All Music is Shite. Discuss.

October 15, 2006 8:52 AM

No Music Day exists because music has run its course. No Music Day exists to give you time to decide what you now want from music. No Music Day is on the 21st November, this and every year. To register, visit nomusicday.com
posted by Blue Stone (81 comments total)

Count me in. Ever channel surf on FM? It's really quite frightening.

"No Hip-Hop Day" would sound a lot more inviting.
posted by wfc123 at 8:58 AM on October 15, 2006

Too late. I already have tickets to go see Primus on Nov. 21st.
posted by shnoz-gobblin at 8:58 AM on October 15, 2006

wow lol dude

i love all music but rap and country! right?
posted by rxrfrx at 9:03 AM on October 15, 2006

One of the founders of KLF is talking about how music is derivitive? That's pretty funny.
posted by dobbs at 9:04 AM on October 15, 2006

Huh?
posted by mzurer at 9:07 AM on October 15, 2006

This article reminds me a bit of Momus' article "Hell is Other People's Music"

Oh those cantankerous musicians, fed up with all the music they listen to.

Me? I've just been turned onto Breakcore. I've been a fan of VEnetian Snares for a while, but now know about Shitmat and LFOdemon.

I really love Shitmat. Pure chaos/ragga/gabber/jungle/dnb... Who needs caffeine when you've got that shit?
posted by symbioid at 9:11 AM on October 15, 2006

Wow, I think I'll start a "No Reading Day" to complement this.
posted by tkolar at 9:11 AM on October 15, 2006 [1 favorite]

I can go for days at a time without any desire to listen to music. I'm a 53-year old musician. I used to play or listen to music all the time, but stopped ten or twenty years ago.

Then I re-discovered pop (which I'd stopped listening to in 1970 when I discovered jazz).

And more authentic sounding cross-cultural stuff started coming out (not that insipid "world music") which I admit to having played twenty years ago.

And all that music from Mali, Morocco, Uzbekistan...I can still go for days without listening to music, but when I do It's wonderful.

I use speakers. I guess I'm getting old: walking around with earbuds is a young man's game.

I'm sure it's pretty complicated psychologically, but this post is already too long.

(I do put in at least a few minutes at the piano every day, and in public, a few hours every few weeks.)
posted by kozad at 9:18 AM on October 15, 2006

Hip hop is not really music, so- uh, is this exempt?
posted by wfc123 at 9:19 AM on October 15, 2006

Hip hop is not really music

Edgy!
posted by mendel at 9:20 AM on October 15, 2006

we GET IT, you don't like hip hop
posted by chococat at 9:22 AM on October 15, 2006

if you don't hear the music you want to hear then make some ... not everyone can do that, of course ... but i can ... and i daresay someone from klf could, too
posted by pyramid termite at 9:24 AM on October 15, 2006

I can agree with the sentiment of putting aside a day to think about what we want out of music instead of listening to it, but his argument is crap.

Perhaps what he's trying to say is that almost everything that can be done has been done. Maybe that's equally crap, but part of globalization and digitization is that:

a) musicians have played and recorded almost every instrument the world over and

b) synthesizers and computers can create almost every noise imaginable. Someone's played almost every conceivable time sig, tuning, and distortion we can think of.

If you're looking for something strictly "new," you're not going to find much of it and what you do find probably won't be very good. Perhaps the author should spend the day thinking about what a better criteria would be... I vote for raw, imaginative, inspired, and powerful.

shnoz: arrgghh, I'm jealous. I've seen Les several times but the one time I had the chance to see Primus was at Bonnaroo '04... and I passed out before the set 'cause I hadn't slept in 48 hours.
posted by trinarian at 9:25 AM on October 15, 2006

The only thing that ever makes me want to fight someone is when they say"they don't like hip hop."
posted by Quartermass at 9:27 AM on October 15, 2006

Too late. I already have tickets to go see Primus on Nov. 21st.

