The Minister of Culture in Latvia, Raimond Pauls, says music has become a mere soundtrack in our lives, a background noise. He says that because we listen to music everywhere, 24/7, it is no longer special to us: "The charm of the new is lost." (I translated) In earlier decades, he says, music was more special, as people turned on the radio at a specific hour with excitement and anticipation. Would you agree? When and how often do you listen to music? How special is it to you?
Probably as true as just about everything else we take for granted in modern society. When I was a kid, my family was poor and meat wasn't on the menu for most of the week, but on Sundays there was always roast something or other. We didn't have an oven, so we would have to prepare the meat and potatoes at home and then take it to the local bakery, as did just about every other family, to have it cooked for us. Those roast meals were probably the tastiest and most satisfying that I ever tasted; because they were rare. By the same token (lack of money, resources and technology), most things were rarer 30-40+ years ago, so they were more highly appreciated and respected than they ever could be now. Nowadays, meat is cheap; amazing food is available most hours of the day and can even be delivered to your door and anyone can become a gourmet chef merely by paying attention to the TV cookery shows or by buying a couple of cookery books, damn', I made my money by selling food! When I was a teenager, there was only one music program on the (UK) radio that was worth listening to; that was Top Gear, with John Peel, who played all the progressive stuff of the day. That show kicked ass and man, was it worth waiting for? Nowadays, all you have to do is log on to the web and your mind can be inundated with myriad genres of amazing music from all over the globe. Jeans! In the old days you could buy 3 brands of naff jeans if you were a pretender, or, you could save up and buy a pair of Levi's 501's if you were genuinely cool; nowadays, Levi's are old hat and you can buy 1000 brands of cool branded jeans if you so cared. Everything moves on; values change; quality becomes more and more elusive and rarity is replaced with commonplace; such is the meaning of progress.
in the car, on the computer, in 3 of my 8 classes at school, (everywhere). all thanks to my ipod video. its not anything special to me, but why should it be. music is meant to keep you entertained.
I listen to music all the time (i.e whenever I don't need to pay complete attention to whatever is happening around me), and it is still special. I may not like the same songs I used to, but I love music as a whole just as much as I ever have. In short, I disagree with the Minister of Culture in Latvia.
yes i would agree. i listen to music every day and there must be something special about it why else would a song play over and over and over in you mind? i haven't had anything else to do that
I agree that music is now just so much background noise for most people. They're unusual if they know the title, rare if they know much more. I'm such a freak I actually listen to lyrics and sometimes instrumentation. The radio will be on at the lab, and if a song comes on I enjoy, I'll sometimes drum a little with a pencil or else mouth along with the words. My coworkers act like they've never seen anyone pay attention to a song before. I made the remark once that if they aren't paying any attention to it they should turn it off (they usually listen to stations I don't like). "We have it on for background noise," they admit. Background noise??? Have you ever been inside a dental lab? Grinders, polishers, dremels, air compressors, laser welders...BACKGROUND NOISE??? That place is nothing BUT background noise! The only reason I can hear the radio at all is because my station is a little forward of the main lab. (I inspect and wrap up the cases for delivery.) I think if more people actually paid attention to the music we might see a bigger variety of genres, and possibly a more adventurous breed of musicians develop. Maybe it wouldn't all sound so preprocessed (pre-chewed, my husband says Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!) and the general public would be in for a treat. Alas, we have become a society that wants to be told what we like. We let the machine do all of our thinking for us and sit back while it spoon-feeds us the latest dreck to ooze out of its pores.
There is music I like to have in the background. A lot of the dance music that's out these days makes great mood music. There is music I like to dance to. Not the same "dance music" because I don't have the moves to dance like that, but the jerky-move stuff like The Killers or the slower moves of "classic rock." And then there's music I like to sit and pay attention to. Busy, interesting, new stuff like The Mars Volta; spectacular old stuff like "In the Dead of Night" by U.K.; thoughtful, depressing stuff like Paula Cole; the occasional symphony; and of course I enjoy my share of dumb stuff like the Pussycat Dolls. So, the fact that there is music to listen to constantly does not make me immune to the charms of the music I love. It's not the same music. No problem.
I agree with what Fraggle Rocker said. There's a lot more music now, but it has different purposes. There's music for your workout, for your relaxation, your reading, job, breakfast, whatever. But there's also music that you like to just listen to. I don't think an activity diminishes appreciation for music; on the contrary, if music is needed during an activity, it means that music is now more special. Also, if you're not limiting yourself to current music of a specific genre from a specific country, there's a lot of awesome music available to you. I'd say today's listener is more picky, and, therefore, more keen in his appreciation.
