felt it. Songs made me tremble, exult, and cry. It started me into progressive rock and metal and paved the way for me to appreciate and love genres like fusion and ragtime. Ghost Reveries also helped me realize that art, for me, must awaken deep emotion in me for me to truly enjoy it. I've always loved music, but not with the deep conviction that I now do, and that album helped me get here.

[rick957]

Music! My favorite thing to talk about!

Aargh, mine too!  Or darn close at least.  I am a hopeless music nerd -- enough so that this entire silly thread just delights me to no end.  Is that sad?  Eh, I don't care.  :)

@Lilias

What you said about your interest in music vocals made me wonder -- do you have a particular male or female vocalist whose voice you find more amazing than anyone else's?  I have one of each (music nerd here, remember?), and I'll tell you mine if you tell me yours.  :)

Oh wait, duh, you already mentioned your favorite vocalist of all time!  Sorry.  I was responding before I finished reading your whole post.  I'm not a Whitesnake fan personally, having heard only their biggest hits, but nevertheless I've always found "Here I Go Again" to be irresistibly thrilling.  Whether or not one considers hair metal a bit silly -- and I'll admit, I do, although that hasn't stopped me from enjoying songs here and there -- that particular track is pure power-chord bliss.

My only other memory connected to Whitesnake (again I don't know their work well) has to do with Tawny Kitaen doing splits atop a convertible or something.  Crap, I got an erection just from saying that.  Excuse me a 'sec! ...

(Oh, in case anybody cares:  Sarah McLachlan for the female, and for male, it's a tie between Sting and Steve Winwood; although all of those artists have lots of music I detest, they also have lots of music I adore, and I have yet to find others whose raw vocals please me as much.  On the other hand, if your favorite vocalist is Stevie Wonder or Peter Gabriel or Tom Waits or Chuck D or any other of a few dozen people, I wouldn't argue with you one bit.)  (As to David Coverdale -- not a personal fave, but hey, it's individuality like that that makes learning about other people's musical tastes so wonderfully fascinating.  'Nuff said.)

@Kuroneko

One of the most glaring things I'm learning from this thread is that the eclecticism in my personal musical tastes is nowhere near as unusual as I would have thought; you're just one of the people here whose tastes might actually be even broader than mine, which is really a wonderful and inspiring thing to see.  Props to musical conundrums everywhere.  :)

@Aiden

From reading this post and others from you in various places, it looks to me like you enjoy flaunting some of your stereotypically hyper-masculine traits, so I'm impressed that you will publicly confess to being a fan of pansy-asses like Justin Timberlake and Maroon 5 -- Sinatra wouldn't let those fuckers shine his shoes, fer chrissake!

(FYI I love Frank and like something or other about both J.T. and Maroon 5.)

As to your top artist.  I heard "Ball and Chain" one time in 1989 and have worshipped Social D ever since.  Rock the fuck on.  :)

...

Don't go nowhere, I'm gonna respond to other posts later on, just 'cause I started the damn thread, and 'cause I love talking about music way too much.  More posts from more peoples are also totally welcome.

[Lilias]

(Oh, in case anybody cares:  Sarah McLachlan for the female, and for male, it's a tie between Sting and Steve Winwood; although all of those artists have lots of music I detest, they also have lots of music I adore, and I have yet to find others whose raw vocals please me as much.  On the other hand, if your favorite vocalist is Stevie Wonder or Peter Gabriel or Tom Waits or Chuck D or any other of a few dozen people, I wouldn't argue with you one bit.)  (As to David Coverdale -- not a personal fave, but hey, it's individuality like that that makes learning about other people's musical tastes so wonderfully fascinating.  'Nuff said.)

Heh. :-) Coverdale is an English bluesman at heart, and despite the runaway success of the hair metal phase, the blues are where he started and where he keeps returning. I heartily recommend Starkers in Tokyo; it's a decade and several light years away from 1987.

As for the female voices that send shivers up and down my spine, there has to be a triple tie there: Simone Simons, Loreena McKennitt and Maire Brennan. I suspect that, beyond ability, each one is so effective because her voice is placed precisely where it was meant to be.

[rick957]

Ooo, back-to-back posts from the guy who started the thread.  That doesn't bode well.  :(  Have I already run out of new people interested in responding to the thread?  Or did my semi-snarky, smart-ass responses put people off?  Or is it just a coincidence, and other people may yet happen by and respond to the thread?  I hope it's the latter, but who can tell?  Anyways, I got time to post, so here's some more responses to things for anybody interested in a bit of PbP-chitchat.  :)  (Oh wait, duh, Lilias posted here last, not me.  Thank you Lilias!)

@Oniya

God, what a charmed life you must lead.  :)  I know that's not always true, for you or for any of us, but your musical remembrance was just amazing, picturing you and future Mr. O defying the complacency around you in that moment and giving crowd love to Dennis DeYoung.  There are so many remarkable things happening simultaneously in that anecdote that it's almost hard to believe, except that I've had comparable experiences myself at concerts, or nearly-similar ones, at least -- moments that easily count among the most mind-blowing cherished experiences of my life.  Those are the kinds of moments that music-listening and music-fandom can make possible for people.  I was thinking over the comment Aiden made above about how a piece of music affected his "soul," I think was what he said ... It's that kind of language that one has to resort to, because there aren't commonplace words to describe the effects music can have on a person, in those rare and priceless instances.  I hope and pray that younger people will be able to enjoy such moments as well, in spite of all the dramatic changes and problems in the music industry over the years.  Not to mention, I wouldn't mind having a few more such moments myself!  :)  Thanks so much for your comments, Oniya.

@Hemingway

Holy shit, another Tom Waits fan!  Never know when or where we're gonna turn up.  :)  You have completely made my day, sir -- I'm not kidding at all -- simply because you're a 21-year-old who knows and loves Tom Waits.  I often fear that the great artists I listen to will disappear into obscurity because younger people are no longer exposed to their genius in the ways that I was; actually, sad to say, I've already watched that happen to more geniuses than I care to count ... But you know, if there are still 21-year-olds out there getting into Tom Waits somehow, some way, then the world must be doing alright after all, IMO.

You and many folks here talked about the ways that people find new music or struggle to do so.  I'm pleased to learn that others do some of the same things I've done, in terms of seeking out artists who are somehow connected to the artists you already love, whether by working with those artists or even just being influenced by them.  It's another practice I hope younger folks are still doing out there somewhere, to help them learn about all the great music that they can't learn about any more from listening to the radio or watching MTV or going to cheap concerts, as we oldsters did.

Many if not most of my favorite artists have some "degrees-of-separation" link to each other ... In fact, one of my best friends long ago had a game he'd made of the whole process, something like "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon," except his was "Six Degrees of Brian Eno" or someone else really obscure and ubiquitous like that ... He could plug in absolutely anybody in the music world (maybe outside of it too) and get back to Eno (or whoever it was), usually in just three or four steps.  Yes, believe it or not, some people are bigger music nerds than I am! ...

Hemingway, I had a genuine LOL over your remarks about "Martha," which has to be in the running for Most Heart-Wrenching Wrist-Slashing Mega-Depressing Song EVER.  :)  (I love it too.)

...

By the way, lots and lots of people here have mentioned artists whose music I know nothing about.  Getting to know new music is a slooow process for me -- I've got a few hundred purchased CDs that I'm behind on listening to already! -- but I plan to eventually look up each of these unfamiliar artists and get a taste of their music, so it's a real service you're doing by sharing your favorites here, for me at least.  I expect I'll find more than one new artist I like from the research process, once I get around to it.

I'm going to use Tsais's post as an excuse to blab further about my musical opinions, but I'm going to put off doing so for a while longer, partly because I'm hoping others will stop by and leave remarks or responses, and also because I enjoy this kind of blabbing so much that I want to save some of it for later.  :)  Is that pathetic or bizarre?  Pheh, I don't care!  :P

[TentacleFan]

1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

I have so many groups or artists that I adore that making a list of them all would prove difficult. I will put a few down here, but in doing so I am leaving so many off just because I'd have a really huge list otherwise. These are in no particular order as I could not possibly rate some of these as higher than others.

Nirvana
Nine Inch Nails
Tori Amos
The Beatles
The Pixies
The Clash
Joy Division
The Cure
Siouxsie & The Banshees
Franz Ferdinand
Queen
Muse
Depeche Mode
The Smiths
The Dresden Dolls
The Cramps
Stiff Little Fingers
The Buzzcocks
Talking Heads
Tom Waits
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Leonard Cohen
David Bowie

I'll probably have to come back when I realize I've missed somebody and put more on.  ;D

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

Lately I find a lot of stuff when listening to stations I've made on Pandora. I used to read magazines but not anymore. I listen to word of mouth from friends and also from other artists via online sources. Don't do radio as I can play Pandora or Google Music or my MP3s in my car and at home.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I won't lie, I've torrented music in the past, some stuff (live/bootleg music) can't be gotten any other way and sometimes you want to try something out before buying it as well. I do spend money on albums for artists I care about, usually via Amazon.com as they're my prefered online music store. I also have a small vinyl collection. I used to buy cd's but got rid of most of them after moving the music to my hard drive.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

32

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

There are so many that have. I'd go with Nine Inch Nails as a band that has been with me for a long time. I know some people don't get the appeal of music speaking to darker emotions, but to me it was an outlet, especially in my teen years to letting me know that I wasn't alone when I felt shitty about life or myself or other things. Those albums, especially the ones from that period, Pretty Hate Machine, Broken, & The Downward Spiral really were there for me.

[JackWhite]

1: I think I'm more of a favourite song-man but most of the songs that I like are from artist that produces quite a few good songs (in my opinion). So I'll put myself between the two. Maybe it's even better to describe me as a genre-man.

(No order of preference)

No Use For A Name - International You Day, For Fiona, Soulmate, Dumb Reminders, Chasing Rainbows
Zebrahead - Anthem, Ricky Bobby, Two Wrongs Don't Make A Right But Three Rights Make A Left
The Ramones - Blitzkrieg bop
Rise Against - Give it All, The Dirt Whispered, Swing Life Away
Flatcat - My Lionheart Beats On, Rockstar Fantasy, Beautiful in Venice,
New Found Glory - My Friend's over You, Dressed to Kill
Millencolin - No Cigar
Less Than Jake - Plastic CUp Politics, Look What Happened
Teenage Bottlerocket - Skate or Die, Bloothbad at Burger King
Last Shot Fired - If We Ever Get Paid
KISS - Rock 'n Roll All Nite
Johnny Cash - Ring of Fire
The Who - Behind Blue Eyes, You'd better bet
Four Year Strong - It Must Really Suck To Be Four Year Strong Right Now, On A Saterday, Wasting Time (Eternal Summer)
Fountains of Wayne - All Kinds of Time
Fall Out Boy - Thnks fr th Mmrs, Dance, Dance
Bouncing Souls - Lean on Sheena
Bowling for Soup - Sometimes, Girl All The Bad Guys Want, Highschool Never Ends
blink-182 - Dammit, First Date, Rockshow, What's My Age Again, Dumpweed, All The Small Things, Going Away to College
The Black Pacific - The System
The Red Jumpsuit Apperentus - Face Down
Simple Plan - I'd Do Anything
The Verve Pipe - The Freshmen
Yellowcard - Ocean Avenue

Some ofBeethoven, Mozart, Bach, ...

2: Last.fm, friends with the same musical taste, youtube recommended videos sometimes
3: If I like enough songs of an artist I go to their concerts when they are close enough. The distance I want to travel for a concert depends on the artist.
4: 19

[Type70item]

1. Pink Floyd - On The Turning Away
2. Metallica - Ronnie
3. Schandmaul - Wolfsmensch
4. Elis - Der Letze Tag

I would have to say above all, Pink Floyd is my favorite, I stole the Animals tape (yes, cassette tape.. showing my age) From my uncle when I was 6 and grew addicted to them.

Normaly I look online (youtube) occasionly with some help by friends who share links on facebook or forums. I'll usually just follow the recomended songs that pop up on the side untill I locate a new band or song that gets added to my list

Jolly roger pirate heh, A lot of the music I listen to is foreign (german, finnish, russian) so most stores here in america don't carry the albums. I would pay for things like concert DVDs and the like if the price of getting it shipped so far wasn't too harsh.

24

Pink Floyd would be my inspiration, especially the era after David Gilmour took the reigns for lyrical style. Aswell as his guitar abilitys, how his solos sound almost like another set of lyrics to the song. He was the one who inspired me as a teenager to get a job and buy my first guitar

[Zylvyn]

1:  I definitely have some favourite musical groups... and some specific songs as well from groups/artists that I don't really care for.  For example, I'm a huge classical metallica, megadeth and rush fan... the tragically hip are also heroes of mine, as well as blood stain child and crazy people like Brentalfloss or George Watsky... but I also love specific songs... like Munster Rag by Brad Paisley, or On The Brightside by NeverShoutNever...  Because my tastes span so many genres (pretty much anything that isn't bluegrass/country) it's super hard to compare them, as I have different music for different moods/personalities/random whims.

2: To find new artists, I pretty much avoid the radio like the plague... that's the same tired and rehashed crap over and over again, where I live (smaller town).  Back when Pandora allowed Canadians to use their service, I used Pandora to discover a LOT of new music... and then when they shut down I did the same with Last.fm...  Now I use Grooveshark, and maintain a subscription to their service.  You can make up a playlist of some of the kind of music you like and then turn on radio mode, which tries to find similar music for you.  I also linkhop on youtube a decent bit.

3:  I spend money supporting the artists that I like the most, and that's about it.  I listen to whatever I want on my phone, ipod and computer via Grooveshark, which I pay $3 a month for... but recently I just ordered all the albums that Daniel Tidwell has put out.
4:  26
5:  While I was in college, I underwent a LOT of personal issues, related a lot around depression, losing touch with reality, and surrealism... and whether you believe this or not, there were absolutely no drugs involved, either...  I was very isolated, very alone, and I spent a lot of time online, living in a fantasy world in a game... more time in a fantasy world than in reality, in fact... and it came to the point where it was all that I could think about...  While this was going on, at a point, I eventually started to lose sleep... I just couldn't stop crying about how much I hated my life and wished I could go to this fantasy world that I preferred so much.  A dear friend of mine... whom I ended up letting down in a very major way, later on... she could tell that something was up with me.  She taught music lessons, and as such was quite stellar with various instruments...  and she wrote a classical tune for me, played it on a fiddle and recorded it, emailing it to me.  I grew dependant on that song, but it helped me sleep...  and as such helped me get through a very ... uninteresting point in my life.

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

I am a big music fan, and the questions above are great sources of curiosity to me, particularly because I'm no longer a young person by most estimations, so I feel out of touch with the lives of young people, especially those under about 25.  (Old fogeys like me are very welcome to respond too though!)

Thanks in advance for any responses, and a special thank-you to the first responder, whose initiative may help a lot to garner further participation.  :)
 
[/quote]

[GardenoftheDead]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.
2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?
3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.
4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?
5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

1. I typically care more about albums and artists then songs. A few include Isis, My Bloody Valentine, Nirvana, Muse, Melvins, Nine Inch Nails, Marilyn Manson, Russian Circles, Agalloch and Boris.

2. Forums, Pandora, and Last.fm

3. I try to spend money when I can, especially for smaller independent artists like Airs, Izalith, and Russian Circles.

4. 19 years old.

5. I'll tell you about two. Nevermind by Nirvana made me care about music. I hadn't heard anything before that sounded like this album did, and it was incredible. It convinced me to keep playing guitar. The Downward Spiral by Nine Inch Nails completely turned everything I thought I knew about music upside-down. I never listened to albums the same way again, and it got me away from my habit of rejecting electronic music.

[rick957]

Wow I thought this thread was long dead, and then TentacleFan turns up with a busload of friends.  :)

I had a lot of fun chitchattering about people's posts before, so I reckon I'm going to do it some more.  But if you'd rather I not respond to your post, just let me know and I'll do some editing below.  (What the frick?  I keep rhyming by accident today.)  Or feel free to chatter back some!  New posters are welcome too ...

