After receiving my first CD player and a gift card to a local music store, I was the definition of both a “lost puppy” and a “kid in a candy shop.” There was so much music at my fingertips and I didn’t know what to do with any of it. I went into this music store without any idea of what I wanted and about an hour later, eight-year-old Owen walked out with a Louis Prima CD, still not knowing if he wanted it.
About a year later I was given a MP3 player for my birthday and that’s when my music taste had a bit of a jump start. My dad had a huge stack of CDs that we burned on to our Dell computer and suddenly I had a bunch of music from the 70s and 80s. This included the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Pink Floyd, Queen, Eagles and many other rock bands. I remember that in the five minutes it took my dad to drive my brother and I to school we would have listened to the entirety of Bohemian Rhapsody.
For the next few years I continued listening to my dad’s music and asking for iTunes gift cards for my birthday and Christmas. I would wait until I heard a song on the radio that I really liked and then buy it, but I slowly stopped purchasing music on iTunes when I was introduced to Pandora, which changed my life. I actually started to cultivate my own music taste and figure out other bands that I liked. I love that there are sites out there that expose you to new music, such as Spotify, another application that curates playlists of music that are similar to what you like to listen to. I almost always have Spotify playing off of my computer; I have become a die-hard Spotify super fan. I am really into Indie/Alternative music with a few Pop songs streaming their way through my ear buds.
While I am mostly a lover of all music and I don’t try to be that person, I can’t get myself to love or even casually listen to country or rap. I think these two genres sometimes have a very specific audience.
Last summer I spent time with a bunch of Texans for an entire week and country music was playing non-stop. By the end of those long seven days, I tried to convince myself that maybe I was a changed person. Maybe country music was my thing now. But that was a complete lie. I appreciate every artist and their craft and I acknowledge the work that goes into writing each and every song, but I can’t get past the country twang and story lines just about beer, girls, God and trucks.
Now what about rap? I have mixed feelings. For a solid month I really tried to get myself to love rap but what I concluded was that I like rap only when it’s mixed with hip-hop. Disregarding the few singles that really get me pumped for the night, I am not a fan of this genre. I applaud clever lyrics but recently all I am hearing is endless lists of provocative ways to have sex, do drugs and drink alcohol. I think artists should be allowed to sing and rap about whatever they want, but these recent rap lyrics won’t be anything I am screaming out loud at parties with my friends.
That being said, I will listen to anyone’s music and spend hours and hours sitting at my computer trying to memorize lyrics. I love music because there is a memory associated with almost every single song. I live for that nostalgic feeling when I hear a song that was played at my sixth grade Spring Fling dance.
Owen is a freshman and a new columnist for The Daily Cardinal. How do you feel about his take on music taste and preference? Please send all feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
