Personal musical taste evolution/timeline

[Steel Icarus]

Following on from "how hipster is your musical taste" thread I got to wondering if I'd done my evolving in a funny order. So here goes - ages, and what I first got into at said age. Some ages will be vague, and eventually it'll turn into nebulosity - of sorts.

0-6: I dunno, nursery rhymes and hymns I expect
6-ish-11: Beatles, Ray Charles, Abba
11-14: Anything in the charts. Bought a single a week. First album was Adam and the Ants.
14: Frankie goes to Hollywood, Queen
15: Dire Straits, A-ha
16: Pet Shop Boys, Marillion, U2, Metallica, Iron Maiden, Bon Jovi, Europe, Whitesnake, New Order
17: Pet Shop Boys, U2
18: The Cure, Stone Roses, Waterboys, Ride, Cardiacs, Leonard Cohen
19-20: Mega City Four, Senseless
Things, Snuff, Stooges, Dinosaur Jr, Lemonheads, Leatherface, Kitchens of Distinction, Fugazi, Pixies
21: Teenage Fanclub, REM, The Smiths, Tom Waits
22-24: Adorable, Underworld, Suede, Blur, Oasis, Verve, Velvet Underground, dub reggae
26: Nick Cave, Radiohead, Daft Punk
30: The Strokes, The Streets, Smasing Pumpkins, Linking Park
33: The Killers, Bloc Party
Post-40: Bruce Springsteen, The Clash, Mission of Burma, Sonic Youth, William Basinski, Aphex Twin, Explosions in the Sky, M.I.A.

 

[danny la rouge]

Not sure I can be that precise.

As a young kid I listened to what my parents listened to. I was born in 65. My mum was an Elvis fan. My dad liked mod-ish r'n'b like Manfred Man and the Small Faces, also Scottish and Irish folk.

Into the 70s, I liked what was on TOTP - first single I bought was T Rex (Jeepster). It was a fluke that it was a reasonably credible first single because I was still very young and I liked all sorts of dross too. I also had Osmonds singles. By this point my parents didn't like the pop music of the day. As I grew older that became a good thing. I started to like things that sounded a bit unusual to me. I loved Sparks. (Still do). If my patents reacted badly to it, that was a sign it was good.

Then when punk hit the tabloids, something seemed to happen. It signalled that eclecticism was OK. I started to explore (through the music press and through books) the influences of music I liked. I was listening to John Peel by this time. He played such a wide range that I realised there was a lot out there I wasn't getting to hear. I started going back into Delta Blues. I liked rockabilly. It wasn't that far from Darts (I had the Amazing Darts when it came out. I still like that album). I even liked country.

I remember the buying Rocket to Russia and cycling home with it under my arm. That's a really vivid memory. Similarly Parallel Lines. That album was a huge moment in my life. I wore out several copies.

It was around the end of the 70s, start of the 80s I got into Louis Armstrong. I don't remember where I first heard him. Probably TV. But I really liked it. I had to use catalogues to buy records, because you couldn't find them locally. So I started getting into jazz. At the same time as following the indie charts.

In the 80s I got back into folk music as well. It had always been there. There were ceilidh dances, family parties where uncles would sing and play guitar, so on. My grandad played melodeon and hammer dulcimer. (I'm pretty sure he made the latter himself). He had played dances in miners clubs when he was younger. So folk music had always been part of my life. I played guitar, and with my mates I was making a post punk noise (my first band included a guy making sounds with a metal detector!), but at family parties I was always asked for folk songs. So I knew enough singalong Scottish folk tunes to keep a roomful of drunk relatives happy. For ages that was a private thing, but then I started going to folk clubs and seeing bands like Silly Wizard and the Battlefield Band, Dick Gaughan. I suppose this was around the time of the miners' strike.

I can't really put precise times on any of this.

 

[danny la rouge]

I seem to have killed a promising thread.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Born mid 1969, so the decades roughly coincide with my age (i.e. 80s = teens, 90s = 20s)

Wasn't that bothered about music in the 70s. My parents had Tubular Bells, Sgt Peppers, some Duane Eddy. My and my sister had a couple of Muppets albums (which I still rate - see the best albums of 1977 thread).

Google says I saw my first episode of Top of the Pops in 1979. I was glued to pretty much every episode for the next 10 years.

Early 80s: Adam and the Ants (first album). Synthpop stuff, two tone. Pretended to like heavy metal because of pressure at school. Liked early hip hop like Grandmaster Flash.

Mid 80s - First gig was Howard Jones at Wembley Arena . Also a dalliance with Marillion . Then John Peel, The Chart Show, Max Headroom. So more of move into indie, punk, goth stuff. Then progressively weirder - late industrial music, noise stuff, EBM, Tackhead, Lee Perry, Can, Crass, Psychic TV, Coil. (I wrote about the first 23 gigs I went to here.)

Late 80s / early 90s - move to London. Butthole Surfers, Big Black etc + a bit of acid house type stuff, On-U Sound.

