You Are Not Your Taste: How We Talk About Music

‘This is horseshit.‘

‘It’s lame.‘

‘Mid at best.‘

My fellow companions on Everything Is Noise will know those phrases, like the back of their hand – because I use them quite frequently. Some music, quickly discarded after my gut tells me how to feel about it. And after being heavily involved with music for most of my life, I trust my gut blindly. Because that’s how my taste is made, right? My gut tells me what’s cool, what’s mid, and what’s horseshit.

What is taste, though? How does taste develop? These are integral questions to understand a very important connection – the one between taste and identity. And because this connection is so important, it shapes the way we talk about the music we like and about the music we don’t like. It also influences how we talk to people who share bigger fractions of our taste, and how we view people who like stuff we think sucks. In this column, I’m trying to explore exactly this – how do we acquire taste, how does it affect us on a personal level, and how does it shape our social behavior when interacting with other people?

There are studies on the correlation between your personality and your taste. Studies about how your upbringing and general socialization as a child shapes what kind of music you’re going to like as an adult. And I will get to the science part of this in a minute, but I thought it would be best to talk a little bit about myself and my experiences – because, and this should be the beginning and the end of this endeavor – you may not be your taste, but what you like is a big part of who you are.

Before I hit puberty, my exposure to music was mostly accidental – it wasn’t a big part of my life. I learned to play the accordion in elementary school, which I knew even then was definitely not cool, and my parents and the parts of my life close enough to be around me regularly were not that interested in music. A friend of my dad’s liked some German punk music – it was the first time I realized an adult liked a certain kind of music – so I quickly picked it up. He made me some mix tapes of stuff, and I listened to that for the rest of my life.

When I hit puberty, things changed. Obviously. And besides those obvious changes, music started to play a bigger role in my socialization. I was a chubby kid, not particularly popular, but not an outcast either – still, being slightly overweight with no significant talents made me vulnerable to being picked on. It was never outright bullying, as many people experience and suffer, but it was enough to give my self-esteem a few cracks. I bonded with a few people who were on a similar social level as I was, and I subconsciously knew that we were all searching for something – retrospectively, for our identity, as every young person does.

During this time, I started spending more time with my uncle (not really my uncle, but my aunt’s longtime boyfriend), who was the only person in my family with any sort of visible cultural preferences. He wore black, had combat boots, long hair and a long beard – surprise, he was into metal, specifically old school death/black metal, grindcore, and other more obscure stuff. I looked up to him quite a bit, as I had never known a person whose appearance was so closely tied to his musical tastes. He started showing me stuff he liked – mostly black metal stuff like Darkthrone, Satyricon or Summoning, and death metal like Benediction or Macabre. I don’t remember liking it right away, but I ate that shit up like nothing. A couple of weeks later, while I was in my room with a stash of CDs, immersing myself in this sonic world by sheer willpower, I asked my dad for his only pair of black shoes and his only pair of black pants. I picked out a black shirt and went to school the next day; my appearance had completely changed. I was a metalhead; I was into music, and I went on a journey to build my whole personality around those traits.

I was kind of a dick about it. As my friends started to get into music themselves, we all got into heavier music together, but while they were starting out with the usual suspects like Metallica, Linkin Park, System of a Down and stuff like that, I was listening to more extreme music, and I was terribly smug about it. And when I got the feeling that listening to that music made me somehow special, I became obsessed with finding more and more music, not necessarily out of what I liked, but what would expand my infamous self-image of someone who knows a lot of shit and can introduce you to bands you’ve never heard of. It was a weird time and I’m glad I grew out of it. Still, it gave me a ton of confidence and purpose, and looking back on that time now, having music as such an integral part of learning how to be okay with myself is definitely the root of the importance of music in my life today.

Another shade of being a dick about this kind of stuff was that I disliked people who liked ‘vanilla’ stuff, like pop or indie, or even worse, hip hop. I talked shit about that kind of music and put down people who enjoyed it. A real piece of work.

It was important to grow out of that and have a more healthy relationship with music, but my little anecdote also shows where those strong feelings that a lot of people have for the kind of music they like come from – everyone has their own story that you don’t know, especially if you just met them (either in real life or online) – but you can assume it’s there. You bond with people who like the same stuff; maybe you start making music yourself, make it your main focus during adolescence, find like-minded people, the whole shebang.

Your cultural exposure growing up is a key factor in determining what you will end up liking, as is your search for social identity. People who feel like outsiders will be drawn to music that resonates with them on that level – people who have self-esteem issues may be drawn to flashy, extreme music to compensate (hey, that’s me) – there are tons of different ways that exposure and identity will shape your taste.

