Do you know anyone who doesn't listen to/like any music at all?

He made a pretty good case. But it was a shitty movie.

the people i've known who were big into film soundtracks never listened to any other music (as far as i could tell).

Dead people.

Yep!

Yes, probably the majority of those who were alive a few hundred years ago or earlier. xpost

I used be as avid a fan as a penniless teenager could possibly be, haunting second hand record stores (I bought some great vinyl cause the DJ explosion hadn't happened back then and it was all, like, 60 cents)...had a radio show in college etc. Then I moved in a musician.

It was fine when we lived apart, but once I moved in...he slept, ate, breathed, showered in music. Something was always playing, or he was practicing, or he was talking about it. His music, friend's bands, bands to see, music he'd bought...from the most elemental to the most technical aspects, it's all he ever talked about. He wasn't an ass about it really. If I wanted to hear something else, it wasn't a problem. He didn't like, shove his tastes at me, or anything.. actively encouraged me to pick up an instrument, go to shows I liked etc.

But it was sooooo HIS thing, in this all encompassing way, that I turned to other stuff for my obsessions (books, movies) and just..stopped being interested in listening to anything. It was weird really. I'd jsut tune it out. stopped being excited about finding out about new bands, or even listening to stuff I already liked. It's like, when someone you're around 24/7 has an obsession so huge, your own interest sort of vanishes cause it's somehow not yours anymore. Not sure if that made sense. But for fuck's sake, I was the girl who introduced him to cornershop and tricky, (yeah, i know, but this was mid 90s), not someone who just listened to the radio and couldn't care less!

Anyway, it lasted about two years. Then he got me an ipod (like I said, he was enouraging and not an ass about it. Just couldn't help himself since it's pretty much the only thing he cared about)...and well, not to write a paen to ipods or anything, but it slowly got me interested again. I could dump everything I'd ever liked into it, and go listen to it someplace far away from him, (especially on subways) and gradually got back that feeling of excitement when something blows your mind cause it sounds so good. The end.

She still goes to ATP with me every year but only because it's a chance to meet up with friends and a it's a weekend break from the kids.

She bought me the Oasis album yesterday. I think this shows that she still cares that I still care about music but hasn't been paying much attention to what music for a number of years.

I sometimes wish I'd been stubborn and kept off music from that day on.

that sounds rather familiar.

I took her to see Arab Strap a wee while ago and she really enjoyed it, and now occasionally plays my 'Strap CDs.

This is a step in the right direction, though I can't help feeling uneasy at my wife describing a man who wears his dysfunctional relationships on his sleeve as "insightful"...

I also have a friend for whom a movie is just two hours in an air-conditioned room; no discernible preference for authors, genres, etc. I have a harder time coping with that.

on the opposite token, joseph, my girlfriend likes a lot of great music but never listens to it. it's wierd. she still recognizes when something's really good, like the Gravikords, Whirlies, and Pyrophones compilation, or Soft Pink Truth, but she doesnt own a lot of CDs, and the ones she owns she never listens to. But I just made her a Donna Summer Mix so i think that's changing.

This sounds painfully familiar... do you really think your workmates don't talk (to you / when you're around) about music "despite knowing [your] extracurricular interests" 'though; or might it possibly that they don't talk about music (to you / when you're around) because they're in some way intimidated by your knowledge of / enthusiasm for the subject?

"I've finally accepted "normal" people having different tastes than I do, but I cannot accept not liking music, period. It just doesn't compute. It's music! How can you not like it at all?"

Mike OTM

I have a friend who falls asleep every single time we watch a movie. Every time! He's not narcoleptic or anything either, I guess he just doesn't get anything out of them and zones out. Shame really, but I don't let it bother me. We joked about it last time it happened.

whoa, are you kidding me? nononono, you can never watch too little tv. sure, some people can be obnoxious about making sure everyone knows they don't own a tv (there was an onion article about this once, i think), but honestly, tv does very little for me. what's so great about it?

i guess that wouldn't be so weird if it was all mainstream radio stuff, but for example, she was really into the dismemberment plan. loved them. but she couldn't tell you anything about any other indie rock or emo or anything like that, or be able to situate it in a context, say what was different about it. i think someone just gave her a dismemberment plan cd out of the blue and she just latched onto it.

then one time, we went to see a coworker play a show, and this power-pop band orange park played on the same bill. i thought it was pretty standard-issue power-pop, kinda like cheap trick, not bad, but nothing remarkable. she, however, loved them, and bought the album, signed up for the mailing list, visited the website frequently. but i don't think she ever understood that they were an example of a genre and that there are other bands in that genre that are just as good, if not better, and that she might be even more interested in. no, she just obsessed about this random band from new jersey, just because she happened to see them once.

Had she seen them live? Because I think their live performances really sold them to anyone inclined to find Travis Morrison sexy. It sounds like something similar might account for her fascination with Orange Pop.

After all, she must have found Dismemberment Plan somehow; and something must have persuaded her to go and see this co-worker's band. Could it just be that she wasn't open to certain people (including yourself) introducing her to stuff?

My partner's daughter can be like this - if her mates introduce her to stuff then sometimes she's prepared to try it (not always by any means, but I haven't been able to work out what the pattern is here, if any - i.e. if perhaps there are certain mates whose opinion she trusts and others she isn't).