Mid 90s - dance music, breakbeat stuff, Megadog, Tribal Gathering, mates into Goa Trance, me into jungle, definitely losing interest in gloomy industrial music. Drugs.

Late 90s - drum 'n' bass / breakcore / big beat, dub, dancehall. Obsessively.

Noughties - reggae (60s to current bashment), with a bit of grime and a smattering of dubstep.

2010 onwards - reggae still the backbone but increasingly getting into jazz (late 50s Blue Note, Coltrane, Miles Davis, Sun Ra). Sit down gigs at Cafe OTO replace nightclubs. Finally engage with improv weirdness. The return of noise, but noise for its own sake not the industrial stuff. Weird dub. Lots of mad stuff on cassette. Occasional retro forays into 90s hip hop, electronic stuff. Finally check out things on a whim rather than stay obsessively on one or two things. Bond with teenage daughter over Wu-Tang Clan and stupid Now! compilations, #ironingsoundtrack

 

[Fozzie Bear]

I seem to have killed a promising thread.

I can't think that fast on a Saturday morning, took me a while.

 

[chilango]

The 1987 thread has got me thinking, it was a pivotal year for me.

• 1980/81: First song I ever remember liking. Ant Invasion by Adam and the Ants.
• 1984: First year I really paid attention to music. Sadly it was mostly Madness, Queen, Michael Jackson etc. on the radio.
• 1986: Bought my first LPs. On tape. From a French supermarket. Born in the USA and Falco's Einzelhaft.
• 1987: The Wedding Present's George Best and to a lesser extent Substance by New Order blow my mind. Then came Birthday by The Sugarcubes and, wow, no going back.
• 1988: Sonic Youth, Spacemen 3 reading the NME etc. Frantic listening to tapes passed on by mates' older sisters etc.
• 1989: Started buying vinyl. First 7" - Regina by The Sugarcubes. First 12" Here Comes your Man by the Pixies. Remember waiting for The Stone Roses to be released, bought it on the first day it was out.
• 1990: First gig - Northside. First good gig. The Pale Saints. Bought Sliver, this changes everything again.
• 1991: Really start chucking all my spare cash at records. Babes in Toyland, Nirvana, Dinosaur Jr, Pond, Superchunk etc. See The Levellers live. Leads to an awkward, if brief, digression towards New Model Army .
• 1992: @neprimerye lends me a copy of maximumrocknroll. Stop buying the NME. Strictly hardcore and punk for a while.
• 1994: Learn to blag my way into gigs for free. Repetitive beats and raves. Free lift and tickets for Glastonbury. Snub the offer.
• 1995: Blur vs. Oasis burns any lingering bridges to "indie" music for me. see The Wurzels for the first time. The next time I see them many years later I will propose to my (now) wife .
• 1996: I feature on the cover of a live LP by The Oppressed. I don't even like Oi!
• 1997: DIY punk and US h/c all the way. Buying vinyl from distros etc. Reading fanzines.
• 1999: Emo detour. My CD collection is stolen.
• 2000: Give away my lovingly assembled vinyl collection.
• 2001: Move abroad. Clandestino by Manu Chao pretty much the last contemporary artist that I (briefly) get excited about. Get turned onto reggae by German squatters. Lee Scratch Perry live.
• 2003: More reggae/dub. French this time.
• 2004: Mexico allows me to complete my CD collection for pennies.
• 2004-8: Bassist in punk band. Have to re-listen to a lot of dreadful old punk stuff.
• 2008: Replace all my lost vinyl with mp3s. Stop buying music.
• 2011: Final good gig before my daughter born. Dinosaur Jr. in Milan.
• 2015: Indie Cindy by the Pixies. Return to buying music. On vinyl.
• 2017: Return to gig going with The Wedding Present for starters.

A fairly depressing slide into middle-aged unenthusiasm there.

 

[stavros]

I remember my Dad playing tapes of the Beatles and Dire Straits in the car in the late 80s and early 90s. I then developed a strange obsession with Queen, before my musical interest lulled for a few years.

I then suddenly got into indie in the late 90s, buying the NME each week and attempting to like virtually every "next big thing" they hyped (Terris? Campag Velocet?). At the same time I explored the cannon going back to the dawn of rock'n'roll, indulging in Madchester, Punk, blaxploitation, 80s NYC hip-hop, 90s gangsta rap, Dylan. I think Hello Nasty was my first hip-hop record, and Selected Ambient Works my first "dance".

Around 2002-03, in my Uni years, I really started to appreciate good pop music, mostly female-fronted - TLC, Girls Aloud - or dance-pop - Daft Punk, Basement Jaxx.

My most recent discovery, over probably the last five years or so, is American post-hardcore, à la Fugazi, Hüsker Dü, etc.

 

[Shechemite]

Birth - burzum.

Since then - things have only gone downhill.

 

[Steel Icarus]

Campag Velocet

I listened to 'Drencrom Velocet Synthemesc' quite recently stavros - that and 'Skin so soft' are really good tracks off their album

 

[krtek a houby]

As a kid; I listened to the music on the test cards, Sesame Street, Muppet Show, The Wombles, Star Wars (by Geoff Love and his orchestra).