These factors and many more are discussed in The Social Psychology of Music, a book published in 2003 by David Hargreaves and Adrian North. Both authors researched musical identities and found out how important the music you are exposed to as a child and teenager is for your relationship to it later in life and how it affects what you will like later in life. Another interesting read on a related topic is The Do Re Mi’s of Everyday Life: The Structure and Personality Correlates of Music Preferences by Peter J. Rentfrow and Samuel D. Gosling, which links certain personal characteristics to musical preferences. I won’t go into it too much because it’s not super relevant to the topic at hand, but it’s an interesting read full of ‘yeah, that makes sense’ moments.

So, now that we know that there is some sort of musical sonder (‘the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness’ – The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows), what does that actually mean?

There is one important fact which is quite contrary to the way we talk about music. One universal truth, so to speak:

There is no universal truth.

Art is subjective. I know there are different views on this concept, but where art starts and where it stops is often in the eyes of the artist or the audience. And sometimes the audience is just one guy. Even if the intention of the so-called artist is not to be an artist but to sell a product – if some recipient feels the product as something of artistic value, if it moves or inspires them – who are you or anyone else to tell them it’s not art? It’s important to understand the meaning and the scope of this. If we go back to just music as an art form, even if we are talking about something as quantifiable as production, where someone with expertise can tell if a production is good or bad – while that may be true from a certain point of view, it may mean absolutely nothing to the next person.

There are so many examples of bad production from a professional standpoint that still created a sound that others would consider iconic, influential, or just perfect – just look at black metal to this day. Do you think the early Hüsker Dü records sound good?

I think it sounds like ass. For others, it’s the greatest thing ever put on tape. And to really inherently understand that even something as seemingly objective as production is just as subjective while being part of art is the key here. Even an expert doesn’t know shit. Experts may be able to contextualize their arguments; an expert’s point may be more informed, but in the end it doesn’t matter. What matters is what you feel, how you contextualize your impressions with who you are, and all your experiences. Nothing else really matters.

By contrast, we have to look at how we talk about music, especially on the Internet. Communication on the Internet is a whole topic in itself; you could write (and people have written) tons of academic papers about how weird communication on the Internet is and what it does to people. Of course, there are different levels we are talking about – a major magazine will post about the latest shenanigans of a mainstream artist on social media. The comments section tends to be wild because there are a myriad of different approaches from a myriad of different people. People who only listen to mainstream artists, whose entire cultural horizon is that artist, including a parasocial relationship with a brand they mistake for a character, and who will die on the hill defending that artist. Trolls who want to target those fans. People who are just over the artist. People who complain about why the magazine doesn’t write more about the one artist they like – the list goes on. It’s normal for this to happen, and it’s also normal for things to get pretty heated quickly because people don’t know how to talk to each other. Arguing without being a dick, without fake arguments like whataboutism, or classics like ad hominem are tools people use by reflex these days.

But even if we zoom in to more niche conversational spaces like forums, arguments can get just as heated. It may not be the weird twist of different social approaches to conversations, but people do get nitpicky about details. What was the best album by obscure artist XYZ? Which riff is the hardest? Which bar is the dopest? There is a sheer, endless parade of these examples, from super-duper niche forums to mainstream comment sections. We can’t really escape it.

We talk about music first and foremost with our guts, and our guts get pissed; sometimes they just want to lash out and tell the other anonymous person what a jerk they are for not validating how you feel about something. Because you feel personally attacked by not having your taste/opinion validated. Because the other person might actually be a jerk for not validating your taste. Which justifies you being a dick to them. It’s a never-ending cycle of being a dick.

So while we are talking about music, we are also talking about a million other things. We’re talking about how we’re feeling today, why we’re having this conversation in the first place, what our personal connection to the music is, which is the body of the conversation, about our experiences, our lives, our relationships, all that stuff. Of course, in most conversations, none of that is mentioned, but it still plays a role in how we approach the conversation – which is what makes it so hard, because a lot of things that are important to getting a feel for those million other things get lost when you are talking to someone in a chat or a forum or a comment section.

This is an interesting one. There always has been, there always will be, and there always will be a lot of buzz about what critics have to say about music. Critics put their opinions on a pedestal for the world to see. If the audience agrees with that opinion, they can feel validated on a much larger scale than if someone with a wacky profile name tells them they feel the same way about something in a comment section or forum. If the audience disagrees with a critic’s opinion, they can feel more deeply offended by it, which can trigger all sorts of reactions.

The important question to unpack this dynamic is this: what role does the critic play for you?