Looks like your name is mud, then.
posted by jonmc at 9:28 AM on October 15, 2006

they don't like hip hop
posted by melt away at 9:33 AM on October 15, 2006

AND YOU WILL NOT TAKE PART IN ANY SORT OF MUSIC MAKING OR LISTENING WHATSOEVER

So, basically, don't turn on a computer, don't check myspace or youtube, don't go into any retail establishment, don't watch TV or go to the movies, don't play any video games, don't call customer service, don't be anywhere where someone might answer their cellphone, don't go to any part of town where people drive with their windows down.

Music is so fricking everywhere in society that it is impossible to escape.
posted by 23skidoo at 9:41 AM on October 15, 2006

Man, do people need a cause to cling to these days.

Africa's gotten boring already?
posted by dflemingdotorg at 9:43 AM on October 15, 2006

I dinna like hip hop. I went to see Grandmaster Flash when they came out with The Message and it was great...but most hip hop turns me off these days, as does most country music. Nothing personal Quartermass, cuz your FPPs here are great, plus you live too far away to come over and kick my ass.
posted by kozad at 9:44 AM on October 15, 2006

It is also impossible not to have a tune inside your head, rhythm is part of being a human, this is so ignorant.
posted by wigu at 9:46 AM on October 15, 2006

A day without music is like a day without air. If you truly believe that music has run its course, then, er, well, I don't really know what to say.

Now, a day without DJs wittering endlessly in-between music, that's something worth organising. No phone-ins, no "I've just got a text from Doris who wants to say 'hi' to everyone that knows her", no presenter "gangs" talking about last night's sport, or what they got up to. DJs ruin music radio.
posted by TheDonF at 9:50 AM on October 15, 2006

I can relate, although less intensely, to many of the article's observations.

However, I think it overlooks the essential role music plays in TV and film. In my opinion, music is as essential in those mediums as it has ever been, and is astoundingly effective at conveying emotion to the audience.

It may not be satisfying in album-format, but music's continued ability to help tell a story when mixed with other media is testimony that it is not all shite.
posted by yorick at 9:52 AM on October 15, 2006

December 12th is no looking day
posted by ZippityBuddha at 9:53 AM on October 15, 2006

symbioid : "Me? I've just been turned onto Breakcore. I've been a fan of VEnetian Snares for a while, but now know about Shitmat and LFOdemon."

As a fan of Venetian Snares for a while, who didn't know about Shitmat or LFOdemon until you mentioned them just now, November 21st may be No Music Day, but October 16th will be "Listen-to-some-new-bands-just-as-soon-as-I-get-home-from-work Day". Thank's, symbioid.
posted by Bugbread at 10:00 AM on October 15, 2006

I'm starting 'no no music day' on the same day. listen to anything you want, wherever and whenever you want. You can even pull up in your ricer and pump eminem or whatever shit it is you listen to, because believe me, the 10-20 seconds you're subjecting me to crap doesn't compare to the lifetime of other crap that i could be more concerned with.
posted by wumpus at 10:00 AM on October 15, 2006

I am hereby instituting No Ironic Gestures Day, to be observed on any day except No Ironic Gestures Day.
posted by fleetmouse at 10:03 AM on October 15, 2006 [2 favorites]

"Too late. I already have tickets to go see Primus on Nov. 21st."

What do you mean "too late"? Sounds like you're going to be strictly observing the date.

(Primus is OK, but that was low-hanging fruit).
posted by klangklangston at 10:12 AM on October 15, 2006

How about a no manifesto day?
posted by srboisvert at 10:12 AM on October 15, 2006

December 12th is no looking day

sweet crackers i'm blind
posted by dflemingdotorg at 10:13 AM on October 15, 2006

Bill Drummond will be appearing at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival (17-26 Nov)

So his set is on the 21st, right?
posted by InfidelZombie at 10:18 AM on October 15, 2006

So I went home and searched every corner of the web for something new, fresh, exciting. Something that would make me hear music in a different way. Something that would open a door to a room in my head which I had never been in before. But even in those furthest corners I could find nothing that did this.