@Tsais

Well crap I see that you haven't been on the site for a long time, so you'll probably never see these remarks, and you might think that would stop me from making them, but you'd be wrong!  Heh.  (I like to hear myself talk ...)

Ooo that's so cool how you listed two or three songs from each of your favorite artists.  Some day when I have even more time to kill, I plan to go net-searching for songs by all the artists mentioned in this thread that I'm not familiar with, so that will help a lot.  Your favorites that I recognize are Opeth and Scott Joplin ... Score a big one for musical diversity!  I love ragtime even though I don't have much of it.  People I know whose taste I respect are always recommending Opeth to me.  You like quite a few bands I've never heard of, which makes me suspect that I'm too old and out-of-touch to know the rest of them.  :P  But I dig the older bands you like.

Hmm, Opeth played with Dream Theater?  Who opened for who I wonder?  My money's on DT opening but I don't know the genre well enough to say for sure.

Your comments about Ghost Reveries were inspiring.  It helps me a lot to hear people describe their responses to music, in terms of figuring out if they find music as moving and important as I do.  I'll keep an eye out for the album.

I'm gonna run long here I see.  Oh well -- onward!

@TentacleFan

Wow you have great taste.  :)  Heh by that I suppose I mean that you and I like a crapload of the same bands and artists ... maybe moreso than anyone else who has posted so far.  The nicest thing about that for me is that it makes me extra-interested in the few artists you mentioned whose music I'm less familiar with.

I finally checked out Pandora after seeing it recommended so many times by so many people.  I was thrilled by the interface and user-friendliness and structure of the site, but then I pulled up a song I knew well and found the sound-quality kinda disappointing.  I remember reading some place long long ago that people like Neil Young were really pissed about the sound-quality decline that took place with CDs as opposed to the older formats like vinyl ... I still feel that way about MP3s/ipods/streaming/etc. vs. CDs, but I also imagine that my audio-snobbery seems just as weird to other people as his did to me way back when.

About NIN -- I hear ya.  :)  Those albums (especially the three you cited) were and remain huge to me.

Boy I can run on forever, huh?  Gonna stop now and do something else.  But I'll be back to bug (respond) to the rest of the posts later on ....

[TentacleFan]

Wow you have great taste.  :)  Heh by that I suppose I mean that you and I like a crapload of the same bands and artists ... maybe moreso than anyone else who has posted so far.  The nicest thing about that for me is that it makes me extra-interested in the few artists you mentioned whose music I'm less familiar with.

I finally checked out Pandora after seeing it recommended so many times by so many people.  I was thrilled by the interface and user-friendliness and structure of the site, but then I pulled up a song I knew well and found the sound-quality kinda disappointing.  I remember reading some place long long ago that people like Neil Young were really pissed about the sound-quality decline that took place with CDs as opposed to the older formats like vinyl ... I feel that way about MP3s/ipods/streaming/etc. vs. CDs, but I also imagine that my audio-snobbery seems just as weird to other people as his did to me way back when.

About NIN -- I hear ya.  :)  Those albums (especially the three you cited) were and remain huge to me.

Thanks! I do the same, taking ideas from others who like enough of the same artists I do. Pandora is nice for the convenience and light years ahead of the radio for finding out about diverse music artists/groups that you'd never hear about on the radio (especially where I live at least). I know for many audio enthusiasts nothing beats actual Vinyl (I only have a small collection of vinyl myself). I mainly use MP3 for the convenience of it all.

My most recent change since I posted my first response is to more heavily use Google Music. I've uploaded over 2,000 songs to it to date and no longer have to switch them around from my computer to my phone/mp3 player anymore.

[Serephino]

I love music; all kinds.  I've got Metal, Pop, Classic Rock, Country, and New Age.  I mostly just like songs, though there are a few bands that I like most of their stuff. 

Within Temptation
Disturbed
Loreena McKennit
Evanescence

I usually search for music by the bands I like. Other than that, I usually keep my ear out for stuff I like.  Most of the time I hear it on the radio.  Once in a while a friend will tell me about a song.

Lately I've been buying my music, though I'm not exactly happy about it.  Oh, and I'm 26. 

[yobo]

1. I was more into groups when I was younger, delving deep into their music catalog. Some of those bands were Helloween, Blind Guardian and Dimmu Borgir. Of those Blind Guardian is the one who is still with me, as for Dimmu Borgir I'm not that into their new music, but Stormblåst (not the new one, where they did a new recording of the album, but the old one!) and Enthrone Darkness Triumphany are still great albums. These days I'm looking more for albums or songs, and not delve so deep into just a few bands.

A few albums I really enjoy:
Neil Young - On The Beach
Jeff Wayne - The War of the Worlds
Sex Pistols - Never Mind The Bollocks
Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska
Lumsk - Troll
Vintersorg - Till Fjälls
Blind Guardian - Imaginations From The Other Side
(and there are lots more, but these were the first that popped into my mind)

2. A lot of places. Word of mouth, radio programs (such as Sexy, playing all kinds of genres), internet (forums, youtube etc.) and music magazines.

3. Yes, I spend money on cd's (not as many as I used to though), Spotify, concerts etc. I mostly use Spotify and the iPod when I'm on the go to listen to music, and cd's or the radio in the car. I buy my music from several places, like Spotify and the traditional music shop. I also like to check out sites like NRK Urørt ( http://www.nrk.no/urort/default.aspx ), where Norwegian bands that are not yet signed can upload their music.

4. 32.

5. The opening on Alt lys er svunnet hen on the album Stormblåst by Dimmu Borgir really opened my eyes to music. There was something with that opening that just hit me, the mood it set I guess.

[Geeklet]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

Honestly, its actually a bit of both. There are some bands that I absolutely love everything they do, no questions asked, and sometimes its just a particular song from an artist I generally don't care much about. Right now, as far as bands go, some of my current favorites are The Creepshow, Mad Marge and the Stonecutters, Benedictum, Guano Apes, Garbage, Bif Naked, Pink(my guilty pleasure) and others I'm probably forgetting. And as far as individual songs, a couple examples... "Ghetto Love" by Spinnerette (I loved Brody and her work in the Distillers, havent heard much from this new venture, though) "Party Rock" by LMFAO (god damn that beat is catchy >.>)

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

Mainly Pandora and Youtube. In the case of youtube, I'll go there looking for a video I know I'll like, and then looking through the list of similar stuff, I'll see something that has an interesting title/thumbnail, next thing you know, I'm 5 links away and in something strange and wonderfully new.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

Yes, I do. I can't stand most of the radio stations around here, so I'll typically play CDs in my car, either bought or burnt. Usually, if I like a song by an artist, I'll go and pirate a couple other songs by them, and then if I like that stuff as well, then I'll shell out some money to support that artist. Sort of a "try it before you buy it" thing.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

30

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

Well, its not something that really affected me in a personal way, but it was something that just made me sit back and go "whoa." My dad was getting a few CDs from one of those "buy 14 CDs for only $1" things, or something like that. But he couldn't find that many, so he asked me if there were any listed I wanted. One of em was Bif Naked's "I Bificus" CD. Now, I knew a little bit about her, being a tattooed rock chick (something I've got a thing for.. *shifty eyed glance*), and had heard a couple songs from her already, specifically "Spaceman" and "Moment of Weakness." So anyway, the CD came, and I was listening to it, grooving out a bit, and then it got to "Lucky" and I was just blown away. It was so different from anything I was expecting, and for the whole song, the first time, I just sat there, listening in awe.

Bif Naked - Lucky

[rick957]

Here'z some more comments about very very old posts to this thread.  :)  I know this thread has been dead for a while except for one alcohol-inspired rant that I posted and then quickly took down, but anyway, here I go responding to posts anyway.  New posters or anybody who wants to chat are welcome to post.  That means yooooou .....

@JackWhite

Hello JackWhite from Belgium, thank you for your post, I'm from the USA so I love the fact that you're from far away from me.  Your taste in music leaves me somewhat befuddled but highly amused.  :)  You've obviously heard some very very great music, but at the same time, you seem to be a fan of certain bands that I don't think very highly of.  ... So what?  :)  Love whatever music you love, and don't let anybody, including me, tell you different!  ;)  Keep listening to new stuff and don't be afraid to explore different-sounding music and let your tastes evolve over time.  Everyone who takes music seriously spends some time figuring out what they like most and then ends up regretting some time spent with lesser-quality music, or maybe decides that nostalgia and personal fondness are sufficient to elevate lesser-quality music to a level of greatness.  I've done both.  I hope you continue listening to music seriously long enough to also do both.

I peeked at your music thread (which looks sooo kewl).  Pay as much attention as possible to the Clash and Black Sabbath, and you'll end up with even better taste in music than you already have.  That's a suggestion but also a high personal compliment, BTW, from one music fan to another.  :)

Incidentally, I'm listening to Prince while I'm writing this.  Take it from me, all youse peoples out there -- you will not find greater genius in all of modern music, try as you might.  Check out the first 33 seconds of "When Doves Cry" and then tell me I'm wrong.  :PPP

@ Hiya Zylvyn,

I'm a big fan of Metallica and (less so but still) a fan of Megadeth and of good ol' Rush (saw them live in Charlotte NC in about 1994 -- great effin' show, natch), although I draw a blank on the other artists you mention (except Brad Paisley -- how come he gets a pass when you avoid all other country, huh?), but anyway, good for you that you're open to different styles and you appreciate the value of matching your tunes to your mood, whatever that may be.  I had a friend once with absolutely great taste in music who had no appreciation whatsoever for matching music with mood, so he was always putting on super-dark, moody shit in the middle of bright, sunny afternoons, when everybody else was looking to party and chill out to feel-good tunez.  Never could figure that out!  Oh well, different strokes make the world go 'round ....

BTW I was really moved by what you said about your college experience and your troubled feelings then, and so forth ... I know a little bit about depression and similar emotional hells, so your comments about your personal experiences were much appreciated.  IMO, one of the most important things about music is the fact that it is one of the few things that can reach people in their toughest, blackest emotional moments and provide some sense of comfort or relief, however limited.  Anyone who has ever turned to music for that purpose has a lot in common with me, that's for sure.  :)

@GardenoftheDead,

Personally, I have huge love for Nirvana, NIN and Manson, so that makes me especially interested in the other stuff you mentioned, because I'm not familiar with those other artists, in spite of the fact that you and I seem to share some musical tastes, so maybe that means I'll like some of those groups.  Anyway, I'll keep my eye out for them and check them out, so thanks for the recommendations.

I'm glad that you spend money on music (is that what you meant by "maintaining a subscription" to Grooveshark?).  The more I think about it -- and I care about the world of pop music a lot, so I've thought about it a lot -- I think the most important thing for music fans to do in this age of widely-pirated music is to find some way to spend money in a way that actually reaches the musicians, the people who originate the music, rather than the businesses (or, too often, hyper-super-Wall Street-Fortune 5000-mega-conglomerate-corporations) that function as middlemen between the actual artists and their audience.  I find that my personal downloading/pirating habits don't actually detract from the total amount of money that I spend on music -- rather, streaming/pirating/downloading/torrenting has just become another way for me to try out new music, in the same way that listening to free radio exposed previous generations to new music.  The stuff that's really worthwhile gets money from me one way or another, eventually if not immediately, when I go to their concerts, or buy some CD that I haven't pirated, or turn on a friend to the band, or whatever.  At least IMO.

Anybody happening by this thread is welcome to post, whether to respond to the original questions in the first post, or to simply comment on other people's posts and contribute to the discussion.  I'm watching and will post again with further responses, commments, etc., whether or not it happens sooner or happens later.  Huge thanks to anyone who happens by and reads along or posts for any reason -- it's a delight to see the responses from any- and every-one.  :)

[ambrosial]

I like quite a few genres; I have my pop and rock (alternative, mostly, sprinkled in with a bit of classic rock) sides, but I most define myself by my love of less mainstream genres, like NeoVictorian and Dark Cabaret, both of which are hybrid reimagningings of historical inspiration and punk/modern influences.

1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

I find myself drawn to genres and groups more than individual songs. While I may like/love an individual song, unless I can get into the entire body of work by a particular artist, I don't care that much. I like building giant collections of all the works, popular and obscure, of my favorite artists (yes, my librarian tendencies manifest themselves even here :P).

I can't really list my favs by ranking, but here are some top contenders:

Rasputina
Emilie Autumn
Dresden Dolls
Caro Emerald
Diablo Swing Orchestra
Vitamin String Orchestra
Pretty Balanced
Katzenjammer Kabaret
Stolen Babies
Clare Fader
Vermillion Lies
Amoree Lovell
Jill Tracy
Pale Young Gentlemen

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

What I like most doesn't appear on the radio, and I'm the one who broadens my friends' musical horizons, so that leaves me with the internet option. I often discover new bands hopping about on youtube.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know. I either buy them, or in the case that what I want can't be purchased (sadly happens if you get into really obscure things), I just stream it online. I'm too much of a goody goody to pirate anything.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you? 24

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested. One of my favorite bands ever is Rasputina, and their song "This, My Porcelain Life" really resonates with me. I definitely have moods where I can strongly identify with the lyrics, and the idea of life as breakable porcelain is both terrifying and hauntingly beautiful.

Alas, youtube fails me in this instance, so here's the song streaming on grooveshark: This, My Porcelain Life

[Headlights]

I haven't contributed much to this forum since signing up but I probably should, as seeing as I had a little chat about music on IRC, perhaps here is a good place to start:

1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

If I hear a song I like, I usually have to find out who it is by and what else they've done; a little compulsive that way. That tends to mean I tend to have favourite artists: songs I like in isolation are usually more of the guilty pleasure variety (and of course, in public I would furiously deny liking them). There are occasions when a band puts out, say, one or two good albums, while I dislike the rest of their output, but I tend to keep listening anyway, hoping they will rediscover their sound.

I'll list a few nominal favourites here, but let's not pretend if you asked me list them tomorrow, I wouldn't choose an entirely different set:

• Sigur Ros
• The National
• Joni Mitchell
• Alison Krauss & Union Station
• Ryan Adams (+/- The Cardinals)
• Asobi Seksu
• M83
• absolutely any reasonably well engineered Chicago blues

I have three genres in which I will listen to almost anything, being broadly dreampop/shoegaze/post-rock/noise, electric blues, and bluegrass.

If you want to read between the lines about kinds of music I don't like, feel free.

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

A combination. There are specific radio shows I listen to, and will quite often follow up recommendations from them (for example, I almost always like the featured performers on Bob Harris Country). I do read the various review sites and newswires, but I struggle to keep up a little so am often a little late - or a lot late - on the latest "big" album.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

In general, I listen to, but don't download, music for free online (although I always keep my eye out for free download offers). If I like it, I will buy it. For a smaller group, I will try to go see them live, this being the way I prefer to support acts. I very rarely spend money in other ways, though: I have maybe one poster and three T-shirts and that's it.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

20s

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

kd lang once put out an album called Hymns of the 49th Parallel. It consists of covers of Canadian songs (Joni, Leonard Cohen, Neil Young). I'm not sure how well the album has aged, actually: I wonder if when I first liked it, I was simply a callow teenager enchanted by her voice (undeniably one of the best in the business). But I still remember one of the reviews of the album: "It makes you homesick for a country you've never been to". It still does: I can't think of Canada (to the annoyance of my Canadian friends) without that music in my head. In The Heart of the Moon had a similar impact, with regard to Mali.

[rick957]

I'm so glad that people keep posting here.  As long as other people post, I'll keep replying to posts.  Back-and-forth discussion is welcome but not required.  New posters always welcome.

@ Type70item

I didn't mean to overlook your post last time I replied to posts -- it was a total accident.  Sorry!  Your comments about Pink Floyd were quite interesting to me.  I've always liked them but never loved them with the kind of devotion that so many others seem to have.  The more compliments I hear for them from dedicated fans, the more I'm compelled to take them more seriously and explore their stuff.

To anyone reading along ...:  as Type70item and others have noted, it appears to me that YouTube might be the single most widespread method by which people hear new music nowadays, kinda like MTV used to be in my teenage days (late 80s-90s), or radio before then.  Does that sound believable to anyone else?  Is YouTube that important in terms of popularizing new songs and bands?  Or is there another medium (website/TV channel/magazine/social construct) that wields greater influence?  Or is there no dominating force any more when it comes to pushing new music out to the masses?

