« The Solipsism of Music

There's a paradox at the heart of musical taste.

Music is one of the universal communicators, transcending language and speaking to people underneath the rational. One of the great joys I have is finding a track that I just *love*, that thrills me and haunts me, that my brain keeps playing back to me constantly (but I don't mind!).
Yet when I feverishly share the track with someone there's (almost always) that crashing comedown as I realise that it just doesn't reach them in the same way. They might say, "yeah, that's cool" if I've chosen carefully who to inflict it upon, they might just politely shrug and mutter "s'awright". (I notice that in my imaginings my friends are all sullen teenagers.)
It seems impossible that they aren't moved in the same way by this incredible music. Are they insane? Are they utterly soulless? Then the embattled grown up part of my mind pipes up and reminds me that "People like different things you know...". But part of my love for the music is diminished, or frustrated in the inability to share it, to experience it with someone else as intensely.
It's one of those things that reminds me of how easy it is to quietly assume that most people around you share your tastes, views and concerns.

So there's the paradox - music reaches everyone, just not the same music at the same time necessarily. I'm not a big concertgoer, but perhaps this is part of the thrill - you're in a room with hundreds of people who for the most part will love the music you're hearing as much as you do.
These moments of failed sharing also make me reflect on my own musical history. I was often influenced by friends, giving the lie to my own experiences above. But perhaps the friends who gave me the music that I fell in love with had the same disappointment - I guess we're looking for instant gratification - an immediate sense of the effect the shared track has on someone. Of course some things grow on you, but there are usually treatments for that. Much music I've fallen in love with hasn't struck me instantly - though there are notable exceptions. Sorry friends if I didn't give you a sense of the effect of the music straight away, but those of you who did give me the music I mention - my sincere thanks. You've enriched my life with it.

~

I grew up with my parent's cassettes around the house. I shudder to recall... my sister and I used to listen to Shakatak, Paul McCartney's solo stuff and probably Bucks Fizz. Oh my... I dimly remember hating "When You're In Love With A Beautiful Woman" by Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show - which seemed like the most sexist pile of nonsense.
My Dad liked Mike Oldfield and I listened to "Tubular Bells" a lot - I guess that was the first of many concept albums.
My first single was "Spies Like Us" by Paul McCartney, a film tie in theme to a Chevy Chase and Dan Ackroyd movie which I must have liked. I'd have seen Airplane! by then and was probably looking for more of the same.
I'd have listened to a good few of Paul McCartney's solo albums - I remember "Pipes of Peace" and listening many times to "Give My Regards To Broad Street" - my second concept album I guess. Watching the film of this album was the beginning of the end of liking Paul McCartney...

I had a curious relationship with the first two A-ha albums. They're the first band on the list who I still love, and one of the many artists I rediscovered and caught up with when iTunes made nostalgia buying easy. In what's sounding disturbingly like a theme I made them into concept albums in my own mind, listening to them over and over and weaving a Mary Sue style alien invasion SF epic around them.
They became the soundtrack to a fantasy life, and it amuses me to remember how over the years of my puberty the storyline gradually evolved from pure boy's own sci-fi wish fulfilment with laser battles, explosions, spaceships and stuff to subtler more emotional epics involving... girls! The romantic subplot grew to become the main focus of the fantasy, still with sci-fi trappings of course, and all far too soft-focus and naive to involve anything more squishy than kissing. What else was there?
Two songs were emblematic of the whole bizarre endeavour: "The Sun Always Shines on TV" from "Hunting High and Low" and the title track of "Scoundrel Days". Each had an epic quality (which was likely nothing more than chorusey synth and lots of reverb on the vocals) but each were pivotal moments in my narrative and each were "running" songs, usually involving some cinematic chase scene in my head.

I should explain that this was made possible (and useful) by two things. The Sony Walkman and my car sickness....

When the personal stereo was invented, suddenly I had a world of possibilities on long car journeys, a great improvement over my previous two options of 1) stare fixedly out the window or 2) vomit copiously.
Now I could stare fixedly out the window and listen to music.

It was just great, and travel soundtrack albums that persist in my collection to this day include those A-ha albums, Rush's "Hold Your Fire" and "Misplaced Childhood" by Marillion. The music didn't just pass the time, it let me use the rushing scenery to underscore the music. I'd find matches between the staves of the roadside power lines, the beat of the trees ticking by and the open epic of Scotland rolling past me. Nearer objects for quick time and the landscape in the distance for sweeping thematic backdrops. So music was travel, and the landscape danced for me.

So in Secondary School (High School, North American chums) my male friends listened to Iron Maiden and Metallica, so I listened to them also, along with a wide range of what's been appositely called "cock rock". Some of it didn't ever quite convince me, but to a fifteen year old the lyrics of "Infinite Dreams" sounded profound, and although I'm still fond of (but never actually listen to) the first two Iron Maiden albums, I found that I couldn't quite get over what an insufferable prick Bruce Dickinson was, and so my tastes softened into Rush and Marillion, more concept albums and all the lyrical profundity I'd ever need.

At Uni I'd dance in the good old Queen Margaret Union to hits of the time. "Step On" by The Happy Mondays, "Size of a Cow" by Wonderstuff, "Losing my Religion" by REM, and the ultimate floor filler: "Sit Down" by James.
I got into so much more music, I was learning to play the guitar. As I shared a room I used to sneak out in the night to the communal kitchen and, being a considerate (or at least confrontation-averse) type I'd play very very quietly. I found a book of tabs to Suzanne Vega songs and - after a long stage where I'd need to use my right hand to reconfigure the fingers of my left hand into the next chord - I got the hang of finger picking.

I went to a friend's flat one night, a cool guy and fellow guitarist called Kev Fulton (with whom I've sadly lost touch.) He was fired up about something and beckoned me over to his tape player, pressed play and said "Listen to this guy..."

And so I heard Nick Drake for the first time. Thanks Kev.

He played me "Pink Moon", the bleak, haunting final album recorded by Nick in the profound depths of the depression that killed him. By "Road" I was hooked. It remains one of my favourite pieces of music.

"How many guitars are playing?" I asked.
Kev grinned "Just one. Just him. He uses weird open tunings."

And Nick Drake's weird open tunings made a rolling cartwheeling utterly beautiful sound that I fell instantly in love with. Kev wasn't a solipsist at that moment, and I'll always be grateful to him for sharing that music. Proof that it doesn't always leave a friend cold, and while they may not melt into a puddle straight away, sometimes things stick. I've had the pleasure of that experience from time to time, and it's always a great pleasure. Gives you the sense that, yup, someone else feels this way about these sounds.

You're not alone.