He Should Have Asked Metafilter!™
posted by reklaw at 10:22 AM on October 15, 2006 [1 favorite]

Noh Music Day
posted by thirteenkiller at 10:24 AM on October 15, 2006

This is a great idea. Music is ubiquitous and I too feel weary, at times, of having heard everything before. Spending a day listening to world around me instead of drowning it out with the same crap coming out of my ipod might be interesting.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 10:29 AM on October 15, 2006

Personally, I tend to find that I don't have enough time in the day to listen to music, to explore/research to find new things, as well as to appreciate that which I already like, etc.
posted by stifford at 10:34 AM on October 15, 2006

I won't say all music is shite but as somebody with no interest in music whatsoever I will say it is all noise (and that is how I use it, I don't listen to it but do play it sometimes when there are other things I don't want to hear).

So I've been participating in this my whole life. But not with the goal of getting better music.
posted by obfusciatrist at 10:38 AM on October 15, 2006

Manohmanoshevitz, before I clicked I was thinking this was going to be like "A Day without Art" on World Aids Day---an intellectual but symbolic sacrifice of some sort---but not listen to any tunage just because this old has-been is feeling wicked curmudgeonly? Squandered opp.
posted by DenOfSizer at 10:43 AM on October 15, 2006

"At the same time, Drummond tells me with absolute conviction that his first wish for the 1992 Brit Awards was to cut off his hand and throw it into the audience.

'I thought that would be the ultimate thing, a way of taking it even further. I was inspired by the story of the red hand of Ulster, which you see on the Ulster flag. That comes from the story that, when the first people came to the region, there was a young man in the boat who wanted to be the first to claim it for his king or laird, so he chopped off his hand and threw it on to the beach. So in my head, I was chopping off my own hand and throwing it into the massed ranks of the music business, claiming it for myself.' "

From http://www.libraryofmu.org/display-resource.php?id=486
posted by BeerFilter at 10:44 AM on October 15, 2006

What the fuck? I went through a couple of years of 'no music day', after really getting frustrated with all the new music sounding like regurgiated cack.

Coincidence or no, this was a time of deep depression (cause? effect?). There is a perverse satisfaction in watching the industry destroy itself like mad dogs as they fail to understand why pre-packaged and well-received (by focus groups, anyway) products fail to sell the way the labels need.
posted by Busithoth at 10:44 AM on October 15, 2006

Is this some sort of Phillip Glass or Brian Eno experiment?
posted by furtive at 10:53 AM on October 15, 2006

"In January 2003 temptation got the better of me. Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys broke my resolve."

Pet sounds is the best he can come up with for a truly unique album? There's nothing worse than an old man who wishes he was still hip, what a loser.
posted by afu at 11:15 AM on October 15, 2006 [1 favorite]

Oct. 26 is no smiling day! Because smiles have all been done before.
posted by obvious at 11:19 AM on October 15, 2006

January 27, 1925 was Nome, You Sick day.
posted by dhartung at 11:39 AM on October 15, 2006

"we GET IT, you don't like hip hop"

Actually, I kind of like hop, it's the hip that I can't stand.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 11:43 AM on October 15, 2006 [1 favorite]

Mr. Crash Davis— hop head.
posted by klangklangston at 11:55 AM on October 15, 2006

The only thing that ever makes me want to fight someone is when they say"they don't like hip hop."

You're going to be a cranky old shit when hip hop is on the trash heap with the other old-fashioned styles of pop music and kids (probably on your lawn) laugh at the funny old music you like. Break a hip hop, gramps!