Before reading this thread, I would have guessed (without first-hand knowledge) that the iTunes Store and site was the most important medium for getting people to hear new music nowadays.  After reading this thread, I'm starting to think that YouTube is at the fore, because it's more widely-used and more non-Macintosh/Ipad/Iphone-centric. 

Thoughts, anyone?  I'm very very interested.  I don't think that people in the music industry have a good grasp on how the public gravitates toward new music (after all the sea-changes wrought by technological change over the past 15 years or so), so I'm terribly curious what other people think about this.  Back when I became a pop-music devotee, all you had to do was watch MTV now and then to figure out what was popular and what was widely available and "hot" ... Or, for the discriminating fan, you could check out the reviews in Rolling Stone and Spin and similar widely-distributed magazines.  All those mediums are ancient history now in terms of influence and penetration into the mainstream of music listeners.  (Right?)  But I still don't fully understand what's replaced them.

Hee hee, I'm a verbose MF.  :)  Next time:  comments about Serephino's post and others since then.

[SinXAzgard21]

1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

Nirvana
System of a Down
Slipknot
Maximum the Hormone
Dir en Grey
Bring me the Horizon
Parabelle
Evans Blue (first album only)
Rise against
The Birthday Massacre
Ill Niño
AFI (before december underground)
Linkin Park (save for catalyst)
Girugamesh
The Gazette
Hollywood Undead (select songs, others are garbage imo)
Rush
Metallica
The Misfits
Styx
Queen
Ozzy Osborne
Pantera
Black Sabbath
Bullet for my Valentine
Soul Fly
Static X
Disturbed
The High Kings
Dropkick Murphys
Flogging Molly
The Dubliners
The Pogues
The Young Dubliners
Blink-182
Apocalyptica

I'm tired of listing them lol

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

I find them at random on youtube, or from friends.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

This all depends on if I can't get it online.... I will not buy from Itunes.  If the CD is not for DL online I will usually just wait, that said if they are a band from Japan playing at a convention I will buy their CD though they tend to be pricy.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

Between 20 and 30

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

I don't have one song that has changed my life, different songs help me deal with certain moods.

[midwestgal]

1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

My musical tastes are incredibly eclectic and range from Pop/Rock to J-Pop/Rock and everything in between. I don't have any particular songs I like better than others. Whatever sounds good, has a good beat and is decent to exercise to (weird, I know).

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else? Usually talking with friends or listening to the music stream at work.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

If I can purchase it from iTunes (and if it's J-Pop/Rock, it usually comes from iTunes Japan thanks to the gift cards I can buy from J-List), I will. I refuse to acquire the songs illegally. If I have to, I will pay for the CD, which can yield even more music.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

36

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

I think probably the Vision of Escaflowne:  For Lovers Only. I acquired it at a local import shop and it was at a time when I was at the lowest point of my life. I think I played that CD over and over until it was worn out.

[Lyron]

1. I think I have more favorite bands than songs, but there are always songs from other bands and artists who I wouldn't deem as favorites. Usually, though, most of the music I listen to is in the rock and metal genre. There's something about that kind of music that speaks to my soul. There are some pop songs that I listen to, though, but they aren't as frequent. On extremely rare occasions I might listen to a country song. I never listen to rap. I just can't get into it. Here are my favorite bands, listed in no particular order: Avenged Sevenfold, Disturbed, Five Finger Death Punch, Korn, Digital Summer, and 3 Doors Down. I would try to list them in order on how much I like them, but this always changes with my moods.

2. Currently, I use the radio in my car to find new songs. There's also Spotify for when I want to look at songs from bands I have already heard a few songs from. ...And Glee occasionally shows me a good song. I've been hooked on "Cough Syrup" for the longest time thanks to that show. I used to use Pandora, Slacker, and Yahoo! radios to find new songs, but I haven't lately.

3. Lately, I just use Spotify to listen to music...and occasionally YouTube, during those rare times Spotify doesn't have a song. I don't have the premium service for Spotify, so no, I don't pay for the songs, but I guess Spotify does. I used to buy songs on iTunes, but I went through money a little too fast. I probably need to buy more soon, though. My iPod is really out-dated, and I'm beginning to get tired of what I have on there.

4.  19, almost 20

5. I'm going to have to go with "Imagine" by John Lennon. It's a beautiful song, and it's a dream that would be nice to see come true. It's actually made me tear up a few times. There have probably been other songs like this, but this would probably have to be the biggest one.

[Parlabane]

1) For me it's a mix of both - there are some groups who I'll listen to almost anything by, and others where there are just one or two songs that I really like and will play the hell out of.
According to last.fm, my top 10 most listened to artists are: Manic Street Preachers, Doves, Matthew Sweet, Regina Spektor, Julian Cope, Sigur Ros, The Rolling Stones, Queen, The Wonder Stuff and Everclear.
Top 10 tracks are: Dear God (XTC), Your Love Alone Is Not Enough (Manic Street Preachers and Nina Persson), Supernaut (1000 Homo DJs), The Cedar Room (Doves), Rockin In The Free World (Neil Young), Fidelity (Regina Spektor), Good Morning Britain (Aztec Camera), Running The World (Jarvis Cocker), What God Wants, Part 1 (Roger Waters), Satellite (The Hooters)
2) Stuff I hear on the radio, see on TV, see friends mentioning on Facebook and the related artists feature on Spotify - the latter is currently my guide into the realms of post-rock having started with Sigur Ros and now listening to lots of Explosions In The Sky and God Is An Astronaut
3) Mainly Spotify premium at the moment, and the £10 a month that costs me is a lot less than I used to spend on CDs! Plus, having premium means I can put offline playlists on my phone and listen to stuff whenever/wherever I want.
4) 39
5) Just about every song in that top 10 has some sort of personal story behind it, as I can usually connect all my most memorable songs to a place, an event or a person. Supernaut, for instance, reminds me of the alternative nights I used to go to when I was at university, while The Cedar Room always takes me back to seeing Doves live in Cambridge in 2004, when it sent shivers down my spine at 'and I tried to sleep alone, but I couldn't do it'.

[rick957]

Hello out there, here's another bump with responses to some posts.  I'm probably too chatty to actually catch up to the most recent posts, but keep an eye out, I'll get there eventually.  So glad to see people continue to chime in.

@ Serephino

Lately I've been buying my music, though I'm not exactly happy about it. 

I'm glad somebody is!  (Why are you unhappy about it?)  I've fallen way behind in buying the latest albums from my many favorite artists.  I find myself worrying about the financial welfare of the small, lesser-known artists whom I like.

I take it as something of a given that everyone in the music industry (with very rare, brief exceptions) is making way less money than they did 10 or 20 years ago, but I have seen other music fans who seem to find that fact hard to accept, especially among those who wish to believe that the internet represents vast new revenue streams that will democratize and diversify the popular arts, seizing control of the gateway to success from the hands of the grubby music industry.  I so wish that fantasy would become a reality -- it may still -- but it so hasn't happened yet.  I saw a quote recently from one of my favorite musicians pointing out how low the actual album sales have been for Adele, whom I gather was the belle of the ball at this year's Grammy awards ... The sales threshold for considering an artist "successful" has never been lower.

Hope nobody minds that I'm using people's replies to just riff about music-related topics.  You knew that was coming, right?  Sure ya did.  :)

I'm glad to see the diversity in your musical tastes, Serephino; that seems to have become such the norm for people younger than me nowadays!  There's a positive development, for sure.  I was astounded, however, to see that you pay attention to radio, given the favorite bands you cited -- you must live in a large radio market with stylistically-diverse radio stations, or maybe a college town?  Just guessing.

Nobody should feel obligated to reply to my queries, BTW.  (But feel free to if you'd like!)

Crap, I rambled for so long that I didn't get very far, yet again.  :(  Oh well, be back soon ...

[rick957]

Strange.  Very strange.  :)

So, I noticed that since I last posted here, lots of people have stopped by and looked at the thread, or at least, the view count has gone up a good bit.  (Unless that just means that spybots or search engines count as views.  I've never been sure about that.)  Anyhoot, what's strange to me is that all these people have a look and none of them have anything to say!  How come?  You don't have to fill out the questionaire thingy -- although you're welcome to -- but you can also comment about anything else written here, or heck, just say 'what's up' and let me know you stopped by.  There can't be that many shy people on Elliquiy, right?  So, post why dontcha.

Here's some more comments from loudmouth me ...

What's up yobo?  ...

I too have always been inclined to delve deep into an artists' whole catalog as soon as I decide that I really like something from them.  That's one of the reasons why I'm so mystified by the decline in popularity of listening to albums.  From what I hear, more and more people are content nowadays to just listen to singles, individual songs, without checking out the rest of the artist's album (much less their back catalog).  Is that a generational thing?  Makes me feel old.

Yobo, your taste in music scared me at first, because I've heard Helloween and Dimmu Borgir, and they scare me.  (But in a good way.  I'm not a fan personally, but I'm glad that bands like them exist.)  ... But then I saw that you're a fellow Neil Young fan!  So now I'm not so scared of you.  Also you get brownie points for having refined and diverse tastes.  :)  Ooo, also you get points for enjoying both metal and punk, which used to be a rare thing to do, not any more I guess. ... I've never heard of Sexy, so I'll have to Google it ... Holy rock and roll, your link goes to a site in a foreign language, Norwegian I guess.  Rock! ... Hey, you're almost as old as I am.  Not quite though.  *pouts*

Hiya Geeklet, ...

Kewl, more bands I'm not familiar with.  Is anybody else but me planning on checking out all these bands other people are recommending in this thread?  I hope so.  I'm assuming, of course, that there are other people besides me reading this thread, which may or may not be the case.  Meh. ... I like Garbage!  Somewhat.  Remember that one year when Garbage was on top of the whole world, music-wise and sales-wise?  Back in 1998 or something.  Those were good days in the world of music, IMO.  Is Shirley Manson still scary and hot?  Hope so.  ... Glad to hear that Brody is still making music. ... Excellent, it's great to see that so many people posting here make it a habit to spend money on music, one way or another.  I don't worry much about major label artists with hit singles, but from what I know, many of the semi-famous music groups out there barely make enough money to support themselves, or else have day jobs, and either way, I still like the idea of a vibrant community of full-time musicians sharing their talents with the public rather than wasting away doing scutwork to make a living.  *gets off soapbox* ... Wow, two 30-somethings in a row!  It's nice to not feel so old.  :)  I love the fact that Elliquiy draws a good number of people of diverse ages.  ... Aww!  I went to listen to your youtube link, and it's already been taken down!  Phooey.  I may have heard the song before though -- I recall hearing Bif Naked once and thinking well of whatever I heard, but never explored any more of her/their stuff.  Props to all the sexy tattooed rock chix of the world.  (Are they still called "grrrls"?  Probably not.  I liked that word though.)

Somebody put up another link to that song so I can listen to it!  Please.  :)  Believe it or not, I almost never go to youtube and wouldn't know how to search it, although I'll figure it out someday, when I get around to searching for all these unfamiliar bands people keep recommending.  Until then, though, getting a link or two from posters in this thread is very helpful!

More blabbery to come, same bat-time, same bat-channel ...

[Geeklet]

I like Garbage!  Somewhat.  Remember that one year when Garbage was on top of the whole world, music-wise and sales-wise?  Back in 1998 or something.  Those were good days in the world of music, IMO.  Is Shirley Manson still scary and hot?

Its Shirley fucking Manson. Of course she is!

Glad to hear that Brody is still making music.

Me too. Always loved her unique voice. Though there are a lot of old Distillers fans that hate this group and say that she's 'sold out.' Its different, yeah, but I appreciate many types of music, I so still enjoy it.

Aww!  I went to listen to your youtube link, and it's already been taken down!  Phooey.  I may have heard the song before though -- I recall hearing Bif Naked once and thinking well of whatever I heard, but never explored any more of her/their stuff.  Props to all the sexy tattooed rock chix of the world.

Pfft. Lets try it again, then.
Bif Naked - Lucky with Lyrics


And yes... I have a weakness for sexy tattooed rock chicks. >.>

[rick957]

Excellent, thanks Geeklet!

All this talk of sexy rocking women made me think of this song.  Heard about this artist a long time ago but got the video recommendation from another Elliquiy person with excellent musical taste.  :)  Nice when that happens. 

This song (circa 2006?) is catchy as hell; the video is fucked-up as hell, IMO.  Subtle, though, watch carefully and all the way thru.  [FYI my personal favorite rock and roll female of all time isn't Peaches, it's PJ Harvey, at least at the moment.  I want to have her children.]

Peaches.

[Saerrael]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.
2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?
3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.
4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?
5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

1. No, I don't. My taste ranges all over the spectrum. I'm... also not posting that spectrum. Just imagine a list containing anything and everything >.>
2. Word to mouth, for me. I don't really like the music offered by the more official media due to how limited that is.
3. No, I don't spend money on music. I hardly have money to feed myself.
4. 33
5. Dublin Philharmonic, Dvorak, New World Symphony - 1st Mvt, Conductor Derek Gleeson

I've not been into classical music for all too long, but the music linked forced me to look into it and I have been sold ever since.
I encountered it the first time in musical appreciation class in the Dutch equivalent of High school. It was very effective >.>

I am a big music fan, and the questions above are great sources of curiosity to me, particularly because I'm no longer a young person by most estimations, so I feel out of touch with the lives of young people, especially those under about 25.  (Old fogeys like me are very welcome to respond too though!)

I'm over 25 and I felt insulted to be called (hinted) old >.>

[rick957]

[I'm in the (slooow) process of replying to all the posts in this thread, not because I have to but just because I want to and enjoy doing so; however I reserve the right to occasionally and spontaneously reply to things out of posting order, like now.  :)  Who cares?  You don't, right?]

I'm over 25 and I felt insulted to be called (hinted) old >.>

I reserve the right to insult everyone younger than me.  ;)  I'm 36, FYI, and none too happy about the new gray hairs I keep discovering in the mirror first thing in the fucking morning.  I will not dye my fucking hair before I turn 50 45 40, dammit.  :)  (Seriously tho, no offense intended, Saerra!  All my posts here, and everywhere else on Elliquiy except in the RPs, are slightly sarcastic and tongue-in-cheek, you know.  Thanks for posting!)

[Saerrael]

As it is possible to reach 100 years of age (though that's rare...) I consider people over 80 'old', myself.
And I have met plenty of 80+ people who did not like it to be called old nor did they act 'old'.
Age is in the heart, Rick, in the way we view the world and how much swag we have (left). It is not in the wrinkles in our skin nor the grey hairs on our head.

Anyway! I shall discontinue the derailment of your thread.

[/derailment]

[rick957]

Age is in the heart, Rick, in the way we view the world and how much swag we have (left). It is not in the wrinkles in our skin nor the grey hairs on our head.

*breaks out in great big smile* 

Anyway! I shall discontinue the derailment of your thread.

[/derailment]

Here's to further derailments of any and all kinds.  :)

[rick957]

Okay, I know, way too many posts from me in a row, but you know, there's no telling when these kinds of threads will suddenly up and die, so it can't hurt.  Also I got nuthin' better to do right now.  *shrugs*

While writing this post, listening to:  Nine Inch Nails, With Teeth.  Great artist, but not a great album IMO.  Then again, I'll take Reznor's weak moments over most musicians' best moments, any day.

@ ambrosial

I like quite a few genres; I have my pop and rock (alternative, mostly, sprinkled in with a bit of classic rock) sides, but I most define myself by my love of less mainstream genres, like NeoVictorian and Dark Cabaret, both of which are hybrid reimagningings of historical inspiration and punk/modern influences.

Neovicabawhaaa -- ?  Heh, I'm already intrigued.  I don't know what you're talking about, but I'm intrigued.  :)

While I may like/love an individual song, unless I can get into the entire body of work by a particular artist, I don't care that much.

