I like pop music. I like show tunes from musicals, especially ones that I used to perform in. I like techno dance music. I like reggae. I like music from the 1980’s. I really like patriotic music. I like classic rock that has been bastardized to make it more peppy so I can run on the treadmill with it. I like ballads, but not Joan Baez, and I like songs with lots of harmony, which I love to try to sing. I like bluegrass and traditional Irish music and Neil Diamond. I like girl bands and boy bands. I like some punk rock, such as the Ramones, and I like lots and lots of alternative music.
I do not like blues, metal or hard rock, screaming guitars, opera, or classical music except for a few select pieces that are especially well-known and enjoyed by pretty much everybody. I only like jazz a little bit.
T has always loudly expressed his disdain for much of the music I listed above as those that I like. Except for reggae, which he also likes. Ever the peacemaker, and ever slightly lacking in acceptance of what I viewed as the more nerdy aspects of my personality, I turned my back on many of those likes. I focused on the stuff in the categories that we both like, like REM and a few others, and I pretended to like as much as he did some music that I really only liked somewhat or else was ambivalent. Like the Eagles. I like them, but they don’t make me feel happy inside.
I am embracing my nerdiness, as one tiny step in a long journey of getting back to the core of who I am, and I am uploading songs like crazy from iTunes that would make T’s hair curl. Mostly pop because my 10-year old daughter keeps suggesting songs that I can’t get enough of. I love the beat, the music, the straight simplicity of the music, and the pure enjoyment of listening to music that I can later sing along with when it inevitably comes on the radio.
No matter what the critics say, I’m finding, pop is not all fluff. It may not be poetry and it may not be a higher form of art, but there is a certain amount of wisdom found in lyrics that sprang from someone’s inspiration to make sense of an event, an emotion, a relationship, or anything else encountered in the world. And even without the shot of wisdom … it really is okay to listen just because it’s fun.
T has always loudly expressed his disdain for much of the music I listed above as those that I like. Except for reggae, which he also likes. Ever the peacemaker, and ever slightly lacking in acceptance of what I viewed as the more nerdy aspects of my personality, I turned my back on many of those likes. I focused on the stuff in the categories that we both like, like REM and a few others, and I pretended to like as much as he did some music that I really only liked somewhat or else was ambivalent. Like the Eagles. I like them, but they don’t make me feel happy inside.
I am embracing my nerdiness, as one tiny step in a long journey of getting back to the core of who I am, and I am uploading songs like crazy from iTunes that would make T’s hair curl. Mostly pop because my 10-year old daughter keeps suggesting songs that I can’t get enough of. I love the beat, the music, the straight simplicity of the music, and the pure enjoyment of listening to music that I can later sing along with when it inevitably comes on the radio.
No matter what the critics say, I’m finding, pop is not all fluff. It may not be poetry and it may not be a higher form of art, but there is a certain amount of wisdom found in lyrics that sprang from someone’s inspiration to make sense of an event, an emotion, a relationship, or anything else encountered in the world. And even without the shot of wisdom … it really is okay to listen just because it’s fun.