Do we all have to like Bavarian oom-pah music, too.
posted by pracowity at 11:59 AM on October 15, 2006

Eh, I just saw TOOL in Mansfield, MA a couple of weeks back. All Music != shite, IMHO.
posted by booticon at 12:01 PM on October 15, 2006

An interesting thing, musicians often can go for long periods of time without consuming other people's music. I often go several days without listening to something. Most of the musicians I know often do this.
posted by nonreflectiveobject at 12:02 PM on October 15, 2006

Well, seems like a good time to drop my mp3 blog, ripe with new music for the pickin.
posted by Mach3avelli at 12:05 PM on October 15, 2006

Do we all have to like Bavarian oom-pah music, too.

I've got a special pair of lederhosen that I wear while kicking asses like yours.
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 12:07 PM on October 15, 2006

I don't trust people who don't like music. There's just something... inhuman about them (nothing personal obscufiatrist... I'm sure that you're a nice person!)

Anyway... it seems to me that this complaint is less about what music sounds like than the reduction of music to a commodity. To a certain extent, it doesn't matter how it sounds if you can buy for 99c on iTunes.
posted by papakwanz at 12:11 PM on October 15, 2006

pracowity : "Do we all have to like Bavarian oom-pah music, too."

Yes. And I'm not being sarcastic. Oom-pah music, and its relative Tejano music, is the shit.
posted by Bugbread at 12:17 PM on October 15, 2006

i love all music but rap and country!

Personally, I hate all music but rap and country. Play me Wyclef Jean's cut of Kenny Roger's 'The Gambler' and I'm in pure hog heaven.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 12:18 PM on October 15, 2006

Why are people taking this so po-facedly? It's Bill Drummond, co-burner of a million quid, co-inventor of Stadium House, transporter of a sacrificial Elvis icon to the North Pole...

So his set is on the 21st, right?

Hee. No doubt, probably DJing music by artists not beginning with G...
posted by jack_mo at 12:18 PM on October 15, 2006

That Wired article has it right; hell is other people's music. I've never hated anyone so much as I hated the asshole in the apartment below my former pad, who liked to come home at 2:00 in the morning on a Tuesday, throw on some techno or show tunes, and pass out. This was more than five years ago, and just thinking about the guy still makes my blood boil. MeFi'er Fuzzy Monster knows what I'm talking about.

I used to listen to music every waking moment of every waking day I was able to, but as I get older I find I value peace and quiet more and more. This past summer I went on a camping trip and purposely didn't bring a stereo, hoping that no-one else in my group would either. And the best trip I've been on recently was to Iceland, where it is very, very quiet. Standing in a gulley, out of the wind where there was absolutely no sound of any kind, was almost a religious experience after the unceasing clatter of life in Toronto.
posted by The Card Cheat at 12:34 PM on October 15, 2006

Oom-pah music, and its relative Tejano music, is the shit.

You've got a spare article in there.

But, OK, how about Schlager, then? Do we have to like the eyeless, soulless Heino?
posted by pracowity at 12:39 PM on October 15, 2006

The Card Cheat : "I used to listen to music every waking moment of every waking day I was able to, but as I get older I find I value peace and quiet more and more."

I do too, but I've looked at how/when that happens, and I realize that it happens when I switch from listening to music to having music playing. When music is playing constantly, it loses all its punch. When I'm listening to music (that is, not doing other stuff, just sitting there listening), it's just as good as it used to be, and silence is just silence, nothing special.
posted by Bugbread at 12:40 PM on October 15, 2006

pracowity : "But, OK, how about Schlager, then? Do we have to like the eyeless, soulless Heino?"

You don't have to like Schlager. And you don't have to like Heino, but you do have to like that photo of him in his youth. Just the photo, not the music.
posted by Bugbread at 12:42 PM on October 15, 2006

There's plenty of good music, but unfortunately it never gets played on the radio.
posted by mike3k at 12:43 PM on October 15, 2006

I think there are a couple of reasons that Drummond and others are having with finding good music.