However if she mentions she likes something and I try to suggest something similar that she might like to try, she's just not prepared to give it a try under any circumstances and insists on characterising everything I listen to as "weird" (which I accept some of it is sure, but not all of it by any means).

This is despite there having been many occasions when she's turned her nose up at something that I've been playing, only to come home with the same album a few months later, because she's now been introduced to it by one of her mates; and any number of times that she's come home announcing that she's discovered some new band only to find that I've already got their entire back catalogue on the shelves.

it just takes them a while to figure it out.

but i do think that most people given the choice of sitting in a quiet room or sitting in a room with music played at a reasonable volume would choose music. hmmm...

i think most people don't like music the way i like music. i love music.

I have this one friend who is, oddly enough, a musician! She's a great piano player and is learning the drums now. You wouldn't expect someone who plays music to listen to it in the way she does, but that is certainly the case. She only owns about 4 CD's and has no interest in getting any more, and no other music (MP3's, vinyls, tapes, etc). I've played Nick Drake around her many, many times. Recently though, during a lapse in conversation or something, she suddenly said, "Hey... who is this?!? This is really good!" as if it's the first time she'd heard him.

I'd buy CD's, play them in the car, and ask her opinion on them (I do this to everyone). Every time she'd reply that in all honesty she hadn't been paying much attention to it, and thus has no opinion. Eventually I stopped asking this. In her car she listens to the radio, and I've never once seen her actually change to a different station or comment on a song with her own determination. The one time she did change the station was when I said I hated the band they started playing.

Is this how normal people react to music?

this has sort of been discussed before on one of the book threads on ILE. but im still curious to see if there is a trend or not.

I've known people who only bought ANIME and VIDEOGAME soundtracks!

Didn't he have synaesthesia (the neurological condition that mixes up the senses so people can sometimes 'taste' or 'see' sounds)? So ker-azy jazz might have been a literal assault on his senses.

SO WEIRD.

I've known Beatle fans who only like the Beatles. I've spoken with guys who've managed record stores and they noticed the same thing. Maybe these fans only like the hair?

one of my close friends is dating a girl who owns like 5 random CDs and otherwise doesnt care about music. this is especially odd as he is a huge music nerd, he has a crazy record collection, etc. very odd.

I have a friend who's as analytically minded as you can possibly, possibly be; she doesn't listen to any music.

(She also has really poor taste in general... she's really good at math though.)

Egil "Drillo" Olsen, head coach of the Norwegian National football (soccer) team for most of the 90s, hates music. He prefers silence to any kind of music.

Back when I was active on the Amiga scene, I also knew some computer geeks who apparently weren't into any other kind of music than computer music. You know, Rob Hubbard, Martin Galway, that kind of stuff. Plus all kinds of tracker modules made by musicians who were part of the demo scene.

I had to introduce my classical music listening friend to every popular band imaginable. Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin.. It got to the point where I was listening to Quasi in the car and he mistook them for the Grateful Dead. Yesterday, he brought a Walden cello concerto (sp?) to listen to in my car (I have no cds in there atm).

Worked with a guy who liked Oasis in the mid-90s and started to like Muse in 2006 but didn't really care for music otherwise. What a douche he was.

Well, at least what little he liked was good then.

My dad doesn't listen to music.

He listens to sports radio, and watches the teevee.

I knew a guy in high school who only listened to music from video games.

John Cage was in this category for a large chunk of his life.

Strangely, and this is purely anecdotal, but most of the musicians that I know of tend not to be very knowledgeable about or have very good taste in music. An aspiring RnB/jazz drummer friend of mine only listens to Dave Weckl CDs and refuses to listen to people like Elvin Jones, Buddy Rich, art Blakey, or any project they were involved with.

A girl my brother knew, who played clarinet in the wind ensemble at the university they attended, only owned a few CCM CDs and that was it. When I once asked her about some various other bands and artists in the same vein or noteable clarinet players, she had no clue about or any interest in any of them.

My older brother doesn't listen to music. He minored in it in college and plays saxaphone, but doesn't really listen to anything - and is not interested in making any efforts to change this. He owns a few jazz cassettes and a few randomly chosen CDs - many of which he admittedly doesn't like - that he bought to "learn" something from. It's just the oddest thing, I can't figure it out!

A girl my brother knew, who played clarinet in the wind ensemble at the university they attended, only owned a few CCM CDs and that was it.

Don't trust anyone who plays clarinet. </skeletons woodwind instruments in the closet>

Strangely, and this is purely anecdotal, but most of the musicians that I know of tend not to be very knowledgeable about or have very good taste in music.

This is why most musicians are crap.

Most musicians I know, even those in somewhat good bands, generally have terrible taste and refuse to pursue anything not within their strict area of interest. I find it appalling.

Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene
Back when I was active on the Amiga scene

Most musicians I know, even those in somewhat good bands, generally have terrible taste and refuse to pursue anything not within their strict area of interest. I find it appalling.

OTM ^^

yeah ive noticed the same thing with a lot of musicians i know listening to very little music and most of it being really garbage. i dont really understand it, but in general those people tend to also make crappy music.