Yes!  Thank you.  :)  If an artist is worthy of anyone's attention, then they ought to be able to make more than one song worthy of note.  (Yeah, I'm lookin' at you, Maroon 5! you sell-out prettyboy cocksuckers!)  (Ahem.  Sorry.)

*puts on devil's advocate mask* But then again, there's a lot to be said for a great single, and much of the history of Rock and Roll has been written by venerable One Hit Wonders -- cf. "Louie Louie," "Born To Be Wild," "Closing Time," etc. etc.).

I like building giant collections of all the works, popular and obscure, of my favorite artists (yes, my librarian tendencies manifest themselves even here :P).

*puts on music nerd mask* Oooo!  Do you collect B-sides and import singles with bonus tracks?  I do too.  *rolls eyes*  I'm ashamed of myself for it though, it's so expensive and time-consuming ... then again, I swear, from doing that, I've got one or two masterpiece songs in my collection that almost nobody else in the world has ever even heard! for whatever that's worth, heh.  Yep, music nerd here.  :)

What surprises me about your list of artists you like is that the only artists on your list that I've ever heard of are artists that I like, and all the rest are artists I've never even heard of.  That's not the case for me with most people, because I worked at a big chain music store for several years in the 90s/early 00s, so I became very well acquainted with popular music that I didn't personally enjoy listening to.  (And no, I'd just as soon never hear Limp Bizkit or Los Del Rio again, thanks!)  (Then again, I still like Korn and OMC, so go figger ... )  Stuff you like that I like too:  Dresden Dolls, Rasputina.  (I'm waiting for somebody to post here who likes only music that I absolutely can't stand!  I don't think that's happened yet, but considering how much popular music I detest, you would think it would have happened by now.  I tend to think that Elliquiy draws people with somewhat-more-refined tastes than the general public.  Of course, if I get lots of complaints from Los Del Rio fanatics after this post, then I'll know better.  Heh.)  Ambrosial, if you see this post, I'd love for you to tell me one or two of your personal favorites out of the list of artists you gave, and if you can cite a favorite album or song from each, all the better -- anything to help me zero in on the best music you know about that I'm not familiar with.  (And yes, I'm genuinely, personally, interested, as I am in everyone's posts in this thread!)

It's been over a decade since the last song I heard from Rasputina (off their second album), so it was a delight to listen to the link you provided.  I'm glad to hear that they're still around and still doing stuff worth hearing; it's hard for me to think of them as music-industry "veterans," but I guess they definitely qualify, at this point!  Can you hear my bones creaking?  Yeh, sorry 'bout that.  :) 

[ambrosial]

@ ambrosial

Neovicabawhaaa -- ?  Heh, I'm already intrigued.  I don't know what you're talking about, but I'm intrigued.  :)

I'm glad my choices intrigued you! I hesitate putting genre labels on anything, since they seem so limiting, but there you go.

*puts on devil's advocate mask* But then again, there's a lot to be said for a great single, and much of the history of Rock and Roll has been written by venerable One Hit Wonders -- cf. "Louie Louie," "Born To Be Wild," "Closing Time," etc. etc.).

I certainly like songs without liking the whole body of work of the artist - I just don't take much effort to acquire my own copies of them.

*puts on music nerd mask* Oooo!  Do you collect B-sides and import singles with bonus tracks?  I do too.  *rolls eyes*  I'm ashamed of myself for it though, it's so expensive and time-consuming ... then again, I swear, from doing that, I've got one or two masterpiece songs in my collection that almost nobody else in the world has ever even heard! for whatever that's worth, heh.  Yep, music nerd here.  :)

Well, I try to collect alternate versions of songs or limited releases, but that's easier said than done!

What surprises me about your list of artists you like is that the only artists on your list that I've ever heard of are artists that I like, and all the rest are artists I've never even heard of.  That's not the case for me with most people, because I worked at a big chain music store for several years in the 90s/early 00s, so I became very well acquainted with popular music that I didn't personally enjoy listening to.  (And no, I'd just as soon never hear Limp Bizkit or Los Del Rio again, thanks!)  (Then again, I still like Korn and OMC, so go figger ... )  Stuff you like that I like too:  Dresden Dolls, Rasputina.  (I'm waiting for somebody to post here who likes only music that I absolutely can't stand!  I don't think that's happened yet, but considering how much popular music I detest, you would think it would have happened by now.  I tend to think that Elliquiy draws people with somewhat-more-refined tastes than the general public.  Of course, if I get lots of complaints from Los Del Rio fanatics after this post, then I'll know better.  Heh.)  Ambrosial, if you see this post, I'd love for you to tell me one or two of your personal favorites out of the list of artists you gave, and if you can cite a favorite album or song from each, all the better -- anything to help me zero in on the best music you know about that I'm not familiar with.  (And yes, I'm genuinely, personally, interested, as I am in everyone's posts in this thread!)

It's not that I don't like popular music (I have a collection of alt rock as well), but I most identify with my more obscure fancies. And I thoroughly encourage you to start searching for those artists on, say, youtube, if you like the Dresden Dolls and Rasputina. That's how I found most of them in the first place (especially since they don't get radio play or wide circulation of any sort).

But since you asked for recommendations, here're a few. It was hard to pick just two, but I decided to try something non-Dresden Dolls or Rasputina, since you're already familiar with them. ;)

Emilie Autumn's "A Cure," an instrumental piece (though her vocal songs are stunning as well):
Emilie Autumn - A Cure

Pale Young Gentlemen's "Clap Your Hands":
pale young gentlemen - "clap your hands"

It's been over a decade since the last song I heard from Rasputina (off their second album), so it was a delight to listen to the link you provided.  I'm glad to hear that they're still around and still doing stuff worth hearing; it's hard for me to think of them as music-industry "veterans," but I guess they definitely qualify, at this point!  Can you hear my bones creaking?  Yeh, sorry 'bout that.  :)

They're going strong - on a smaller scale than mega-hits, of course, but still! I saw them last year in concert (and it was fabulous!), and the opening act was Voltaire, who mentioned that he himself was inspired to become a musician because of Rasputina. So I think it's awesome they have influence, in some circles. ;)

[JackWhite]

@JackWhite

Hello JackWhite from Belgium, thank you for your post, I'm from the USA so I love the fact that you're from far away from me.  Your taste in music leaves me somewhat befuddled but highly amused.  :)  You've obviously heard some very very great music, but at the same time, you seem to be a fan of certain bands that I don't think very highly of.  ... So what?  :)  Love whatever music you love, and don't let anybody, including me, tell you different!  ;)  Keep listening to new stuff and don't be afraid to explore different-sounding music and let your tastes evolve over time.  Everyone who takes music seriously spends some time figuring out what they like most and then ends up regretting some time spent with lesser-quality music, or maybe decides that nostalgia and personal fondness are sufficient to elevate lesser-quality music to a level of greatness.  I've done both.  I hope you continue listening to music seriously long enough to also do both.

I peeked at your music thread (which looks sooo kewl).  Pay as much attention as possible to the Clash and Black Sabbath, and you'll end up with even better taste in music than you already have.  That's a suggestion but also a high personal compliment, BTW, from one music fan to another.  :)

Of course there's a difference in our bands and I can understand that you don't like every band I put up here or in my thread. I can inform you that I do like The Clash and Black Sabbath too but that I didn't mention them here. Both are great bands. As you mentioned spending time listening 'lesser-quality' music, I think I don't really regret it. That music makes us decide what we want and it seems to me that such thing is at least as important. Maybe one day I'll have a completely different taste of music but I won't regret listening this because it does bring back all the memories of what used to be.

[Semantics]

1.  I fall a bit between the two.  There are plenty of songs I listen to that are the only songs I listen to by that artist.  But there are also plenty of bands/artists I'll listen to for days on end.

I can't rank my favorites, but in no particular (and also incomplete, especially since my JPop/JRock, sea shanty, and folk songs generally come from smatterings of different artists) order:
Louis Jordan
Mississippi Fred McDowell
Mississippi John Hurt
Gaelic Storm
Anuna
Metric
Sons and Daughters
Flogging Molly
Dropkick Murphys
Movits!
Collective Soul
Oingo Boingo
Squirrel Nut Zippers
Queen
The Four Tops
The Clash
Edward Elgar
Brian Setzer Orchestra
Union Station
Jethro Tull
The Hot Club of San Francisco
Clutch
Tom Lehrer
Tom Smith
(And I'm forcing myself to stop remembering here.  >.>)
Edit:  Actually, add Gorillaz, just because I skimped on the genre.

2.  Sometimes word of mouth from a friend.  In rare occasions where I've been able to raid my brother's music collection for names, I've found we have a lot of the same tastes (Which is pretty easy, since our tastes both cut a pretty broad swath.)  Pandora has been great for expanding who I know about by leaps and bounds.  Plus sometimes I'll figure out what song was in a commercial, or track them from a game.

3.  I used to pirate some songs, mostly in batches after which I'd sort out those I liked and didn't like.  That's how I found out about Gaelic Storm, since which I've bought two CDs by.  Most of the time, though, my CD buying is rare, maybe two CDs a year.  I'd love to buy more, but between books and games I already have two money-pit addictions.  Spotify and the aforementioned Pandora play a big part, and if I really feel the need to listen to a song that's not on Spotify, I'll just look it up on YouTube.

4.  25.

5.  I don't know that I can go that far, although some have hit close.  There was a song that completely got to me a long time ago, but.  If I can't specifically remember it now, probably isn't fair to count it.

And as to a question you asked along the way.  I'd probably say YouTube is the most used method.  While I've gotten in to using Spotify, and I still have some time left before the non-Premium services are cut, if I listen to something on YouTube and like it, I can immediately link it to friends so they can listen to it, and they don't need any sort of membership or account.  I don't think that ability can be overlooked.

[Thraben]

1. A bit of both, I have favorite artists (In Flames, Killswitch Engage, Eluveitie, Deadmau5, Foo Fighters, System of a Down, etc) and favorite songs.

2. Word of mouth, opening bands at shows, and on occasion iTunes.

3. I support the bands I like by going to their concerts.

4. 21

5. I didn't have the greatest childhood so I used to put on the album "Soundtrack to Your Escape" by In Flames on my discman and just listen to it on repeat for hours on end to try and drown reality out. It helped me get through allot of tough times.

[yobo]

What's up yobo?  ...

I too have always been inclined to delve deep into an artists' whole catalog as soon as I decide that I really like something from them.  That's one of the reasons why I'm so mystified by the decline in popularity of listening to albums.  From what I hear, more and more people are content nowadays to just listen to singles, individual songs, without checking out the rest of the artist's album (much less their back catalog).  Is that a generational thing?  Makes me feel old.

Yobo, your taste in music scared me at first, because I've heard Helloween and Dimmu Borgir, and they scare me.  (But in a good way.  I'm not a fan personally, but I'm glad that bands like them exist.)  ... But then I saw that you're a fellow Neil Young fan!  So now I'm not so scared of you.  Also you get brownie points for having refined and diverse tastes.  :)  Ooo, also you get points for enjoying both metal and punk, which used to be a rare thing to do, not any more I guess. ... I've never heard of Sexy, so I'll have to Google it ... Holy rock and roll, your link goes to a site in a foreign language, Norwegian I guess.  Rock! ... Hey, you're almost as old as I am.  Not quite though.  *pouts*

I must admit, I am guilty of listening more and more to songs/single instead of whole albums these days. I think it has something with the way I listen to music. When I was younger I didn't listen to mp3's, I listened to cd's. I remember I used to bring maybe 5 or 6 (as many as fitted into a pocket in my bag) cd's to play in my discman. That way I listened to album, and not just singles. Now I have an iPod, and often just use the shuffle setting. The same with Spotify, mostly just use shuffle. I should start listening to albums again more often.

Brownie points are always nice.  ;D I like to branch out I guess, and I think it gets a bit boring just listening to the same old genre of music all the time. I remember liking both metal and punk were a bit rare earlier, but I guess that depends on which circles you are wandering in. Being a metal-head, I remember a lot of the metal fans was very narrow in their views of what good music was. There even was a real divide among black metal fans about what was "true" black metal, and what was not. Dimmu Borgir was not true black metal for example.

Sexy was an awesome radio show, unfortunately they stopped it in February.  >:( I loved their motto: "A good tune is a sexy tune."

[rick957]

I've started a handful of threads at Elliquiy, and this is one of the most successful in terms of garnering replies.  Thanks peoples!  (Although I wouldn't mind some more back-and-forth in terms of discussion, but hey, I'll take what I can get.)  :)

@Headlights

[seriously, I'm determined to reply to everybody who's posted here, no matter how long it takes me, and not 'cuz I feel obligated, but 'cuz I loves talking about musics, is all]

I haven't contributed much to this forum since signing up but I probably should, as seeing as I had a little chat about music on IRC, perhaps here is a good place to start:

Welcome to Elliquiy, Headlights.  I love your avatar; that picture has special sentimental resonance for me.  Hope you like it around here.

If I hear a song I like, I usually have to find out who it is by and what else they've done; a little compulsive that way. That tends to mean I tend to have favourite artists: songs I like in isolation are usually more of the guilty pleasure variety (and of course, in public I would furiously deny liking them). There are occasions when a band puts out, say, one or two good albums, while I dislike the rest of their output, but I tend to keep listening anyway, hoping they will rediscover their sound.

Oh! -- Man, I hear ya.  Totally.

I'll list a few nominal favourites here, but let's not pretend if you asked me list them tomorrow, I wouldn't choose an entirely different set:

    Sigur Ros
    The National
    Joni Mitchell
    Alison Krauss & Union Station
    Ryan Adams (+/- The Cardinals)
    Asobi Seksu
    M83
    absolutely any reasonably well engineered Chicago blues


I have three genres in which I will listen to almost anything, being broadly dreampop/shoegaze/post-rock/noise, electric blues, and bluegrass.

Fucking A.  If you were a chick, I would propose.  ;)

(Sidebar:  One of my less charitable yet strongly-held personal opinions is that women generally have far shittier taste in music than men, and the exceptions to that rule usually have a tasteful ex-boyfriend to thank for it.  Anybody who wants to shoot down my sexist proposal there is more than welcome to; maybe you can convince me otherwise.)  (But I doubt it!!! hehehehehe *runs away chortling to himself*)

There are specific radio shows I listen to, and will quite often follow up recommendations from them (for example, I almost always like the featured performers on Bob Harris Country).

*scribbles in notebook*  ... H-A-R-R-I-S.  Gotcha.  :)

kd lang once put out an album called Hymns of the 49th Parallel. It consists of covers of Canadian songs (Joni, Leonard Cohen, Neil Young). I'm not sure how well the album has aged, actually: I wonder if when I first liked it, I was simply a callow teenager enchanted by her voice (undeniably one of the best in the business). But I still remember one of the reviews of the album: "It makes you homesick for a country you've never been to". It still does: I can't think of Canada (to the annoyance of my Canadian friends) without that music in my head.

Thank you for this; one more reason for me to want to check out the album.  (My first reason was the fact that she had the good taste to cover the allmighty, all-too-overlooked Bruce Cockburn.)  As to Ali Farka Toure, I absolutely adore a song he did with Ry Cooder that reappeared on the Dead Man Walking Score.  I'll keep an eye out for the album you mentioned.

God I love this thread!

@ambrosial, take two

Emilie Autumn's "A Cure," an instrumental piece (though her vocal songs are stunning as well):

(After just one listen) -- how intriguing.  I read her bio on allmusic.com (however flawed, still by far the best music info site I've found on the web, FWIW).  I assume that's electric violin?  Yet she got sounds out of it that sound more like guitar than violin ... You have successfully and thoroughly piqued my interest, which (not to sound vain, and notwithstanding my perhaps-overly-exuberant remarks throughout this thread, but hey, I'm just tryin' to keep the thread alive, y'know ... -- ) isn't easy to do, honestly.  :)

pale young gentlemen

They're from Madison Wisconsin, of all places.  I've seen several unforgettable concerts there.  (Used to live near Chi-Town, just an hour or two south.)

I didn't expect to like that, considering that I truly liked your first recommendation and I really am terribly picky about music, but yeah, I think I really liked that on a first listen.  ... Thank you.