Firstly would be the issue of too much choice. As behavioral scientist Sheena S. Iyengar observed in an experiment, if you put 6 jams in a tasting booth 30% of shoppers would make a purchase, but if you put 24 jams in a tasting booth only 3% would make a purchase. Too much choice causes anxiety and a sort of paralysis. (If this sounds familiar it's this is widely quoted by Malcolm Gladwell.)

Secondly is the "peer factor" in wether someone likes music. Now I can't find the study but if someone "sorta likes a song" will change to "really likes a song" if you place them in a group of people who really like a particular song. Notice Drummond cites artists like the Beach Boys and the Byrds, both widely popular and critcally acclaimed. The problem is you don't have that as much any more with the (as Momus refers to) the genrefication and tribalisation of music. Statistically, while a decline in music sales is debatable there is a very real decline in the number of big, platinum and multi-platinum albums. The big rock bands of the 90s were smaller than the big 80s rock bands which were smaller than the big 60s rock bands. Personally, I like finding and listening to obscure gems, so I don't really have many complaints about music now, but someone looking for something new and different and as popular as Pet Sounds (which wasn't even that popular when it came out) is going to have some difficulty.
posted by bobo123 at 12:44 PM on October 15, 2006

When music is playing constantly, it loses all its punch.

As much as I love my iProduct, I'm beginning to see the truth of this.
posted by The Card Cheat at 1:03 PM on October 15, 2006

symbioid: I really love Shitmat. Pure chaos/ragga/gabber/jungle/dnb...

You probably want to check out Tim Exile.
posted by influx at 1:12 PM on October 15, 2006

It is also impossible not to have a tune inside your head, rhythm is part of being a human, this is so ignorant.

Not having a tune in my head currently, does that make me ignorant, or merely inhuman? You love music - I get it, but not everybody is wired that way.


When music is playing constantly, it loses all its punch. When I'm listening to music (that is, not doing other stuff, just sitting there listening), it's just as good as it used to be,

Amen.

I hardly ever buy music, certainly don't follow it, never listen to the radio, and may catch a music vid if ads are on on the other channels. Very occasionally something will strike me and I'll check it out via the nets (last time that happened was Minuit's song Fuji, but that may have been because of the lead singer's amazing jiggly shoulders, now safely ripped from youtube for my later delectation) and I literally can't remember the last time it happened.

You are welcome to argue the fact that I have no soul (a bit of a fait accompli for this atheist), but the stuff that makes my mind excited is usually made of 26 symbols and some punctuation.
posted by Sparx at 1:42 PM on October 15, 2006

Sparx : "the stuff that makes my mind excited is usually made of 26 symbols and some punctuation."

I'm excited by 26 symbols and some punctuation, and also by 26 cymbals and some punctuation.
posted by Bugbread at 1:49 PM on October 15, 2006

papakwanz: No insult taken.

I've lived a lifetime of people thinking I'm extremely odd (and sometimes without soul or inhuman) for not having any interest in music.

I appreciate it at a mechanical level. I'm awed by the artistry that goes into it and the technical skills required to produce. But that is also true of quilting and I have no desire to spend much time with that either.

I think it really came about because I was such a bookworm as a kid. Literally, if I wasn't moving, I was reading. And while I could kind of watch TV while reading I couldn't listen to music because I would completely tune it out. So I just stopped.

I don't "hate" or "dislike" music. There are things that are better than others if I am forced to listen. I just have no interest in it.

Oddly, I love musicals. And live performances, if dramatically staged are interesting as well. But no matter how much I love a musical I never have interest in just listening to the soundtrack. It is very much the combination of sound with visual. The sound by itself is boring.
posted by obfusciatrist at 1:53 PM on October 15, 2006

I, too, rarely listen to music -- or at least I'm rarely responsible for it being played. I used to listen to music constantly, was in a few bands, etc. It changed suddenly one evening when I was at Brownie's, watching my ex-roommates' band play. There were all these emo kids watching the lead singer, singing along with all the words, staring at him with admiration. All I could think was "yeah, but he never takes out the garbage."

