as the title says.

 

i must have been about 15 and m.i.a.'s 'bucky done gun' came on the tele, i went out and bought the album, i then noticed she was nominated for the mercury and it all went on from there.

 

i went through a period of loving really heavy/rockier stuff, well like the crystal stilts, deerhunter etc and now my taste is a little more on the poppier and electronic end of the spectrum. that seems to be the way the general 'scene' itself has gone too

I used to be a radio whore but it all started to change in 2007 with the help of mainstream-er indie hits like Young Folks, Golden Skans, We'll Live And Die In These Towns. A year later Santigold released L.E.S Artistes which I consider to be the song that sealed this taste transformation and then it all went cray cray (for the 2008 Pavel standards obv) - got into Los Campesinos!, Bloc Party, Marina, Crystal Castles, etc. In 2009 I started experimenting more and by 2010 there was no going back pretty much. And I'm getting even further down in my alt tastes now too. There's still a lot to discover.

Buzzjack kind of changed my music taste to be honest. I wouldn't have heard of Stroame and Sleigh Bells without it when I first joined, but it all kind of changed for me when I first heard Bon Iver's Holocene. Since then, I've become more interested in music that isn't coming from the mainstream - I wouldn't have heard of Autre Ne Veut or Grimes without this forum for example.

Yeah but you still don't even LIKE Grimes. :(

Hmm, well pre 2008 my musical tastes consisted pretty much solely of Madonna and ABBA (fun times). From about 2008-2009 I started to explore at random, basically artists linked to those, either by place (lots of Swedish pop) or by influences (some Grace Jones and other random stuff like that). 2009 was also a great year for the charts so that helped build up a fandom of several big acts (Kelly Clarkson, Gaga temporarily and many more). But yeah since about 2010 onwards it's been gradually moving more and more towards foreign/unknown artists.

 

Genre wise I'm still pretty much a pop fan, but there are strong offshoots into more Indified territory too, though more often than not I do still tend to favour Indie music with familiar pop structures. Indie pop, though obviously such genres, or sub-genres, are very fluid and subjective. I'd say the single biggest influence is blog hyped females (Florrie, Foxes, Queen Of Hearts and that ilk) and generally female fronted electropop would be the modal style.

I guess it depends where you define Alt. Music. I was about 5 when Punk broke and with an older brother who was quite influential I guess I started with New Wave/Post Punk bands of the early 80s like Adam And The Ants, Siouxsie And The Banshees and Talking Heads. From there on in it took me through Punk, Goth, Psychobilly, Metal, Industrial, Horrorpunk, Shoegaze, Madchester, Grunge, Crusty, Britpop, Nu Metal and everything else.

I think I must've been born with some sort of genetic defect that combined with the musical timeline to create my preference for anything leftfield

I've gone through so many changes and honestly my tastes are all over the place. When I was 11 I was listening to System of a Down one moment, Britney Spears next, and then PJ Harvey right after without that feeling weird to me. At 22 now, I feel like I treat music the way chefs talk about food honestly — good food is all about a diversity of interesting flavors and pairings. I think people who are so bound into one "box" or "genre" are so boring 2 me, not that I don't have preferences of course - but the people I can really talk to and get into it w/ music all have really diverse taste. There's an excellent Bjork interview where she's talking about 2Unlimited and people who hate on pop music, and how she sees that as bullshit (and also makes a reference to food).

 

I definitely went through a "Pitchfork"/"Blog" phase a couple of years back, though I was always still really interested in pop music. I slowly realized how that was sort of bullshit and also v untrue 2 myself — I would say my tastes right now are all over the place w/ a focus on pop music, video game OSTS, Nu-Metal, drum n bass, 2-step garage, 90s house, electronic, and dance music and a tendency towards LGBT or female vocalists. I've also really loved relooking at a lot of music that's really nostalgic to me that I sort of pushed to the side - Imogen Heap & Korn come to mind.

'speak for yourself' is an incredibly poignant record for me

 

this performance made me totally reinterpret the emotion/power/creativity/talent available within music:

 

It's incredible! The fact that she produced it all (I believe) is literally so incredible, and the fact that production is actually really amazing and intricate. She's so talented. Even Ellipse, which I initially thought was boring, has really really intriguing moments and lyrics imo, though I think it does still pale slightly to Speak For Yourself or Frou Frou's Details.

Edited January 12, 201411 yr by Mariah Scary

It's incredible! The fact that she produced it all (I believe) is literally so incredible, and the fact that production is actually really amazing and intricate. She's so talented. Even Ellipse, which I initially thought was boring, has really really intriguing moments and lyrics imo, though I think it does still pale slightly to Speak For Yourself or Frou Frou's Details.

i really ought to give it more of a chance ('ellipse' that is)

 

she was also my first gig aged 15 i've just remembered. i'd forgotten how strong my connections were to her.

I totally have the same feeling about her. Such a strong connection in like 2004-2006.

 

This is probably my favorite on Ellipse:

 

Yeah I can't say my music taste is TOO diverse ooops. I mean, I listen to plenty of different genres (how do Team Rockit/Beyoncé/Burial/Grizzly Bear/Karl X Johan/Disclosure sound anything like each other) but it all fits into an indescribable but easily-identifiable P4k-friendly* aesthetic. idk.

 

 

Tracks that don't fit in there take time to GROW and GROW.

 

& I will get back into proper indie rock eventually.

 

*I mean the range of tracks it reviews, not so much its readers.

Edited January 12, 201411 yr by Harve

One track did it for me. Up until then I'd been listening to The Beatles, Status Quo, whatever was in the Top 40. But then on a dark November night in 1983 I saw this:

 

 

and I haven't been the same since.

Probably The Cure - Lullaby but New Order's True Faith was the second song I ever liked but it probably wasn't the guitars that I liked in that song - the first was It's A Sin from PSB.