@JackWhite, take two

Of course there's a difference in our bands and I can understand that you don't like every band I put up here or in my thread. I can inform you that I do like The Clash and Black Sabbath too but that I didn't mention them here. Both are great bands. As you mentioned spending time listening 'lesser-quality' music, I think I don't really regret it. That music makes us decide what we want and it seems to me that such thing is at least as important. Maybe one day I'll have a completely different taste of music but I won't regret listening this because it does bring back all the memories of what used to be.

Amen, my friend.  :) 

@yobo, take two

... There even was a real divide among black metal fans about what was "true" black metal, and what was not. Dimmu Borgir was not true black metal for example.

This just made me smile so hard.  :)  :)  :)  Music lovers are so petty, aren't we?  I just love it.

More responses to come ..........

[yobo]

This just made me smile so hard.  :)  :)  :)  Music lovers are so petty, aren't we?  I just love it.

That is very true. That discussion makes me smile as well.  ;D

[Geeklet]

Music lovers are so petty, aren't we?  I just love it.

Hah, I know. I always have to laugh when I see comments in certain videos about how the band has "sold out" or some such just because they make something that isn't 100% like their older stuff.

[Semantics]

Hah, I know. I always have to laugh when I see comments in certain videos about how the band has "sold out" or some such just because they make something that isn't 100% like their older stuff.

"What?  You mean the band might have more musical interests/influences than just mine and those they've shown so far, and these might change over time?  Preposterous!  They must have sold out!  That's the far more likely explanation!"

Comments like those range from the hilarious to the sad, and mostly amuse me greatly.

[Sasquatch421]

Question 1:  It would have to be favorite groups... I have tried to rank them before but it just never seems to work.

Damn Yankees
KISS
Iron Maiden
Cradle of Filth
Within Temptation
Kamelot
Evanescence
Steel Panther
5 Finger Death Punch
Lamb of God
Lynyrd Skynard
Heart
Kansas
Big & Rich
Turisas
Black Veil Brides
Jackyl
Skid Row
Ugly Kid Joe
Firehouse
This is just some of the bands I like...

2:  I never seem to intentionally look for new music to like. It's actually more like stumbling across them wether it be from the radio or my sister popping in her newest Alesana CD and I just happen to hear it.

3: I always buy my music which can be bad in some cases (remember Chumbawubma? I still have the CD even if it has only been played once.) I also spend my money by going to their shows when they get close.

4: I'm 32

5: Actually there is a couple... This year before my girlfriend and I broke up we went to her daughters concert. The last thing that was played was The Armed Forces March and the director had asked that when a certain  part played, the veterans could stand.

Well right off the bat they started with the Marine Corps. Hymn and of course I stood. The crowds applause seemed thunderous at the moment and as it went on and we had the Sailors, Soldiers and Airmen stand for their respective songs the applause just got louder. It was a moment where I had goosebumps afterwards it was inspiring...

Second is with Lee Greenwoods song "Proud to be an American"

It was the end of the Crucible and we were hitting the Grim Reaper. Three mile march with 50 pounds packs that seemed to be all uphill. That morning it was about what platoon or division you were in, anybody fell out and another would help them along.

When we finally hit the top and were able to set down our packs. They then had us form up in ranks and started playing that song on the speakers in a loop. Our drill instructors then proceeded to move along our rank and pin our first Eagle, Globe and Anchor to our Cami's and call us Marines for the very first time. Then all of the three months of training came to an end and I have never seen so many grown men cry. That is and will probably always be the greatest moment in my life.

[ambrosial]

@ambrosial, take two

(After just one listen) -- how intriguing.  I read her bio on allmusic.com (however flawed, still by far the best music info site I've found on the web, FWIW).  I assume that's electric violin?  Yet she got sounds out of it that sound more like guitar than violin ... You have successfully and thoroughly piqued my interest, which (not to sound vain, and notwithstanding my perhaps-overly-exuberant remarks throughout this thread, but hey, I'm just tryin' to keep the thread alive, y'know ... -- ) isn't easy to do, honestly.  :)

Glad you enjoyed it! It is indeed an electric violin, which she plays like a true virtuosa, as far as I'm concerned. I'd recommend the rest of her instrumental album Unlaced, which also includes some lovely traditional violin pieces, like Bach. Her most recent album Opheliac is fabulous in my opinion, but it's not for everyone's taste. You really can't go wrong with Unlaced though.

Her official site will give you quite the interesting read, but I'm not sure how useful it'd be from a biographical standpoint, since last I checked, it's rather fully in-character. All the same, a fun place to wander about.

They're from Madison Wisconsin, of all places.  I've seen several unforgettable concerts there.  (Used to live near Chi-Town, just an hour or two south.)

I didn't expect to like that, considering that I truly liked your first recommendation and I really am terribly picky about music, but yeah, I think I really liked that on a first listen.  ... Thank you.

I've heard Madison's a cool town, but I've never made my way that far north in the Midwest.

I have far less to say about PYG than EA since I know little about them outside of their music, but glad you liked the song!

[rick957]

Well let's see, I'm only a little over a month behind in making my smartass remarks about people's posts.  ;)  Don't worry folks, you'll get your smartass remarks too, heh.

@SinXAsgard21

Nirvana
System of a Down
Slipknot
Maximum the Hormone
Dir en Grey
Bring me the Horizon
Parabelle
Evans Blue (first album only)
Rise against
The Birthday Massacre
Ill Niño
AFI (before december underground)
Linkin Park (save for catalyst)
Girugamesh
The Gazette
Hollywood Undead (select songs, others are garbage imo)
Rush
Metallica
The Misfits
Styx
Queen
Ozzy Osborne
Pantera
Black Sabbath
Bullet for my Valentine
Soul Fly
Static X
Disturbed
The High Kings
Dropkick Murphys
Flogging Molly
The Dubliners
The Pogues
The Young Dubliners
Blink-182
Apocalyptica

Rock, rock, and rock!  You like lots of bands I like too.  That's been the case for way more people who have posted here than I ever would have expected in advance.  I'm guessing that's partly because Elliquiy draws slightly older and/or nerdier people than your average RP site.  Not that I would know though!  I only RP around here.

(No offense intended, nerds.  I am one of your kind!  Put down the pocket protectors!  NOOoooooooo ....)

I will not buy from Itunes.

Whatcha got against iTunes, huh?  Huh?  Not that I have any special love for iTunes, don't use it myself, but I hear good things about it more often than not.  I used to think that iTunes and Steve Jobs helped to kill off the music industry as I knew it, but now I mostly think that they just stepped in to fill a need.  (I think the industry killed itself, shortsighted Luddite greed-heads that they were.)

If the CD is not for DL online I will usually just wait, that said if they are a band from Japan playing at a convention I will buy their CD though they tend to be pricy.

I'd like to know what this refers to (anybody can answer if you know).  Is this anime conventions or something?  Are those big nowadays?  How much music is at these conventions, and what kinds of music?  Am I totally off-track with my guess?

@midwestgal

I don't have any particular songs I like better than others. Whatever sounds good, has a good beat and is decent to exercise to (weird, I know).

Oh that's really fascinating, just because it's so different from the way I personally approach music.  I'm glad you posted here.  Unfortunately, though, your personal emphasis on J-Pop puts me at a loss as far as thinking up smartass replies to your post.  Actually, wow, come to think of it, that's an entire genre of music that I know almost nothing whatsoever about, so if anybody out there wants to explain it to me -- how is it similar or different to other genres of pop music?  are there multiple styles of music considered J-Pop, or is it all a single style/mood?  how big is J-Pop outside Japan, or for that matter, inside Japan?  is there one or two bands or artists who are considered the reigning kings/queens of J-Pop?  is there one song you consider archetypical for the genre that you could maybe put up a link to, so I can hear it?  is all J-Pop connected to anime or something?  did you have to look up the word archetypical?  I did, hehe -- those are all things I'd be interested in hearing about, if anybody wants to tellll meeeeee .....

Okay I'm stopping with fresh surveys now.  I'm within one month of the recent posts as far as replying to them!  Yay!  I like doing this.

Here's some smartass replies to other people's smartass or not-so-smartass replies.

Hah, I know. I always have to laugh when I see comments in certain videos about how the band has "sold out" or some such just because they make something that isn't 100% like their older stuff.

Yay, somebody replied to one of my replies, and then somebody else replied to the reply of the reply, hence, conversation!  I like conversations, back-and-forth discussion, long rambling sentences like this one, abuse of adjectives and adverbs and grammar, general silliness, and most of all, I love people talking about music, music, MUSIC, anything about music.  Please feel free to talk about anything at all here.  I like it.

As to "selling out," that used to be a really really big deal, waaaaaay back in the 1980s, as I recall; for any artist to be accused of selling out was just about the lowest thing you could say about 'em.  Then came the 90s and 00s, and Bob Dylan was doing Victoria's Secret commercials, and everybody who was able to sell out did so, and people like Henry Rollins were even publicly defending the right of bands to use their songs to sell phone plans and shit like that, so basically nobody cares about "selling out" any more.  I do, but nobody cares what I think either.  ;)  (One of my personal favorite artists of all time sold a fucking song to a Weight Watchers commercial.  I mean, WTF?  I used to love that song, and now every time I hear it, I think about the Weight Watchers commercial.  I take certain things way too seriously, I know, I know!)

Oh I guess when I said "selling out," I was referring more to artists letting companies use their songs to sell shit, whereas when you guys referred to "selling out," you were talking about when bands let their sound evolve and then all their old fans get pissed off at them.  Wow, that takes me back!  I don't hear that usage of the term "selling out" very often anymore, so it's kind of fascinating to know that it's still used that way.  Of course bands have to evolve if they take their music seriously enough, duh!  Then again some bands don't, look at the Ramones for example, they were great and they didn't ever change.  Much. 

Bye now!

[Oniya]

I'd like to know what this refers to (anybody can answer if you know).  Is this anime conventions or something?  Are those big nowadays?  How much music is at these conventions, and what kinds of music?  Am I totally off-track with my guess?

Conventions (my experience is with science fiction conventions) frequently have tables in the dealers' room where merchants have audio for sale.  This can be anything from recordings of filk sessions (I used to have some of Mercedes Lackey's vocals on cassette, as well as Tom Smith) to small bands that 'fit' with the general outlook of the convention.  One time, I was walking through the dealers' room with a Walkman, and a guy affiliated with a group called Mach 25 practically shoved his cassette at me to try 'right now'.  (It was done by a group of ex-NASA employees, and was a bunch of filks about the space shuttle.  Yes, I bought it.)

Sometimes, a more famous band will be invited to a con - such as Abney Park playing at Mythic Faire this past summer.  In those situations, the band will usually tote along a load of swag to sell (CDs, T-shirts, etc.)  I suppose that J-pop bands might be more popular at anime cons.

[rick957]

I like going to seedy little comic book conventions where the air reeks of mildewed paper and obese fanboy sweat and all the women present are with their boyfriends or husbands and the only music is the sound of money changing hands, longboxes sliding, live lightsaber-fight demonstrations, and maybe a television somebody set up to play VHS bootleg 60s sci-fi television shows.  ;)

Whoops, this is the music thread thing and not the comic geeks thread thing.  Never mind ...

(No offense intended, fanboys.  I am one of your kind!  Put down the mylar snugs!  NOOoooooooo ....)

[Semantics]

Oh that's really fascinating, just because it's so different from the way I personally approach music.  I'm glad you posted here.  Unfortunately, though, your personal emphasis on J-Pop puts me at a loss as far as thinking up smartass replies to your post.  Actually, wow, come to think of it, that's an entire genre of music that I know almost nothing whatsoever about, so if anybody out there wants to explain it to me -- how is it similar or different to other genres of pop music?  are there multiple styles of music considered J-Pop, or is it all a single style/mood?  how big is J-Pop outside Japan, or for that matter, inside Japan?  is there one or two bands or artists who are considered the reigning kings/queens of J-Pop?  is there one song you consider archetypical for the genre that you could maybe put up a link to, so I can hear it?  is all J-Pop connected to anime or something?  did you have to look up the word archetypical?  I did, hehe -- those are all things I'd be interested in hearing about, if anybody wants to tellll meeeeee .....

Hoo.  Maybe should let someone else answer this, because I generally ignore some of the things asked about, so keep in mind that the following may not be supported by Actual Things.

Basically, JPop can be taken literally.  It's just pop music from Japan.  So essentially it can be as diverse as the whole of all other pop genres, because it's not a sub-genre based on being, well, a sub-genre, but a sub-genre based on where it comes from.  A lot of it, I've been told by a friend who pays more attention to these sorts of things than I do, is happy and cheery due to corporate influence, but that's not a requirement to being JPop, just a thing that happens.

Because of this, some of the other questions are a bit hard to answer.  (Such as popularity in Japan.  Music from other countries is certainly also popular, but since JPop is its own thing, you can't just use "How big is pop music in Japan?" since that would include all pop, not just JPop.)  Suffice to say, though, that JPop is Very Big in Japan, and while I've no clue exactly how big it is outside of Japan, it certainly has a very solid following in large part thanks to anime, leading me into the next part.  (Although, said solid following isn't apparently enough to get more of it on Spotify or Pandora.  ::Grumps::)

(Preface, this next part involves only recent anime.  My memory on older stuff is a bit sketchy.)  As to anime, there's obviously a connection, since pretty much each anime will have an opening and closing song that's either JPop or JRock, and often come up with new opening and ending sequences a solid amount if it's a multi-season series.  Anime that hits the 200+ episode mark goes through more openings and endings than you can shake a stick at, and each one will have a new song.  But you've got it reversed, really.  All (Or at least a vast majority) anime is connected to JPop/JRock.  Because, as previously stated, that just means Pop/Rock from Japan, and why wouldn't you use Japanese music for Japanese animation?  They're not, however, really linked by some larger-than-usual degree, except in that opening and ending sequences for anime are more detailed than stuff in the US.

According to a friend, this group had a lot of airtime in Japan recently:
【PV】 ヘビーローテーション / AKB48 [公式]

Edit:  And, nope.  Didn't have to look it up.  I wouldn't have chosen this name if I didn't enjoy words.

[rick957]

BWAHAHAHAHAHAAH

I want to move to Japan right now.

[Geeklet]

I've got two new additions to my list of favorite bands. Not sure how long they will remain on the list, but right now I'm completely obsessed.

Dead Sara:
WEATHERMAN | DEAD SARA | VIDEO

and Halestorm:
Halestorm - Love Bites (So Do I) [Official Video]

[rick957]

Phooey.  :P  I almost got to within one month of being late replying to stuff here, but then I slacked off, so now I'm months behind again.  Oh well.  I'm still gonna take as much time as I feel like, though, because heck, why not?  :)

@ midwestgal cont., and @ Semantics
subhead:  American prudishness meets the sexy J-Pop pink nylon happy-happy

Before I do anything else I just gotta watch that J-Pop video again.  ;)  Excuse me for a sec ...

(minutes pass)

Yay!  Everybody should watch that at least once a day, preferably in the morning while drinking caffeine like I am!  Wakka wakka yeah!!!!  Sorry I'm being silly.  I like being silly and totally cornball, so sue me.

The music in the video is so over-the-top and syrup-ly produced that it reminds me a bit of Andrew WK.  Remember Andrew WK?  I was not at all a fan of his, but I thought his shtick was distinctive, at least, for the five seconds that anyone cared.  Funnily enough, though, this kind of Pro Tools-gone-mad approach to music production has become so common that it's no longer all that remarkable, is it?  Abuse of Pro Tools (ex.: autotuned vocals, super-high volume levels, etc.) is maybe my least favorite thing about the last 15-20 years of pop music.

On the other hand, the song in the video is well-crafted as a piece of pop fluff.  That's not at all as easy to do as it first appears, BTW.

Mostly what thrills me and intrigues the hell out of me about that video is the utterly non-Western cultural iconography on display.  Here we have a room full of incredibly physically-perfect minors (minors, right?  that's supposed to be obvious, right?  I hope I'm not just being a perv here) frolicking around in sexy undies, and they're all so damn happy it makes your teeth hurt.  Yay and win, I say.  But also -- WTF????  It's the unabashed juxtaposition of hyper-sexual images with images of youth and childish, un-erotic emotions that just shocks me.  I can't decide if it's super-sicko or super-refreshing or some of both.  It's super-titillating, that's for sure, in both the sexual and non-sexual sense.

