I agree that people don't continuously listen to music they don't like just to prove some weird point. Although I definitely believe that there are people who are disingenuous about their tastes in ways that require less commitment than constantly listening to music that they don't like. And it's actually often to try to maintain an image of open-mindedness by selling the idea of their eclectic tastes. It happens often with classical and jazz. My boss at my former internship had "Kind of Blue" framed in the office, but I was the only one in the office who ever put any jazz on the stereo. Someone might cop an old Mozart joint and listen to it and enjoy it, and then profess some big love of classical music. So I think that's more how people can be posers when it comes to taste. I think it happens a lot more often with movies than music, because if you admit to not liking a critically acclaimed movie and you can't back up your opinion super verbosely, you are afraid people will accuse you of "not getting it" (which is the only socially acceptable way to call people stupid to their face).

This kind of falls outside the "hipster" thing though.

this is the best advocate for forcing yourself to listening to something outside of your comfort zone I've seen yet

the idea of forcing yourself to listen to ew&f sounds absurd to me... it's like forcing yourself to breathe...

Believe it or not Batman, I forced myself because you went on and on about them for so long. Keep in mind that this was before I got into Soul/RnB/Funk/Disco in general, and it took a few other artists to "click" first before they did, but I had to keep at it, and I'm glad I did.

I have at least one good friend who does this. Now he probably doesn't repeatedly listen to these things but he listens to them largely so he can brag about his musical taste.

Depends on what you mean by same music. If you mean by genre, then that would greatly depend on the genre. I suspect that one could go through a very rich set of life changes and only listen to western classical music. Similarly I would bet the same with jazz and some of the traditional genres from the east. You can probably do the same with rock.

Nope, but it's been on my radar for quite a while. If I'm ever again not in the middle of 4 books simultaneously, I might give it a more serious look.

I think I'm in the same boat as George here



simply because they're the band that's been with me the longest. It's hard to imagine life without them.

Yeah it depends on the definition of "same music," and it also depends on how early in your life you consumed music avidly.

I whip myself with snakes if I listen to two songs by the same artist in a row, that's how fucking eclectic I am

Good stuff. I'm rereading it now. He's got some particularly interesting points in the early chapters about the different levels on which we listen to music and the nature of what musical ideas are.

you win...

What exactly do you consider boring taste? Sticking to the canon? Being predictable? Adhering to a rather limited number of different styles?

the only thing that bothers me is when old people use it as a generational slur to disparage any and all youthful activity that isn't modeled after the 1950s (oh wait my hipster bad, forgot everyone was dressing like mad men). like when will they stop? nothing short of being old will appease these people

what bothers me is that it does have meaning when it's used this way, and the meaning is "fuck young people"

look, i work in fishtown. it's the spot in phila the hipster archetype (notice how in a peer to peer context we all know what i'm talking about, though let me know if anyone needs elaboration) transplants itself in when brooklyn and austin are too hip to be hip or possibly not hip enough. i see these assholes walking around my city all the time and to any philadelphian, they stick out like a sore thumb. we all know who we're bashing -- neighborhood disrupting, drunk, fickle, transplant assholes with no actual interest in community or entrepreneurial endeavor. nobody likes these guys, but the problem is as soon as you jump to the next boomer kid generation up (think like 33-40), anyone our age (the 20-32 range) is a fucking hipster right alongside these assholes. like, quit being old people

you hit the nail on the head. It all comes down to yuppie posers vs everyday people, but old (i mean, older) people and internet-dwellers tend to lump both into the same negatively-lighted group. In reality, the former is bad for a community and the latter is good for a community. I have many friends who exhibit a lot of so-called "hipster qualities" that are actually just good traits (buying local stuff, food knowledge, bicycling, supporting local art, dumpster diving, general community involvement). I dunno why these people are lumped in with hipsters