In the 1950s, critics had a lot of power to shape how the public viewed an artist. They could make or break careers by telling their readers how they felt about something. Critics created genres by coining genre terms; they defined the discourse of music; and they made famous artists who would otherwise never be exposed to a wider audience. Some critics, like Lester Bangs, became pop icons in their own right.

When MTV hit Western pop culture in the ’80s, things changed. The written review became less and less relevant – visual media and the people who presented their opinions on it became the new tastemakers. Spotlight features and interviews made artists accessible; the tone changed. The commercialization of music made the need for a strong underground movement vital to artistic progress, and many critics championed underground artists as a countercultural act against MTV and its dictation of what was cool. Talking about music became more of a trench warfare – what was authentic and real and what was fake and commercial.

Then we all went online. Music and information about music became waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more accessible. People to talk to about music became more accessible. The role of the traditional critic became much less relevant, because it was never easier for anyone to become a critic themselves. No need to get hired by Rolling Stone – just start a blog. Critics were more diverse, covering all sorts of different things, and platforms like Metacritic democratized the opinion of critics and the opinion of the audience. The ‘user’ was more independent. No one wants to talk about the genre you love the most? Just start a forum and the people will come.

Today, the landscape is different again. People simply rely less and less on the critic’s opinion, because they don’t need it to know what to listen to. The algorithm does that for you, and it tricks you into feeling more validated when you discover something new because it makes you think you’ve found it yourself. Critics have become influencers, often more concerned with how to get your attention than with the music itself. Not everything is worse. There are more people making essay-like music content, focusing on things an algorithm can’t give you by contextualizing cultural history, or understanding their platform as a place of curation for those who are looking for it – building a musical personality and helping people navigate their journey by providing takes on things they like. That’s what we’re trying to do, by the way.

So, are you looking for a steamy, controversial take to get angry about? Are you looking for drama? Are you looking for validation or a vent when validation is denied? Or are you looking for recommendations and a healthy exchange? All of this determines how you engage with critics, and it shapes a good part of how you talk about music with others. Following critics with a positive attitude who just want to share what they like and explain why they like it will most likely influence you to do the same. Clickbaity content, which is more about flashiness and getting a lot of clicks very quickly with controversial tabloid-like topics, will also influence you.

That’s in case you give a shit about critics at all.

Remember the sentence I bolded a couple paragraphs before?

There is no universal truth.

I really believe that, and when it clicked, I felt incredibly free. Because talking about music wasn’t a competition anymore. Being a snob became nothing more than a comedic role, a running gag I do because it’s funny. I understood that my opinion, even if it was more informed than most, was no more valuable than the next person’s. And while some might see this as a devaluation of honestly earned expertise, I felt free.

So how can we do actually better?

Let’s face it, trolls are going to be trolls no matter what. Mainstream posts on mainstream platforms are still going to attract a plethora of different people with different reasons for being there; there’s not much you can do about that other than actually grow the fuck up and start acting like a responsible, empathetic human being for once. But that’s not going to happen anytime soon; a quick glance at any conversation on the Internet will tell you that.

I’m speaking to the people who are actually interested in talking about music in a constructive way, even if they have fallen into traps that made them behave like a dick.

Differences of opinion are a good thing. Talking about differences, if done in a healthy way, can only enrich your own perspective. Being challenged in how you see things is a good thing if it is done constructively from both sides. It can give more meaning to your own opinion by opening up a train of thought about why you like something, or it can give new shades, whatever they may be, to something you already love. It can make you reevaluate your relationship to music – maybe sticking with an annoying, sketchy artist because they have a few good riffs isn’t worth it, and maybe you’ll listen if someone points that out. There are tons of different ways that talking about music can be nothing but positive – IF both sides are interested in doing just that.

If you find that someone is just trolling, trying to trigger you, or just trying to get off on their own monologue – walk away. It’s not worth it. Just don’t feel personally attacked because someone doesn’t like the music you like. It’s just music. It’s not a real conversation. Your taste is just as valuable as the next person’s taste, for better or worse.

If someone makes a good point about why they don’t like something you like, listen and/or read carefully. You may learn something new that advances your own perspective. Maybe you will continue to disagree – in which case you can make your own argument for why you disagree.

It’s really simple when you think about it. The big problem is the tone of Internet conversation and the strong connection between what kind of music you like and who you are. Anyone who regularly engages in conversations about music needs to learn to separate their identity from their taste. Otherwise, it’s just the basics of proper conversation. Listen to the other person, don’t be a dick, and if the other person is in the conversation just to be a dick, walk away and maybe point it out. There might be a learning effect, but probably not.

I hope you got something out of my ramblings. If not, don’t be a dick about it. Have a good one.