It's getting harder to listen to music

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

My longest most regular listening time is while doing the ironing while Top Gear* is off air. I just don’t have continuous swathes of time to listen through entire Floyd or Steely Dan** albums any more. Doing the ironing though, isn’t time wasted and it’s a ‘ears free’ activity, hey let’s have The Cramps this week…

A major contributor to not listening to the kid’s music is that John Peel isn’t around these days :frowning:
(On seeing RoboDog’s comment) If you care to google my username you could make a good guess at my age. Born in the the 60s, saying no more).

  • “Watching” Top Gear is the other make the ironing not a chore activity.

** Or stuff by any of those dead German guys.

22

Interesting as I don’t see that at all in my life, but the opposite. I am 53 and I find I listen to more music now than I did when I was in my early 40’s. At that point I had found myself falling into the ‘no good music now camp’ and so I made a conscious effort to, ya know, actually listen to the music being played and found I enjoyed quite a bit of it, and started enjoying it again.

My wife and I also go listen to local musicians, etc. PLUS I find with You-Tube I have access to so much music than ever before. So I often will have music playing in the background.

However I have noticed when I drive with my wife for example she doesn’t seem to like music playing, in fact my daughter mentioned it to me the other day. But for her she needs it quiet to concentrate, and I have the opposite requirement, I need something to focus against, and music is great for that.

Now I do have excellent hearing and never did play my music super loud so maybe that has something to do with it. I like it as a background white noise that I can focus in on when I hear a song I really enjoy.

23

No, I’m older than a decade. :wink:
Five of 'em actually.

24

I agree that at least some of the problem has to do with our hearing. As we age, we lose the ability to hear certain frequencies, and music that we used to enjoy now sounds “thinner,” and some of it even starts to sound un-musical.

25

[QUOTE=panache45]
… As we age, we lose the ability to hear certain frequencies, and music that we used to enjoy now sounds “thinner,” and some of it even starts to sound un-musical.
[/QUOTE]
Well I find Lada Gaga pretty unmusical but I don’t think it’s that, not for me anyway. The top end of my hearing is pretty screwed alter years playing in rock bands and running sound systems, I compensate by using piezos* for tweeters in my “stereo”. It all sounds fine - better even after I added a sub-bass unit. I just don’t have the down-time to sit around doing nothing but listening. I can listen to instrumental stuff while reading (Bach and Shut Up and Play Your Guitar are favorites) but I can’t read with sung words going on. I can’t work while listening to music either, just can’t do it. And since John Peel left us it’s all talk radio for me thanks.

Come to think of it I do sit down and listen to Later With Jools but that has moving pictures :slight_smile:

  • which is probably making my hearing even worse, oh well.
26

I don’t listen to music as much as I used to, but I still slap on headphones from time to time and immerse myself in a favorite album. I think the main reason for the change in my listening habits is that I crave peace and quiet in a world increasingly filled with noise and distractions.

27

No need to Google your username Small Clanger; I have more than a passing familiarity with Mr Postgate’s work :slight_smile:

…and yes, John Peel, why did you leave us so soon? :frowning:

28

Maybe you should try expanding your horizons and listening to something besides “new rock” or whatever.

May I interest you in some techno music?

29

Well thank you, I’ll give that a go. If nothing else, the “listen now” menu has given me a Bluffer’s Guide to techno when talking to my niece…

“Yeah, that sounds a bit like Goa-Psy Trance or maybe Cosmic Downtempo”

I suspect I’d be rumbled in about 10 nanoseconds though :smiley:

30

I’ve switched to mostly instrumental music from the 1950’s and 60’s. Henry Mancini and Mantovani are my biggest favorite. I find that it blocks outside noise and I concentrate better when I’m working. I also enjoy this music when I’m reading books.

Classic Blues like Billie Holiday or classic rock are a nice pleasure when I’m surfing the web. But, any serious reading on the web requires instrumental only or silence.

I agree with the OP that just sitting and listening to music rarely happens anymore. I get fidgety.

31

I’m about 40 and I have no problem listening to music. Mostly while I’m driving or walking around with my iPod.

But like Small Clanger, I have difficulty finding time just to sit around doing nothing but playing music. And at work, I’m running around so much or need to concentrate on what I’m doing so it’s touch to just play stuff in the background.

I both agree and yet disagree with Le Ministre de l’au-delà. Back in the day, music was expensive. It was a sizable investment for a kid to buy a vinyl or later a CD at the record store. “Sharing” music meant making a poor quality tape mix for your friends. So there was a greater inherent “value” to music. But the flip side of that was we all listened to the same music.

Because music is so cheap now, I think it’s a lot easier now to discover a much greater variety of both new and old music. Sure there’s the nostalgia aspect of having your favorite 70s, 80s and 90s songs in various playlists. But I’ve also started listening to a lot of stuff from those eras that I never heard while I was growing up.

32

So far, posters have talked about a few common issues: changes in lifestyle , changes in interests, less free time, changes in hearing as we age, etc…
But I think there’s another, major, reason that explains why music just isn’t as important now as it was when I was 3 decades younger : emotions.
When you’re young, music is not just an aural thing…it is mostly an emotional thing.