I got sick of the whole performer / audience setup, quit going to shows, and have never found my way back. That was almost ten years ago. I presume that some day I'll start getting pleasure from following music again -- a different genre, no doubt -- but for now my iPod is full of audiobooks and news podcasts.
posted by The corpse in the library at 1:54 PM on October 15, 2006 [1 favorite]

HA, (un)fortunately, i go to an arts school for Music, and every tuesday and thursday ALL my classes are music classes, and nov. 21 falls on a tuesday. therefore unless i choose to skip school for the sake of something quite satanic, i've got no choice!
what do all you have against music!?
posted by alona at 2:21 PM on October 15, 2006

symboid and bugbread: a friend of mine runs a breakcore distro and runs festivals and the like. Here are some other artists who destroy music in a similar fashion:
-Larvae
-Bong-Ra
-Enduser
-Needle Sharing
-Panacea
posted by mkb at 2:58 PM on October 15, 2006

Looks like I chose exactly the right time to get an iPod with a bigger hard drive.
posted by Bugbread at 3:19 PM on October 15, 2006

Damn! I've got a gig that day...
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:40 PM on October 15, 2006

There's plenty of good music, but unfortunately it never gets played on the radio.

NOT TRUE!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:50 PM on October 15, 2006

I will never understand people who don't like music. It's a non-statement. It's like saying you don't like sight or taste. What you mean is that you don't like the music you've heard, an impossibly small fraction of the music out there. Bah! I can barely find time to listen to all the music that comes out each week. 99% of it is complete shit, but even so a few amazing albums come out each week, and that's just what I (a person who barely puts enough time into it) hears.

It's your loss.
posted by phrontist at 7:25 PM on October 15, 2006

Oh, DOOO, phrontist, DOOO tell us more about the Magical Land of MUUUSIC where all the tiny Minims and the curmudgeonly Crotchets have sandwiches beneath the Piccalo Trees, where guitars go solo into dangerous towns where cheating Tablature creep unnoted and it's all the quavering semis can do, despite their ballad power, to haul their orchestras into the safe regions of the popular band in time for the top ten at ten and THEEEEN, phrontist, THEEEEN, perhaps you could be even MOOOORE condescending and tell us what we really, really, MEEEEEEEAN.

Because I forget. Damnable short term thingummy.
posted by Sparx at 8:05 PM on October 15, 2006

Awesome. November 21st is my birthday, and I now have an excuse to make sure people don't sing "happy birthday."
posted by Citizen Premier at 8:18 PM on October 15, 2006

This author is a very very selfish man; having "consumed" music all of his life ... and now finding himself invigorated by such ancient fare as Pet Sounds and The Byrds ...

... it never occurs to him that it's his turn to make some music. Sir: you're missing out on the best part of music: making it yourself.

It has never been easier, and all the coolest people are making their own, on the computer or improv.

"I don't have time for that!" Neither does anyone else.
"I don't have any talent, no experience ..." Listen to what's on the radio: does that make any sense?

Music has gone full circle and come back to where it started: Anything goes, having fun making noises.

Go! Do it! Get pregnant! Pop!
posted by Twang at 9:36 PM on October 15, 2006

What you mean is that you don't like the music you've heard, an impossibly small fraction of the music out there.

Well duh. But how many awful Dan Brown books do I have to read before I stop reading them on the theory that those millions of people must see something I'm missing?

How many different rice puddings must I try before it isn't worth the effort to try another hoping that this will be the rice pudding I like.

In my 32 years I've heard an awful lot of music, of an awful lot of varieties. And never once have I experienced the feelings of "isn't it nice to sit and listen to this." It is always "sitting and just listening to this would be awfully boring. Maybe I can find something to read."

