Musical Moments #1 -- The Quest for "The Candy"
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So @slobberchops got me pulled into another one of his music thingies last week. I'm going to have to start thinking twice before I visit that blog. Anyway, he taught me something really interesting about the way he -- and I suppose other people, too -- listen to music. He says most people tell him they know immediately whether they like a song or not, but it can take him more than a dozen times through before he finds what he calls "the candy."
According to him "the candy" is a little piece of musical magic that really appeals to his ear. Something about it (and it can be only a few seconds long) charms him ... to the point that he'll listen to the whole piece just to get to that part. It's the whipped cream and cherry on the hot fudge sundae -- or the worm in the bottom of the mezcal bottle; take your pick. But he gave an impressive selection of examples in his post of what he means by "the candy."
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I have to say I had no freakin' idea what he was talking about -- even after hearing his selections. A lot of it was a big shoulder-shrug to me. (That's ok. I can still like him.) I figure @catweasel understood it more than I did -- because he has really ... eclectic ... (aka awful) ... taste in music. But he does listen to a lot more variety than I do. He just has to wear headphones for most of it.
He usually likes what I like. I usually have no use for what he grooves to. (Thank you, dear person, who invented headphones. You've managed to keep @catweasel housed and fed for almost twenty years now, because he can listen to that stuff all he wants, and I don't have to.)
Now, that leads me to believe @slobberchops will find most of what I enjoy ... insipid. (He may have some worse words for it. We'll have to see.) A lot of the music I know and enjoy won't mean a thing to him -- having been popular about a hundred years before he arrived on the scene. But I suspect he's at least willing to listen to some of my choices, and being a person who believes in reciprocity, I'm determined to do the same. (Yeah, I may think, Huh?? at the end of some, but it won't kill me. It won't be the first time, either.)
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Still, his lovely post on "the candy" made me ask myself -- "How do I listen to music? What about a song appeals to me?"
I think I listen to classical music the way @slobberchops does his ultimate "candy" selections. When I've heard a piece often enough to "know what's coming" I'm comfortable with it. It may even find a place among my favorites when I'm in the mood for that.
As for popular music though ... I'm not much of one for showy, intricate instrumental solos. (And drum solos -- the kind many people are wild for -- make me want to hurt somebody in order to make them stop.)
What I often look for is a melody I can hum ... something that lingers in my memory after the music is over. But I'm also looking for words -- lyrics that mean something -- words that tell a story. The music also has to be right though ... and when they pair up, that's a winner.
Neil Diamond's I Am, I Said is an example that misses. I like a lot of ND's music. The lost-and-lonely lyrics of this piece really speak to me. But the music doesn't fit somehow.
Same deal with Cold Water Morning.
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Anyway ... while the direction this manuscript has taken gives me ideas for a lot more posts, this is not the post I intended to write. I understand completely when @slobberchops says he listens to songs again and again. I've been known to do that obsessively. Setting the CD player on auto-repeat. Making tapes (back in the old, old days) I could play in the car. When I fall in love with a song, it's total immersion.
Now ... I mentioned how @catweasel entombs himself under his headphones -- listening to stuff I don't even want to know. Thing is, he sets it at a volume I'm sure should cause physical pain. Across the room I can sometimes hear it ... like rhythmic white noise or EVP. Somehow for him there is music that just isn't ok unless it's loud enough to make a normal person's eyes bug out.
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So, as I did in the last @slobberchops set-to, I asked myself ... is there a song I feel that way about, where the volume almost can't crank up far enough, where the whole experience becomes the collision of notes from my right ear meeting notes from my left, exploding at the base of my brain in an indescribable Gestalt? (The ultimate "you have to be there" moment.)
Yeah. There is. Probably for personal reasons even I can't decipher. (And I expect @slobberchops will be as mystified by my choice as I am by some of his.)
It's this one.
As @catweasel would say: Naff. Right?
Blame @slobberchops. He started it all.
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Not naff. In fact, when you are on an Eric Carmen jag I will almost always stop to listen to 3 repeats, despite the fact that you rarely have enough volume.
I am not a great Neil Diamond fan, but these songs I agree with you, the lyrics are great but the music is wrong somehow. I don't really know the second one, but I often have the words to I Am, I Said running through my mind.
I also concur, @slobberchops is a menace, frequently dragging us into his life. No wonder we don't have time for lives of our own.
Trust me, I'm a doctor.
Haha.. made me laugh, music is so subjective. I love Neil Diamond, I remember years ago in my vinyl collecting era searching out his big hits from the early 70's, and managing to get them all including your pick.
Moving on to the mid 80's, Love on the Rocks was the smoochie song that was played in UK clubs at around 1.50am, just before closing time.. this was when you could get a little tongue jamming in if lucky... ;)
I dont know this Eric Carmen song, but All by Myself and Hungry Eyes both did it for me.