When I was 20 yrs old and driving down the highway, I wanted fast, upbeat road music–to add to the upbeat emotions of moving fast in my very first new-to-me car. If I was contemplating friendship issues, I wanted softer music with meaningful lyrics.
Going to a concert was not just a musical event, it was an emotional event.
The emotions would be shared.Sometimes with a group of friends if you were going to get rowdy for a rock band and then get drunk. And sometimes with one very special friend, if it was a Joni Mitchell performance and then…(ahh…how hope always spring eternal!)
Whether it was love songs, or hard rock, or whatever…each type of music had its own place and drew a specific emotional response.

But now, after several a couple decades of stability, marriage, a career and a mortgage, etc…life is kinda routine and stable. And music is less important. So I listen a lot less. And when I do listen, I don’t mind if I cut it off part way through, before the end of a favorite old song.
Because I already know how it ends.

And when I hear the new music that the young ones like so much…I just gotta say: “Get off my lawn!” Yeah, I know…, the music itself is actually better than “my” music.More complex, more technical, etc… But it just doesnt stir my emotions.

So —my advice to you kids:
Grab the future…go have a good time ,make friendships, and get laid… cAnd while you’re doin’ it…Savor the music!

33

We all eventually mature and tastes change. We were drinking Boone’s farm wine and Schlitz in college. A night dining out was at Pizza Hut. Now we’re drinking Napa Valley wines, Sam Adams and eating at high end restaurants.

Music is the same. I’m often surprised at how simplistic some of the 60’s and 70’s music sounds today. Jazz, Blues and Instrumentals are an adult taste. I would have laughed at anyone suggesting I’d enjoy that music thirty years ago. But, I’m older and I appreciate it now. I also sometimes appreciate silence. I’m baffled why people bring boom boxes to state parks. Why would anyone ruin the experience with noise?

34

I’m 41. I go through periods where I don’t want to listen to anything, but usually I have to have music throughout my day. And if I can’t sleep I will listen to music to try to help me relax. But I find I still actually like the heavier/harder rock and punk as much as I ever did.

I have developed an appreciation for acoustical and lighter, softer sounds I didn’t like when I was younger. I’ve also really learned to appreciate other styles of music like swing, jazz, and even country, which I used to abhor.

35

Country was never my favorite either, but as a guitar player I have to acknowledge how good the musicians who play it can be. Country guitarists were tearing up fretboards thirty years before there was a Jimi Hendrix or Randy Rhoads.

That said, I agree with the notion of it being more difficult to find the time. I do listen while walking with my Android, but the natuire of being outdoors is such that it’s not well suited to listening to music where you’re trying to get every nuance. More often I listen to podcasts, NPR, or whatever.

36

I wouldn’t say it’s more difficult but I do it a lot less than I used to. Mostly I listen in the car, it’s not too often that I crank it up in the house anymore.
So I’d say no it’s not difficult to listen, just difficult to sit and do nothing but listen.

37

I’m 44 and this has been me for the last several years and it’s killing me. I almost can’t read at all any more. :frowning: And although I’ll still rock out in the car when I drive (if I think of it), that’s about the extent of my listening to music. I don’t really seek out anything new unless it hits me over the head in some other venue, like a TV show, and the old stuff I’ve always liked is getting boring, repetitive and isn’t standing the test of time like I’d hoped. Like chappachula said best, I agree it’s some sort of emotional issue. As for reading, I fear it’s due to something else. The whole thing sucks.

38

Up through college I had no TV in my bedroom, so music was a lot more prevalent there. There were also no mp3s, so most of my music experience was whole albums. Now I listen to more music in my car or while exercising, and it’s more of either custom playlists or my whole library on random. I think the one commonality is I still like to fall asleep to music.

I also used to be a voracious reader, but less so now, partly because I burned out on it after college and working in a bookstore and partly because I find it rarer that a particular author will entice me to devour all of their books. Now it’s more picking and choosing. It’s probably also because I actually read more than ever, but now it’s more Internet stuff than novels or books.

39

I too used to listen to a lot of music. I had, and still have hundreds of CDs. I used to listen to music all the time at work, as in most of the day. I stopped listening to to music for the most part at work. I will still put something on here and there, but maybe a couple of times a week at most, and only for one album or a few songs. I do listen to music in the car, but the majority of my trips are short so I don’t get to hear much. I also find that on the days I do drive the 30 minutes to work I listen to the radio and traffic.

I’m 39.

40

Age 46 here. These days I don’t listen much to my favorite older bands, like Rush, Judas Priest & Iron Maiden. Still love the stuff, but since I’m a bassist and guitarist, I’ve spent so much time playing along with that music over the years that I’m just not that interested in simply listening to it.

I don’t like turning on “background” music unless I’m just doing some mindless, time-consuming physical task, and even then I often prefer to work in silence. Especially at work - I’m of the opinion that if there’s music playing, it needs to be loud enough to enjoy, not just a babble of background noise. But in the workplace there’s always a manager who doesn’t want music turned up for one reason or another, so I prefer to just leave it off.

If I’m playing a videogame, my game likely has its own music, and so I want to hear that. When I’m otherwise on my computer/on the Internet, I’m either reading or writing, and since I’m very word-focused, I’m easily distracted by song lyrics. So again, I leave it off (I don’t have a great deal of instrumental music in my collection).

OTOH, I do like to explore and find “new” music. So I frequently take time to just poke around YouTube looking for stuff that catches my ear. But even then, I like “watching” the music. That is, a lot of my enjoyment comes from seeing the music performed in connection with the visual presentation, whether that be a music video or a live performance. I’ve found a lot of stuff that I like, but can’t see myself putting it on the iPod and just listening to it. It’s the whole performance package that I like.