Is there any difference at all between quality and personal taste when it comes to music?

You haven't been here long, have you?

Taste

Though I guess I'm getting kind of circular there in that I'm saying we can't really define what "quality" means in the same way we can't define what "better" means up there. But that's the problem I think, there isn't a place to start with value judgements and build up to what is good and what's not.

BTW, I doubt that a normal, grown-up person would get as much pleasure from listening to Britney Spears, at least if we're talking outside a party/club/dance setting, as someone else get from listening to Velvet Underground or Beethoven. I think that when someone that isn't very dedicated to music say they like a song, it is often the case that they don't really really like it the way a passionate music lover likes some of his/her favorites. Of course, there may be a lot of exceptions.

ps. I know this may seem like pretentious crap.

(They are, anyway, mostly.)

How do you qualify enjoyment? Is on your back on the floor, arms and legs waggling in the air dumb idiot joy pure pleasure physical enjoyment of a piece of music better than, worse than, or simply different than intellectual dissection and dissertation thereof?

(Call VU songs non-catchy again, and I'll HIT you, Tom!)

Which does not disqualify catchy, disposable bubblegum pop automatically. I will still argue to the death that Sugar, Sugar is one of the greatest pop records ever made.

You can think that all you want. But that's just your perspective. What it is exactly that is a waste of time (assuming that a waste of time in inherently bad... sometimes I like waste my time, though, you know?) is not the same for everyone.

Thus patchwork formula pop usually fails, because it's just a bunch of 'stuff that works', built from the top down (diva singer, backbeat, octave ostinato bassline, fr ex) and not from the bottom up. A good song is one where I can tell somebody actually kind of knew what they were doing and nobody else came along and did a bunch of Pro Tools bastardization, reverse guitar for the hell of it, put delay on the last line of every verse, etc.

I may not like whatever an artist achieves but I like to think I can still tell the difference between shit that sucks because nobody cared enough and shit that I don't like because Trent Reznor's voice annoys the hell out of me.

so what you're saying: that we should listen to the strokes? come on man.

if there's anything i learned from ilm it's that there are people out there who seem to genuinely love stuff that i thought was just hyped-up, boring crap and vice versa. which is kind of enlightening actually.

as for being able to argue for your tastes - i don't think that only speaks of how insightful and articulate the listener might be, not the music.