Are Asian (or non-Asian) fans of this kind of imagery oblivious to the implications of all that flesh being on such cheerful display?  Americans have this kind of thing too, sort of (reference early Britney and Christina, circa 2001 or so) but the wink-wink denial component is very important to us, what with our Puritan cultural heritage.  The Japanese seem to take their pedophilia neat, without the shame spritzer ... or is it actually pedophilia at all?  Everyone is so cheery and innocent-looking that luridness or lasciviousness doesn't seem to enter into the picture in any way -- except, come on, people!  Look at all that lovely young flesh!  You can't tell me that the Japanese aren't responding hormonally, just like us pervy Yanks.

Anybody who can help me understand all that is invited to try.  :)  I'm becoming a fan of some manga, which has just as much if not more confusing cultural iconography, along similar lines to that video ... Japanese Vs. American Sexual Imagery 101, anyone?  Please enlighten me.

On to other stuff ...

@ Haru329
more grousing about being old -- "it'll happen to yooouuuuu ..."

most of the music I listen to is in the rock and metal genre. There's something about that kind of music that speaks to my soul.

*high-fives*

On extremely rare occasions I might listen to a country song. I never listen to rap. I just can't get into it. Here are my favorite bands, listed in no particular order: Avenged Sevenfold, Disturbed, Five Finger Death Punch, Korn, Digital Summer, and 3 Doors Down. I would try to list them in order on how much I like them, but this always changes with my moods.

Nothing wrong with country, as long as it's good country, knowwhatImean?  :)  I've spent most of my life in parts of the American South, so I've heard plenty of country in my day ... most of it bad ... but some of it real good too.  I think it's interesting that you enjoy listening to at least two bands who show rap influences (Korn especially), but you don't like rap.  It's hard to find too many people these days who dislike all rap.  It makes me kind of nostalgic though, because I'm old enough to remember when most people didn't consider rap to be music.  (Me?  Well, I'm from Down South, so I've heard plenty of rap in my day ... most of it bad ... but some of it real good too!)

Five Finger Death Punch gets my vote for "band name of the day."  There's an art to choosing a great band name, you know; it's very very difficult to do.  You know what band name I really like?  "Huey Lewis and The News."  Love it.  Don't ask me to explain it, though.  As with most everything else when it comes to rock, The Beatles nailed it, as far as band names go.  IMO.  (I was a Beatles fan for at least a decade before I realized the word "beat" was in there.  Yeah, I can be slow sometimes.  Talk about a great name tho ...)

Hmm -- "Glee."  TV show, right?  Broadway show?  Both?  Neither?  So, do they include actual original songs, or other people singing covers of songs?  What kinds of songs, for example?  (Have I got a clue about "Glee"?  Obviously not.  Sorry, I'm an old fart who doesn't watch TV much.)

4.  19, almost 20

What amazes me about your age is the fact that you are a fan of certain bands -- Korn, Disturbed, 3 Doors Down -- who I thought stopped being popular when you were too young to listen to much music.  Did you get turned on by an older sibling?  Or are those bands still popular with young folks?  I would have guessed that all their fans were in their late-20s and 30s by now.  I haven't heard a new Korn album in forever, but I still love their debut album.

As usual, I've run on at the mouth too long to get through many responses, but so it goes.  :)

Any chitchat about anything musical, responses to questions, new survey responses, etc. etc. et al. are always welcome but never required, y'know.  ;)

P.S. Geeklet, thanks for stopping in and for bumping the thread!  I don't have time right now to listen to your new links, but I will soon.

[rick957]

....

[Semantics]

Mostly what thrills me and intrigues the hell out of me about that video is the utterly non-Western cultural iconography on display.  Here we have a room full of incredibly physically-perfect minors (minors, right?  that's supposed to be obvious, right?  I hope I'm not just being a perv here) frolicking around in sexy undies, and they're all so damn happy it makes your teeth hurt.  Yay and win, I say.  But also -- WTF????  It's the unabashed juxtaposition of hyper-sexual images with images of youth and childish, un-erotic emotions that just shocks me.  I can't decide if it's super-sicko or super-refreshing or some of both.  It's super-titillating, that's for sure, in both the sexual and non-sexual sense.

Are Asian (or non-Asian) fans of this kind of imagery oblivious to the implications of all that flesh being on such cheerful display?  Americans have this kind of thing too, sort of (reference early Britney and Christina, circa 2001 or so) but the wink-wink denial component is very important to us, what with our Puritan cultural heritage.  The Japanese seem to take their pedophilia neat, without the shame spritzer ... or is it actually pedophilia at all?  Everyone is so cheery and innocent-looking that luridness or lasciviousness doesn't seem to enter into the picture in any way -- except, come on, people!  Look at all that lovely young flesh!  You can't tell me that the Japanese aren't responding hormonally, just like us pervy Yanks.

Anybody who can help me understand all that is invited to try.  :)  I'm becoming a fan of some manga, which has just as much if not more confusing cultural iconography, along similar lines to that video ... Japanese Vs. American Sexual Imagery 101, anyone?  Please enlighten me.

Hoo.  This is an even harder question (and also a mine field), so I'll be, I think, a bit more brief than before.  Even after speaking to the aforementioned friend, things are still not that clear.  So, an even larger grain of salt to everything I say this time around.

The first thing I'm about to say is, quite honestly, probably of no help at all.  Technically, the national age of consent in Japan is 13.  The reason this really might not have any bearing is that prefectures, much like in the US, set their own.  I'm not sure if there's any place in Japan where 13 is actually the age of consent.  These extra laws generally fall under child protection so it could be their system tries to do exactly what the US system does, except in reverse.  I.E., rather than, "X is the age of consent.  Oh, unless your partner is only x many years older than you," it becomes, "The age of consent is x.  Unless one partner is x older than the other."  Granted, that's a guess after reading various posts about it, very few of which involved actual readings of the laws.  So it could just be that the government set one low and let the individual prefectures choose their exacts, and this interpretation could definitely be completely wrong.  Also, I have no clue what the ages are for appearing in/looking at adult entertainment is.  Obviously, if it's lower than 18 there, well.  That would pretty much make the whole issue a lot more meaningless.

The first actual notable thing to get into is that in some ways, Japan is definitely more open in terms of sexuality than the western world, although more reserved in others.  Some manga and anime that has a largely young-adult target audience also has scenes other countries just wouldn't show to anyone not an adult.  Sometimes they just wouldn't show them at all, except on a movie channel or something.  Many shows that aired during the Toonami run what feels like so long ago had various scenes clipped out.  In at least one show, Outlaw Star, a full episode was clipped.

I think a big thing in Japanese culture is the appearance of youth.  This goes hand-in-hand with innocence a lot.  They don't, either seperately or together, nesseccarily mean to hint at underage, although sometimes they do, but they're often there.  Both of those also go hand-in-hand with the sheer fact that entertainment tries to cater to an audience.  And if males get catered to more often and youth/the appearance of youth is important, well...

Sometimes, though, it does fully enter a place where maybe it's best not to try thinking too hard.  Miu Nakamura, for instance, started as a gravure idol when she was 14.  For those who don't know, gravure idols are essentially the Japanese equivilant of bikini models.  In some cases, tastefully done.  In others, they can make bikini models look downright Completely Innocent.  (Athough it could be argued doing so pushes them closer and closer toward another genre, apparently named chaku-ero.)  And, as said, they don't have to be 18+, or even 16+.

So, yeah.  There is no easy answer here.  Best you can do is recognize that some of it is more openness, and then try to just ignore the stuff that might otherwise really weird you out.  Granted, as the remembering, thinking, and researching for writing this has reminded me, you have to do the same thing in the U.S. at times.  I still have to change the channel whenever a commercial for a beauty pageant reality show comes on, so I can keep my sanity.

Addendum: Huh. Completely failed at not being as long-winded.

[rick957]

@ Semantics

Thanks so much for the detailed explanation.  I actually love long, detailed posts, so the length of your post pleased me enormously.  ;)  Your post contained much info that I found not only informative and educational but also completely unexpected and surprising, so it was much appreciated -- that bizness about the minimum age of consent is really pretty mindblowing to me, and helps to at least partially account for the gross disparity between Western and Eastern depictions of adolescent sexuality, or so I imagine, at least. 

(Am I wrong about that?  If so, please correct me!  Anyone, I mean, who happens to see this.)

So, I can't tell if I've made a mistake by trying to respond to people's posts here or not ... since nobody's posted lately, I wonder if that means that my conversational, rambling posts detract from the whole generic-impersonal-fill-out-the-form-and-forget-about-it-no-pressure-whatsoever thing that might have helped people to participate in this thread.  Or, on the other hand, maybe more people would have posted if I had kept up with the responses more?  Hell, I dunno. 

Anyway, if more people post to this thread with anything -- survey replies, conversation, whatever -- then I'll probably keep going with my detailed replies and such.  Or if not, then not, and hey, we had fun while it lasted, right?  :)

Apropos of nothing:  I often wonder whether people younger than me who came to know rock and roll through younger bands missed out on anything in the process, by discovering popular music through bands with lesser artistic skills than the ones I was first exposed to.  This is a perpetual and perhaps unsolvable problem -- I wonder just as often whether people older than me were exposed to popular music in a way that was altogether more meaningful and profound than what I was exposed to. 

The question is whether or not pop culture is on an unstoppable downward spiral, a process of ever-diminishing returns, with each successive generation of young people being exposed to pop culture of decreasing value and meaning, and not even knowing any better because the culture of previous generations has been wiped out altogether.  That may be exactly what has been happening to generations of people over the last several decades, don't you think?  Or maybe not.  If you disagree, please let me know.  I don't want to believe such a cynical and bleak theory, but hell, it sure sounds plausible to me right now.  (Won't you please convince me otherwise?!)

Anyway I was gonna say, part of me would like to believe that each generation of young people is exposed to a different set of music stars, but it all balances out in the wash, meaning that each generation learns about the potential of pop music and ends up getting more or less the same benefits from the bands that they listen to, even though the bands might have very different levels of musical knowledge and playing facility and overall artistic ability.  But, to be frank, the larger part of me is too fucking cynical to believe that.  When I hear younger people rhapsodizing about how Avril Lavigne or Blink-182's songs helped them cope with their traumatic breakup or helped them make sense of the nagging angst that haunts them as they make the transition from teenagerhood to adulthood, all I can think is, fucking-A, how goddamn sad is that?  These young people have been fucking cheated.  My generation of young people, or previous generations of young people, had the same experiences, but we had the music of fucking Nirvana or R.E.M. or the Beatles to help us get through our lonely nights and help us make sense of our raging hormones and existential dread.  How fucking horrible is it that younger people don't have those resources to make sense of their lives?  I for one cannot imagine -- would not want to imagine -- living my life without the benefit of Prince and Nine Inch Nails and Bob Dylan and all the other musical geniuses who helped me become the person I am, who helped me make sense of this crazy befuddling absurd miasma that we call "life."  All I can do is thank god (or God or the gods or whoever) that I wasn't left with no one better than fucking Avril Lavigne to help me make sense of my fucking life ... Jesus!  What a goddamn gyp, you know?  Fucking Johnny Rotten/John Lydon said it best:  "Ever get the feeling you've been cheated?"  Damn right!

Alright, so anyway, if anybody wants to contribute to an ongoing discussion or contribute fresh replies to the survey thingie, then I'll keep posting to this thread too, but if not, I'll assume that interest has officially died off and it's time to put this thread to bed.  It's been hella fun, though! and thanks SO fucking much to everybody who posted -- I can't tell you how much fun it's been for me to get a peek into your musical tastes and thoughts.  Thanks to everybody who's played a part, even if it was just in adding to the "view count."  :)  Peace out ya'll ...

[BlackMetalBarbie]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

I'm mainly into extreme metal. Black and death metal being the favourites. Where I come from, Sweden, it's a pretty big and vibrant sub-culture. Some of my favourite bands are: Mgla, Leviathan, Immortal, Darkthrone, Slayer, Dark Funeral, God Dethroned, Rotting Christ, Funeral Mist and Necrophobic. I guess not many have heard of them outside of Europe. Apart from Slayer, then.

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

Word of mouth. I know a lot of musicians on a personal basis and some of them are nice enough to send me new songs and stuff. The death/black subculture is also pretty knit-together and news travel fast.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I download, but if it's any good, I buy it as soon as I can afford it. If it's by a favourite artist, I usually buy it even if it's not good. Haha

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

Pfft. Older than 18. Younger then 30.

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

That's a tough one, since music affects me profoundly in a number of different ways. It's a catharsis for when I'm angry, it's help when I'm sad or lonely. It's joy and energy when I'm tired and bored and it's a buffer screen against the world. If I should just mention one, it's an album called Slaughter of the Soul by At the Gates. Hearing it for the first time as a little tween, it blew my mind. I listened to it over and over again, completely hypnotized. It made sense out of my world and how I felt about myself and the people around me.

[Kifer]

Question 1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.
2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?
3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.
4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?
5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

1. Actually, there are quite a lot of them, but I will only name the best of the best:
VNV Nation - for giving me hope for better future
Moonlight - for being with me in both good and bad times
Pink Floyd - for creating magical worlds with music
Closterkeller - for staying the same against all odds
Combichrist - for energy to live another day

2. My friends are the best source, especially because they create their own music.

3. I buy CDs, DVDs and mp3s whenever I have some free funds. Also I go to the concerts every now and then.

4. 27 years old.

5. I'd say VNV Nation. VNV means Victory, not Vengeance. It means that human should strive to overcome any obstacles whatever the odds. You can clearly hear that in their music, I strongly encourage you to google and hear that yourselves.

[SinXAzgard21]

Well let's see, I'm only a little over a month behind in making my smartass remarks about people's posts.  ;)  Don't worry folks, you'll get your smartass remarks too, heh.

@SinXAsgard21

Rock, rock, and rock!  You like lots of bands I like too.  That's been the case for way more people who have posted here than I ever would have expected in advance.  I'm guessing that's partly because Elliquiy draws slightly older and/or nerdier people than your average RP site.  Not that I would know though!  I only RP around here.

(No offense intended, nerds.  I am one of your kind!  Put down the pocket protectors!  NOOoooooooo ....)

Whatcha got against iTunes, huh?  Huh?  Not that I have any special love for iTunes, don't use it myself, but I hear good things about it more often than not.  I used to think that iTunes and Steve Jobs helped to kill off the music industry as I knew it, but now I mostly think that they just stepped in to fill a need.  (I think the industry killed itself, shortsighted Luddite greed-heads that they were.)

I'd like to know what this refers to (anybody can answer if you know).  Is this anime conventions or something?  Are those big nowadays?  How much music is at these conventions, and what kinds of music?  Am I totally off-track with my guess?

I have plenty against Itunes but I'm not going to get into why buying is better than downloading for free.

As for the Japanese music, I actually learned most those bands from friends in high school and what not.  Most originally where not heard in anime but now a grand majority are.  Anime conventions, well depending on which ones, can feature artists from Japan.  They also sell their albums down in vendor has at hugely inflated prices.  But that is imported goods for you.

[rick957]

I have plenty against Itunes but I'm not going to get into why buying is better than downloading for free.

Sure, I'm a staunch believer in finding ways to financially support the artists whose work I enjoy, even if I do my share of downloading stuff too.  Hope I didn't make it sound otherwise, before.

Happy to see more posts here, I never get tired of reading them.  I still haven't decided if it's best to leave this thread alone and just let people fill out the questions without replies, or if it's better to keep intruding with comments.  I'll probably do some more of the latter someday, though, being the chatterbox that I am, especially about musical stuff.

[Boxy]

1:Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

I have both favorite groups as well as songs.  there are so many, but if I had to choose, the top four would be the Beatles, Talking Heads, Queen, and Red Hot Chili Peppers.

2:Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

Most would come from my father, who's always had an interest in music, and has been in his own small bands for the past couple decades.  Sometimes i'll go on youtube and just search for stuff, but mosty I've grown disheartened in my search for anything that is not shallow anymore.  I'd be completely content with listening to most music before my time.

3:Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

Just listen to stuff through youtube or my mp3 player, really.  Don't have a job to get money with.

4.(strictly optional):  How old are you?

20, turning 21 in November.

5.(optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

There are quite a few songs like that, actually.  If a song isn't funny, such as those by Weird Al or Tiny Tim, the only other reason I'd even choose to listen to something is if it has depth or at least any artistic merit at all.  That said, since there are so many, I feel I should pick one at random...

Red Hot Chili Peppers- Soul to Squeeze with lyrics

I've dealt with depression in the past, and I feel that this song has quite a bit to do with that.

[SinsOfEden]

Q1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

Q2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

Q3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

Q4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

Q5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.


A1: I definitely have a lot of favorite groups/bands/artists; and my tastes actually skip around all down the spectrum as far as genres go. But some of my top favorite bands/artists are:

Mushroomhead
Tenafly Viper (Which is a side project of a member of Mushroomhead)
Slipknot
Stone Sour
Five Finger Death Punch
Ghost Machine (Old project of Ivan Moody's, who is lead singer of 5FDP)
Deathstars
Rammstein
Faderhead
Eisbrecher
Godsmack
Sully Erna (Lead singer of Godsmack; he made a solo album)
Disturbed
Combichrist
A Perfect Circle
Hollywood Undead
Theory of a Deadman
Kamelot
Daughtry
AC/DC
Lynyrd Skynyrd
Johnny Cash
Hootie and the Blowfish
Theatre of Tragedy
Evanescence
Winds of Plague


A2: I typically rely on word of mouth. Especially if it's coming from that of any bands I already listen to. And I definitely love when a band supports the side projects of a band member and shines light on them. :)
I also tend to discover new music by soundtracks for my favorite movies. At least the ones with good music.


A3: I hate pirating music. Especially if it's an artist/band that I really, really love. So when I have the money to spare, I definitely make it a point to pay for their music. I like to support my musical obsessions when possible and as much as possible - and the best place to start is by actually purchasing their music.


A4: I'm 22.


A5: It's difficult to really say that just one particular album/song/artist has deeply affected me, because I'm so into music and lyrics that they all affect me in some way and on some deep level. However, Free Bird by Lynyrd Skynyrd is definitely as personal as it gets for me. It was my dad's favorite song and he wanted it played at his funeral. Unfortunately, the funeral home wouldn't allow it. But I can never listen to that song without thinking of him and I typically listen to it in honor of him.

[Iniquitous]

1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.
Generally, if I find a song I like then I usually like the artist/group. However, I have never ranked the artists I like. When I sit down to listen to music what ends up on my playlist is based on my mood - and it tends to change constantly.
Corvus Corax
Apocalyptica
Emilie Autumn
Wumpscut
Type O Negative
Adele
Lisa Gerrard
Dead Can Dance
Shiva in Exile
Korn
Fever Ray
Globus
Lords of Acid
Johnny Cash
Patsy Cline
Rammstein
E Nomine
Combichrist
Slipknot
Tom Waits
Loreena McKennit
Sarah Brightman
Anything classical - too many composers to name
A lot of opera - too many to name
Florence and the Machine
Parov Stelar
Skrillex
Dragon Ritual Drummers
Depeche Mode
The Cure
Pink Floyd
Queen
Ozzy
Black Sabbath
Led Zepplin
Grateful Dead
The Doors
The Beatles
Janis Joplin
Bloodflowerz
Lacuna Coil
Iron Maiden
Amon Amarth
Sentenced
Poison Black
Porcelain and the Tramps
Way too many European techno DJ's to list here
This list could go on to inifinity. I am extremely eclectic about music and can listen to most anything.


2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?
Usually youtube.
3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.
If I have the money and I really want the album I'll buy it. If I don't have the money then I put the songs on a playlist on youtube.
4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?
39

[Kimhi]

Hey!


1:  Bit of both:  there are artists and bands I love in general and then sometimes I can find just a song or two I like from a particular person or group.

Unsure of how I'd rank them but a few of my favorite musicians are:

Iron Maiden
Flyleaf
In Flames
Hurt
Dark Tranquility
Muse
Serj Tankian
Stone Sour
Apocalyptica

I like a lot of heavier or just rocky music ^^

2:  Typically word of mouth.  Have been relying more and more on just picking up bands I see live of late.  There's some really amazing unsigned acts out there that just don't get heard.  Almost all of them will jump at the chance to give you a cd free of charge too.


3:  If I really like an artist I'll try to support them and buy a CD, go to gigs etc.  I do tend to get a lot of my music second hand from friends though.  Ripping songs off the CD also happens.  Often find stuff on youtube too.  I have downloaded music in the past but decided it was just a bit two faced if I was in a band myself and trying to make a couple of quid from gig to gig.  So I try to avoid doing it. 

4: I be 23.

[Aaron Steel]

Pretty interesting how this topic remains on the first page after a whole year. Or does this forum just not get a lot of traffic? Regardless, I would like to answer the questions for myself.

1. I generally tend to have favorite artists over songs. This is generally because when I hear the name of an artist that interests me, I might listen to one of their songs, such as their hit singles. If that checks out, I may listen to one of their albums, and eventually as much of their discography as possible. I first did this with the venerable heavy metal band Judas Priest, and later to what would become more of my favorite artists: W.A.S.P., Accept, U.D.O., Motorhead, Saxon, Iron Savior, Dream Evil, Running Wild, and Sister Sin to name a few.

2. Primarily I find out about other artists through my own internet research, playing a game of N Degrees Of Separation with artists I already like. Black Sabbath led me to Ozzy and Dio, Judas Priest led me to Halford and Fight, Accept led me to U.D.O., Sister Sin covered Motorhead and U.D.O., and so on.

3. If I like a particular artist enough, I would go to their concerts and buy their merchandise should the opportunity present itself. Last November I got to see Judas Priest on their farewell tour, having reserved a ticket far enough in advance to get a front row seat, and then bought some shirts from the merch booth after the concert. I hope to do the same thing with W.A.S.P. on their upcoming 30th anniversary tour.

4. I'm 23, though I feel as though I was born in the wrong decade. Most of the artists I listen to were around in the 80s if not sooner. Had I been a child of the 80s I would have spent a lot of my time at record stores spending my allowance on records and subscriptions to rock & roll magazines.

5. The one album that has resonated with me the most is W.A.S.P.'s The Crimson Idol. To me, it was a highly moving concept album from start to finish, with a story I felt I could relate to in some way. The album inspired my current username, after a part of the main character, Jonathan Aaron Steel.

[Oniya]

2. Primarily I find out about other artists through my own internet research, playing a game of N Degrees Of Separation with artists I already like. Black Sabbath led me to Ozzy and Dio, Judas Priest led me to Halford and Fight, Accept led me to U.D.O., Sister Sin covered Motorhead and U.D.O., and so on.

I've done this with a band or three.  Styx led me to Damn Yankees, which led me to Night Ranger and Ted Nugent  Touring connections led me to REO Speedwagon, and Kansas.

As for this thread still being on the main page - that happens in many of the more 'social' threads.  Sometimes they'll slip down to page two or even three before someone new wanders across them.  It's more a testament to the universal nature of the topic than the activity level of the forum.  :-)

[Chelemar]

*waves*  Hi Rick.  thought I would answer your pole.

1.  Do I like songs or artists ? I guess I would say that if I find a song that I love, I check out the rest of the artist's work.  If I find that I love more of their stuff, then I become a fan. :)  So, I favor songs.  If they lead me to love the artist, so be it, if not.  I'm down with that as well.  Though, usually I find that I will love the artist's body of work. 

A few favorites are:
Adele
R.E.O. Speedwagon
Kansas
Night Ranger
Stone Sour
Creed
Green Day
Katy Perry
Skynyrd
Sarah Mclachlan
Norah Jones
Cindy Lauper
Blondie
CCR
Maroon 5
Pink
Train
Pit Bull
No Doubt
Jason Mraz
Les Mis Sound Track

Just too many to list.  :D

2.  I find out about music from friends, radio, DJ'ing, TV shows, movies.  Just about anyplace you can hear music, if something is played that I like, I try and find out about it.  Youtube.

3.  I used to spend money all the time.  Now, I do on occasion.  I don't download.  I find that there is music everywhere anyway, so I put on the radio a lot, just like when I was a kid.  If I don't like what's playing, I change the channel.  At home, I listen to an online radio, or there is a music channel to listen to on TV.  Only if I need music for DJing do I spend money.

4.  OLD AS DIRT

5.  The one song that sticks with me forever is "The House on Pooh Corner."  It's my first memory of loving a song.  I think I was 2 or 3 and my dad, who worked away, recorded it onto a tape for me, and I would play it on my little recorder, and sing  it, and as much as I loved the song, I would cry because I missed my dad as he was gone on 8 day work stretches.  Dad says he had to record "Pooh," as I called the song, 3 times because I wore the tape out over and over.

I remember him singing it with me, and begging him to play it for me on the big stereo when he was home.  The song is so tied with my early childhood, the feeling of love and loss, and my dad,  that I can't hear it today without having my eyes well up.

[rick957]

*waves*  Hi Rick.  thought I would answer your pole.

*waves back*  Hi Chele!  :)  You can do anything you like with my "pole"!   :o

... just -- couldn't -- resist!  >:)

[Chelemar]

*waves back*  Hi Chele!  :)  You can do anything you like with my "pole"!   :o

... just -- couldn't -- resist!  >:)

RAWWWR now there's an offer a girl can't refuse! ;D

Than and learn to type "poll" correctly ... bwhahahah...

:D

[Sasquatch421]

Hey Rick I got a question for ya... Actually it could be for everyone if it's all right... How many bands do you listen to that are not form the states or your home country? Now I don't mean major bands like AC/DC, Lamb of God, or Judas Priest who are well known. I'm talking bands like Lordi, Tarot, Emphatic, or Alestorm who might not be well known in the country...

[rick957]

Wow yay a question!  An opportunity for discussion!  I love those.  :)  Although it's hard to guess whether other visitors will respond or not; I hope so.  (I kind of gave up on this thread as a place for discussion and stopped responding to people's posts, although I keep a close eye on the thread, regardless, since so many people have turned up and answered the original questions anyway.  It's a blast to read.)

Sasquatch, I confess that I'm not familiar with any of the less-famous bands you mentioned.  It seems to me that you're asking about two different things, sorta.  Personally I listen to shitloads of bands from countries outside the USA, but they're famous bands that everyone has heard of.  The UK in particular has played as large or maybe a larger role in the history of rock than the USA, so it's hard not to listen to bands from other countries and still be a big fan of rock.  My personal favorite band at the moment is a defunct band from Australia -- Midnight Oil.

Your question seems to also address the popularity of bands -- whether people's favorite bands are famous or not.  Personally, I would guess that about 20% of the music in my collection is from bands that few people in the general public have ever heard of, and the other 80% is artists that almost everyone has at least heard of, although they may not have heard the actual albums or songs I love. 

I'll be intrigued to hear how any other people respond to that point, because now more than ever, it's become less and less likely for people in the general public to focus their attention on the same small handful of artists; people hear about music in so many different ways now that smaller bands have opportunities to reach more people than they used to.  (On the other hand, and rather unfortunately, I think it's nearly impossible right now for any new band to reach a large segment of the public with their music, but the reasons for that are complicated.)

Sasquatch, now that I've given you far more of an answer than you probably wanted, heh, I can't help but turn the same question back on you and ask for your answer to it.  :)  How many bands do you love who aren't big in the USA, and how do you feel about that fact?  How many of the bands you love are small, lesser-known or obscure artists, versus the ones everyone has probably heard of?  You can answer with as much or as little detail as you wish.  Oh, and one more thing -- why did you ask this particular question, why does the topic interest you?  Just curiosity, or is there more to it than that? 

Thanks Sasquatch, and thanks to all the folks who keep participating in this thread in one way or another, as readers or posters ... warms the cockles of me heart, it does.  ;)

[Sasquatch421]

Actually now that I think about it Emphatic is from Omaha, Nebraska but they are not that well known unless one likes WWE entrance music. I believe they did Wade Barrett's theme...

Somedays though what I listen to mostly ends up being lesser known bands, but usually over a site like Youtube since it's hard to import a lot of the bands I like. Lordi was only over here once if I remember correctly... They did Ozzfest the year that Sharon decided to make it free for the fans. Though what really made me start loving the group was the fact that they dress as monsters and that the lead singer Mr. Lordi makes the costumes himself. Then there others I like such as The Deathstars, Krypteria, Turisas or Alestorm (pirate metal!)

The problem is there is little hope for me seeing most of these bands live since they really don't cross to the states. Other bigger bands that I like and are a little more known, still really don't make an appearance in the states. Nightwish was supposed to do a U.S. tour, but I don't think it came through. Then there is Cradle of Filth, Behemoth or Amon Amarth which I don't think will ever make it over here.

I do like The Black Mages and some Gackt as well, but I can only find their stuff on-line since no stores near me can import them.

The question popped into my head while listening to Lordi last night... They were singing about Jack the Ripper and I got curious to see if they had any new albums out. Then unfortunately they are not popular enough for many of the stores to carry them. It was only for that Ozzfest then they died back out. Come to think of it I had to tear apart how many stores before I could find any Skindred or Kamelot as well....

[SinsOfEden]

Actually now that I think about it Emphatic is from Omaha, Nebraska but they are not that well known unless one likes WWE entrance music. I believe they did Wade Barrett's theme...

Somedays though what I listen to mostly ends up being lesser known bands, but usually over a site like Youtube since it's hard to import a lot of the bands I like. Lordi was only over here once if I remember correctly... They did Ozzfest the year that Sharon decided to make it free for the fans. Though what really made me start loving the group was the fact that they dress as monsters and that the lead singer Mr. Lordi makes the costumes himself. Then there others I like such as The Deathstars, Krypteria, Turisas or Alestorm (pirate metal!)

The problem is there is little hope for me seeing most of these bands live since they really don't cross to the states. Other bigger bands that I like and are a little more known, still really don't make an appearance in the states. Nightwish was supposed to do a U.S. tour, but I don't think it came through. Then there is Cradle of Filth, Behemoth or Amon Amarth which I don't think will ever make it over here.

I do like The Black Mages and some Gackt as well, but I can only find their stuff on-line since no stores near me can import them.

The question popped into my head while listening to Lordi last night... They were singing about Jack the Ripper and I got curious to see if they had any new albums out. Then unfortunately they are not popular enough for many of the stores to carry them. It was only for that Ozzfest then they died back out. Come to think of it I had to tear apart how many stores before I could find any Skindred or Kamelot as well....

The members of Lordi were in a movie four years back. It's called Dark Floors. Really good, even though it's not a very high budget movie.
Turisas is awesome! I got to see them in concert with Cradle of Filth back in March 2011. Very good show. :)
I wish Deathstars would come play a tour in the US. Would LOVE to see them live. :D

[Sasquatch421]

I picked up Dark Floors the first day it came out... Now if I can only convince Mom to give me her copy of KISS Meets the Phantom of Central Park. I think that was the title....

I also have a new found love for Steel Panther and their nice dirty songs like Asian Hooker, Community Property, Party All Day (Fuck All Night) and Eatin' Ain't Cheatin'... Then there is the classic King Diamond and Motorhead.... I've been trying to find out more about Chthonic at the moment and one of these days I'll actually listen to Ghost....