Yes, it may be that the next song I listened to would put me in a rapturous state that satisfied me to the far end of my life. But why would I keep trying?

You don't understand me, I don't understand you. It's all cool. I can't fathom what it is about a man beating a rock with a stick that makes people go ga ga. You can't imagine how it wouldn't.
posted by obfusciatrist at 10:59 PM on October 15, 2006

A man beating a rock with a stick? No, no, no...you're going about this all wrong. A man rocking a beat with a stick...that's the good stuff.
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:35 PM on October 15, 2006

I will never understand people who don't like music. It's a non-statement. It's like saying you don't like sight or taste. What you mean is that you don't like the music you've heard, an impossibly small fraction of the music out there.

It's not like saying you don't like sight, it's like saying you don't like Picasso paintings. It's not like saying you don't like taste, it's like saying you don't like eating sweets. Music is not the only thing to hear.
posted by 23skidoo at 11:53 PM on October 15, 2006

The author is almost onto something -- at least he realizes the problem isn't purely external... you get to a point where you think all music sucks and you're probably finding spring and hot chocolate and the touch of a lover leave you cold and you really ought to do something about it.

I'm convinced that part of the reason that teens tend to take ferociously to music is not only the intensity of the marketing. It's also that their systems are primed for it: most teens *feel* things more intensely than a lot of us sellout adults who seduced into banal security of a salary and a house in the suburbs. So if you're not feeling the music, it might be that most of the stuff out there sucks, but you might want to check to see if you've let yourself become a little too insensitive to the world where the colors are brighter and the sound is big as your dreams. I've fallen into that trap more than once and have yet to escape its threat.

I'm not sure the enforced break is the answer, though. Nor is it really so hard as to require a dedicated day. If you can avoid retail and broadcast media, you've done most of the work, and it's easy to go days without touching either.
posted by weston at 12:09 AM on October 16, 2006

Twang : "This author is a very very selfish man; having 'consumed' music all of his life ... it never occurs to him that it's his turn to make some music. Sir: you're missing out on the best part of music: making it yourself. "

You...you do realize that the author is Bill Drummond, co-founder of the KLF, one of the most influential (though I don't like them personally) music groups when it comes to sampling and electronic music.
posted by Bugbread at 7:15 AM on October 16, 2006

Wow, some of the commenters in this thread are crochety old bastards. "I don't listen to music"? What? It may not be like saying "I don't like sight", but it's very close to saying "I don't like written words." Music is not "Dan Brown books", music is books.

I can't even believe that this conversation would happen outside of some abstracted academic setting. What is the point of music? What is the point of happiness?

It may not be nice and it may not be politically correct of me but I'm going to just assume that people who don't like music because it's pointless noise have a condition somewhat like people who can't recognize faces, or perhaps the man who mistook his wife for a hat.

I have no idea how anyone with emotion that is in any way related to the way I experience emotion could not have an appreciation for music.

Anyway, I guess I'm a crochety old bastard, too. But at least I listen to music.
posted by blacklite at 3:06 AM on October 17, 2006

As an afterthought, I don't think anyone is saying they don't like music. They're just saying they don't like it enough to pay attention to what's new, going down, in stores now, number one with a bullet, a tragically overlooked part of the long tail or whatever.

They're not saying they don't like to dance and would never attend a concert or play a CD if the mood took them, just that it's not that much of a disappointment to have a thousand flavour of the moment bands pass them by - that the mood doesn't take them every single day/week/month - that they'd rather hang in a library (or marine park, or whatever) than a record store, that a new author's oevre to experience is more exciting than a new band as that's where their internal priorities lie.

Perhaps our parents read us stories at bedtimes rather than sang lullabies or something. Who knows. But there is no movement to get music removed from public life because it actively annoys us (as opposed to those that think that there is something wrong/soulless/malformed/emotionless with us - now that is annoying)
posted by Sparx at 1:35 PM on October 17, 2006