[Kythia]

Since you insist, Rick  :P
1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

As per our discussion in a different area, I have albums I like.  Some of them are from the same band.  Off the top of my head I can't think of a single band that I've liked every single album of, although I don't want to rule their existence out.  Favourite albums is in a constant state of flux.  Checking in my CD player it's currently stocked with:

Cinderella's Long Cold Winter
Def Leppard's Hysteria
and because of our discussion, Bon Jovi's Cross Road

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

All over the place.  If I find an album I like I check the liner notes to see what bands they shout out to.  I follow several music magazines.  If I band is touring for an album I like I'll usually check out an album or two from the support act if I'm not familiar with them.  Word of mouth isn't massive, I tend to be more a transmitter than a receiver but it does happen.  Last.FM occasionally.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I've never, to my head, pirated a song.  I have downloaded some albums from illegal sites but only in the case where its an album I have previously bought that's become damaged or similar.  I listen, as mentioned, to Last.FM as well.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

25

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

Christ, where to begin.  My dad (step dad technically) owned a 12" of Led Zeppelin's IV which I listened to a lot and I tend to give as a fairly pat answer to this question.  In truth though, I'm always listening to music (Bon Jovi's You Give Love A Bad Name at the moment) which means that any positive or negative event in my life has a song attached to it.  A song called Colour Of Your Smile by Night Ranger is my E song because its what I was listening to when I filled in the questionairre.

[Lux12]

 1: I do have a lot of favorite artists . However I do like a sizable amount of individual songs as well. Typically if I like a band or artist I stick with them unless they do something like drastically change their sound  or the members profess a certain ideology I dislike.
As for my favorites, in no particular order:
Coheed and Cambria
Mastodon
Zeromancer
Kamelot
Atreyu
In Flames
Seether
Disturbed
The Sound of Animals Fighting
Antiflag

2: I found out about them in a variety of ways. I read magazines, I look around online, I check recommendations on my rhapsody account and I do some times hear from word of mouth

3:  I buy albums by artists I like whenever I can. I would feel like a jerk if I just downloaded the album.

4 (strictly optional):  21

5 (optional): As for albums and artists, the first one I got really into was Evanescence.  Atreyu whether you love them or hate them did help me out when I was in a jam years ago. Their album The Curse in particular. Then there's Enigma's MCMX A.D. is one that really helps me relax when I feel stressed out and it actually helped me out when I was facing a period of great anxiety in my life. Behemoth's Demigod was actually a spiritual revelation to me as much as it was a musical one. Without that album I might not only have never have gotten into Behemoth I would not have heard of Thelema.

[yobo]

Hey Rick I got a question for ya... Actually it could be for everyone if it's all right... How many bands do you listen to that are not form the states or your home country? Now I don't mean major bands like AC/DC, Lamb of God, or Judas Priest who are well known. I'm talking bands like Lordi, Tarot, Emphatic, or Alestorm who might not be well known in the country...

I listen to loads of bands from abroad that are not major bands, but I do listen to major bands as well of course. I think it is only natural to listen to a lot of small bands from abroad if you have a certain interest in music. Being a former metalhead I naturally delved into metal, and even though Norway has produced a lot of good metal bands, especially black metal bands, there are a lot of bands outside Norway too. Some of the bands I discovered this way was Blind Guardian, Helloween, Queensrÿche, Anorexia Nervosa, Within Temptation, Thyrfing, Vintersorg, Otyg and the list goes on and on. I still like to discover new bands, be it Norwegian or non-Norwegian. :-)

[Caehlim]

Question 1: Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

Generally if I like one song that a band does, there's a good chance (although not guaranteed) that I'll also like most of their other songs. Checking over the songs that I've been playing lately, some of my favourite groups/artists that I've listened to recently are (in no particular order);

Zeromancer, Bad religion, Nat King Cole, Bloodhound Gang, Blink 182, Lindsey Stirling, George, Loreena Mckennet, Ke$ha, The Corrs, Disco Curtis, Scrillex, Katy Perry, Matchbox 20, Lady Gaga, Adele.

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

Youtube, recommended links. Also word of mouth.

3: Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I usually watch them via youtube so... no, no money but it still pays them via advertising. 

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

28.

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

Well this is reaching back to the scary time that was my teenage years but Avril Lavigne's song 'I'm with you' actually had a pretty big effect on me. I was about 19ish, had just come to grips with my sexuality and just recently came out as gay. I ended up being pretty slutty at the time and not overly selective with who I was dating. I was listening to the song and paid attention to the lyrics, realizing that I was dating people just because I wanted to be with someone at all, rather than them specifically.

Caused me to re-evaluate some decisions and be a bit more careful about who I dated.

[Caehlim]

My personal favorite band at the moment is a defunct band from Australia -- Midnight Oil.

You can't get much more defunct than Midnight Oil has managed. The lead singer Peter Garrett has gone into politics and turned into such a classic politician that it's hard to remember he was ever one of our big protest musicians.

[rick957]

You can't get much more defunct than Midnight Oil has managed. The lead singer Peter Garrett has gone into politics and turned into such a classic politician that it's hard to remember he was ever one of our big protest musicians.

Aw.  :(  Does this mean he's become some kind of scumbag politician?  A little more info would be hugely, hugely appreciated.

[Caehlim]

Aw.  :(  Does this mean he's become some kind of scumbag politician?  A little more info would be hugely, hugely appreciated.

Scumbag is way too harsh a term. He's currently the Australian Minister for Education.

About 2 years after the oilz disbanded, he joined the Labour Party (think the equivalent of the democratic party in the US. It's the most left-wing of our two main parties). In 2007 the labour party won and he was given a position on the cabinet as minister for the environment, heritage and arts. After the 2010 election he was given a different cabinet role and made the Minister for Education, early childhood and youth.

I've seen him on interviews, and it's not so much that he's gone evil or given up on improving the world. But he used to be a very plain-spoken man who said whatever was on his mind and now when you see him in interviews he's always very careful to toe the party line and watches what he says. It's quite a change. He doesn't seem much like a rock and roll rebel anymore.

On the plus side, he's managed to get into quite a high office, with serious potential for change so I don't blame him for taking the opportunity and giving up on the music.

[rick957]

*sighs with relief*  For a second there I thought you were going to tell me that he was corrupt or involved in some scandal or something.  That would have seriously bummed me out!

I don't know enough about him or about Australia or about Australian politics to feel good or bad about his career change, but naturally, I would hope that the integrity and honesty that he brought to his music would translate well into his current sphere of activity.  But you never know what people are really like -- famous people I mean -- or how they can change over time.

I can tell you that Midnight Oil rocked like motherfuckers right up to the end of their career, because I got to see them several times here in the States on their last times passing through.  So I can't complain about that at all!  Well like I said, they're my current favorite band, and I approach music with so much seriousness and passion that it means a lot for me to pick a favorite like that.  To me at least.  :)

I'm somewhat familiar with most of the biggest and most acclaimed bands in the history of rock, and I'd put Oil up there with any of them; they were among the small handful of the greatest artists rock music has produced.  Hands down, no question about it.  *sigh*  I miss them terribly.

On the other hand, they went out on a high note -- another great album and an earthshattering tour (for those few who saw it) -- and all things considered, I'm glad they stopped before they started to suck.  Most bands, even the best ones, stick around until they turn into caricatures of themselves and sully their body of work with their latter-day disappointments; not so with the Oils.

Sadly, I don't know anyone besides a couple friends of mine who give a flying fuck about Midnight Oil, so I don't expect people to agree with my take on them.  But that's okay with me!  It's wonderful to be part of an ocean of fans for certain bands, but there can also be a special pleasure in having a treasure all to oneself.  :)

Anyway, thank you very much for the details!

[Caehlim]

No problem.

The oilz are still well known here in Australia, at least by Australians of my generation or older and you'd be hard pressed to find someone who couldn't sing along to Beds are Burning. I think it's because he's so widely regarded and admired as an artist that he's subject to harsher criticism for taking up a political career.

Now I think of it...if you're interested in discovering some unique Australian bands, have you ever heard Yothu Yindi? Absolutely amazing rock band, who sing about the issues facing indigineous australians with a mix of both aboriginal and western musical traditions.

Here's probably their most famous song. (Note: when I found this one, the first recommended video over to the right in youtube was Beds are Burning by midnightoilz).

Treaty - Yothu Yindi

[rick957]

A land where everyone knows at least one Midnight Oil song.  Wow.  That's, like, my idea of heaven.  ;D

Thanks so much for reminding me of "Treaty" and Yothu Yindi.  I think they might have toured some with the Oils once, or had some other connection I heard of.  Regardless, I haven't heard that song in at least a decade and possibly two decades or more -- I don't recall when it came out, but I want to say it was in the late 80s or early 90s.  I've been wanting to buy a CD with that song on it ever since the first time I heard it, but I had almost forgotten all about that band, until you just now mentioned them and reminded me.  Thanks for that! 

[Lux12]

Are there any other bands out there like Yothu Yindi?

[rick957]

Caelhim might be able to give a better answer, especially since I've only heard the one Yothu Yindi song.  If you subtract the aboriginal Australian instruments and vocal parts, the rest of the song reminds me of a lot of great 80s rock (ex. U2, Peter Gabriel, Smiths, etc.). 

Three such bands whose music I consider essential:  Midnight Oil (also Australian); Talking Heads (mentioned previously in this thread); the Clash (they were -- uh -- gods).  Two albums I'd recommend to anyone, with songs that are still played on classic rock radio:  one and two.

"Treaty" also made me think of Joe Strummer (Clash vocalist) and the albums he did with the Mescaleros, long after the Clash was gone.  That or Paul Simon a little bit, but maybe that's just the "world music" vibe from the video and vocals.

Sorry that I can't provide video links, but I suspect they're not hard to find for any of those groups.  Here's a little background info about YY.

TMI?  Sorry!  I'm a music nerd!  :)

[Caehlim]

Are there any other bands out there like Yothu Yindi?

I never really heard any with that same distinctive sound.

Archie Roach is another good Aboriginal artist though not in quite the same style.

Archie Roach - Took the Children Away

There's Gondwanaland but they seem a bit more, easy-listening and electronica than aussie pub rock.

Gondwanaland - Drought

[Lux12]

Well I must say I'm rather pleased by Godwana Land.I have a particular fondness for new age music though.The Aboriginal sound has a rare trance like hypnotic quality that is rare in many forms of traditional music.

[Caehlim]

Well I must say I'm rather pleased by Godwana Land.I have a particular fondness for new age music though.The Aboriginal sound has a rare trance like hypnotic quality that is rare in many forms of traditional music.

Well the didgeridoo is a droning instrument. In order to play it you actually have to learn this circular breathing technique which lets you continuously play without pausing for breath. It's a very challenging instrument to play, but it gives it that very unique sound.

There's another aboriginal band that I forgot about, Warumpi band. Here's a video of them performing with Midnight Oil.

Midnight Oil and Warumpi - Blackfella Whitefella

[Lux12]

I see.If I recall correctly, the same technique is used by opera singers when performing.Circular breathing that is.

[Oniya]

I know it helps with bagpipes.  A friend of mine piped at my wedding - he was also capable of playing the didgeridoo.

[ejohanson]

I'm a huge music nerd! I listen to music at least 12 hours a day, and download a few dozen albums a week.

1:  Do you have favorite musical groups, or do you more have favorite songs, without caring much who the artists are?  If you have favorite musical groups (bands or solo artists), please name a few of them.  If you're willing to rank them by personal preference, all the better.

#1 - Jello Biafra... especially his work with the Dead Kennedys, nomeansno, and the Melvins. He is my conscience, the little voice in the back of my head which helps me evaluate how well I'm doing in life.

#2 - Andrew Jackson Jihad
#3 - Johnny Hobo and the Freight Trains - my favorite homeless-people band (honorable mention: Random Axe)
#4 - A Silver Mt. Zion - Canadian anarcho-prog!
#5 - Manuel de Falla - I enjoy a lot of Flamenco, but his favorite piece of mine is Nights in the Gardens of Spain
#6 - Tiger Army - their cowpunk/psychobilly stuff is pretty great
#7 - Ke$ha - so nihilistic I get contact high. Awesome live shows. I'm 0% facetious.
#8 - Big Freedia - anarcho-tranny bounce. Incredibly fun. Can't recommend highly enough.
#9 - Iggy Pop circa Lust For Life.
#10 - Gucci Mane - I like most people in the Coke Rap subgenre, but Gucci Mane is the most eclectic
#11 - Bela Bartok - great percussive landscapes
#Locals - Purple & Green, DJ Anjali & The Incredible Kid, All The Apparatus, MU, Portland Cello Project

2:  Where do you look to find new songs or new groups to listen to?  For example, do you rely on word of mouth, or a particular radio station/internet site/magazine/TV show, or something else?

I read Pitchfork, 4chan's /mu/sic board, and Last.fm. I go out to see a lot of live local music too.

3:  Do you spend money (directly or indirectly) on the artists or songs you like the most?  Or do you enjoy the music in some way that doesn't require any money to be spent, such as downloading free songs or pirated songs?  Absolutely no judgment here, I really want to know.

I buy vinyl... I have about 400 jazz and blues recordings, ~300 punk and avant garde 45s, many of them splits, and about eighty LPs of 90s gangsta (Dre, Sugar Hill, NWA, Snoop...). If I'm at a show and they're selling vinyl and I like the band I'll usually pick it up. I almost never pay for any other music though.

4 (strictly optional):  How old are you?

30

5 (optional):  Please tell me about any one song or album or musical artist that affected you in a deeply personal way.  Go into as much or as little detail as you like -- I'm interested.

Well I already talked about Jello Biafra above. 'Well Paid Scientist' is almost solely responsible for why I took the academic track and not the corporate one. 'Chickenshit Conformist' and 'Halloween' are constant rebukes to me when I backslide away from my punk ideals.

'Punks With Clean Kitchens' by Evan Greer and 'Up The Punks' by Ghost Mice are on the opposite side of that coin.

[rick957]

Besides the survey responses (which have been so incredibly enlightening -- thanks ya'll!), this thread has contained some general discussion about music-related topics, so I thought it would be okay to dump this here.  I was gonna make a new thread for it but then changed my mind.  *shrugs*

Music Industry Myth-busting, or, The Day the Music Died ... for reals

I'm a bit of a music nerd and have had one or two interesting conversations with others at Elliquiy about the state of the music industry.  No beating around the bush here -- my take is extremely negative; as far as I'm concerned, rock and roll died in November of 2005, although it's death throes started long before that.  I don't expect anybody to see that exactly like I do; it's a highly subjective (although well-considered) personal opinion.

What's far less debatable, however, and widely misunderstood, is the cultural and financial freefall that the music industry has been in for about a decade.  Many people don't even believe this has happened, because they hear all the media hype about new technology and assume that musicians are cashing in on it.  That's a total misconception, so far at least.

Anyway, recently I stumbled across by far the single best link I've ever seen to concisely demonstrate the industry's decline, so I wanted to share that for others who might find it interesting:
"Music's New Math:  Pop's old metrics don't matter," from New York Magazine, of all places.

It's short and has lots of pictures and snazzy charts and stuff.  :)  Also the article mentions several recent developments that are quite astonishing (the biggie:  that catalog album sales finally eclipsed new album sales in 2012, for the first time ever).

For any inquisitive link-lovers, here's some more for ya:
"How Much Does a Professional Musician Make in 2012?" by Tom Hawking at Flavorwire (the Grizzly Bear piece from New York is well worth reading too, but it's relatively long);
"Putting Common Assumptions About How Musicians Make Money to the Truthiness Test" from Kristin Thomson at the Future of Music Coalition;
and -- if you've really got some time on your hands and want to get down and dirty with the numbers --
"Mythbusting: Data Driven Answers to Four Common Assumptions About How Musicians Make Money," ibid.

The takeaway from those three links is that the majority of pro musicians -- including people you wouldn't expect, famous bands selling hundreds of thousands of albums -- are solidly middle-class, even though the media makes most pop/rock musicians out to be rich.  The FMC site is a real treasure trove of music industry data I've never seen before or never seen in one place. 

It's not all bad news, and honestly, I learned that there are lots more musicians doing well these days than I previously imagined ... but that's partly because my assumptions were so low.

I'm of the opinion that major media outlets have given the public the impression that the music industry isn't doing too badly.  I find it worrisome that the same corporations that own most of those media companies also own all the remaining major music labels (last I heard at least, it changes so fast) and either own or have close partnerships with the big companies manufacturing gadgets that play music.

Comments, discussion, polite debate are all welcome.  :)  Or more survey responses, if anybody wants to ....