I can't be arsed making a list since then.Nothing's lived up to those heady days.

 

[killer b]

I then developed a strange obsession with Queen

Everyone went through this phase didn't they? they were my only real musical interest for several years.

 

[krtek a houby]

Everyone went through this phase didn't they? they were my only real musical interest for several years.

Queen II is magnificent, mind

 

[danny la rouge]

Everyone went through this phase didn't they? they were my only real musical interest for several years.

No. I always disliked them.

 

[Wookey]

As a kid; I listened to the music on the test cards, Sesame Street, Muppet Show, The Wombles, Star Wars (by Geoff Love and his orchestra).

I can't be arsed making a list since then.Nothing's lived up to those heady days.

I still have the Flumps theme on my play lists, it's the most transportative time machine music I know!

Rhubarb and Custard Megamix, likewise.

 

[Fez909]

0-10 : I don't remember, but I assume absolute shite.

10 : This is when I first remember having specific likes. But they were all based on other people's. A friend's old brother was into 'rave' so we used to listen to his mixes. I remember one called "Playing With Knives" that I didn't realise the meaning of until years (10+) later. One had a tune that sampled King of the Swingers from the Jungle Book, so being a kid, that was an obvious favourite - Also liked a lot of the pop-reggae that was in the charts at this time as my mam used to listen to it in the car. Along with Mariah Carey and Celine Dion at home

11 : Secondary school now, and still no real likes of my own. Listened to anything and everything, mainly pop, and some random rock like Meatloaf Started getting into the Beatles because evetyone at school seemed to like them.

13 : Britpop/indie now. Again, influenced by my circles, but for the first time ever I was actively seeking out new music, rather than just listening to whatever happened to enter my ears. Turned into one of those, "dance music is not proper music" wankers. Big fan of Oasis and similar. Went to gigs with the likes of Cast, Embrace, etc. Lots of dirge.

16 : Still into the same stuff, but started going to clubs now. Got introduced to dance music by a fella who used to get on the same bus as me on the way to work at the factory. Armand Van Helden was the tune that did it. Then spent every Friday night in the Sugarshack in Middlesbrough for the next few years and discovered a new world. Loved house first and ended up mostly on a progressive house/trance tip for a few years. Big fan of Sasha & Digweed's sound, and the Global Underground mixes.

18 : Heard the Dave Angel Essential Mix on Radio 1 and got introduced to techno. Didn't realise how diverse it was until I went to the Orbit in Morley (probably around this time - not 100% sure). Got into it in a bit way and that dominated my tastes for the next few years. Still listening to house, but the progressive stuff is getting stale. Most of the techno I was listening to was loopy or hard. Samuel L Session, Ben Sims, Umek, etc. Also at this time started going to a night near Middlesbrough called Retro, where they played tunes from the early 90s that I was too young to experience the first time around. Got exposured to loads of Italian piano house and 'soft' hardcore - "Aha, so that's what Playing With Knives is!"

23 : Still listening to techno but also broadening my horizons a bit from internet knowledge and widening my social circle when I moved to Leeds. Moved towards some of the more eclectic DJs like Moodymann and Theo Parrish and their underground disco and soul. Also listening to Afrobeat and Jazz, as well as the ever present house and techno.

Everything since : Well, my tastes haven't changed a lot since then. I still listen to mostly house/techno/disco, but it's a lot more varied now, rather than being "tunes for the club dancefloor". I've been DJing a lot recently in bars where I can't play the sort of stuff I would normally play, so I've been listening to, and buying, and playing more downtempo that normal. It's not really changed what I like, just widened the scope it even more.

This week I have been mostly listening to electro

 

[krtek a houby]

The biggest leap forward in my musical evolution was when I stopped being snooty about what bands/artists/groups etc I chose to listen to. It was difficult because in my teens the peer pressure was intense. Got so much stick for listening to New Order, Joy Division and Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Bronski Beat. Now I can happily listen to Bill Withers/Pentangle/Tom Waits/Madonna/Gong/Krafwerk/ABBA/Huey Lewis/etc etc etc without fear of this kind of response

 

[nogojones]

0-10 some stuff my folks liked - Elvis, some rebel music and random pop from R1. I remember being really into Slade at one point.

11-13 ska explosion. Was growing up in Cov so the Specials, Selector. Beat and madness loomed large.

14 - Started to like rock music - Led Zep, Floyd, Sabbath, Stranglers, Status Quo - Then saw them in concert and got pretty bored after the first half hour

15 - 16 started listening to some proggy stuff - Marillion really stood out and I can't understand for the life of me why? Also started listening to more classical, fusion and jazz funk

17 - hearing a bit of indy, but never really into it that much. Some Smiths, woodentops, Violent fems....

18 - More jazz funk, straight up jazz, funk, soul, disco, bossa nova, latin jazz, rare groove, some afrobeat and my first hip hop. Going out dancing started to be a regular thing. Also started hearing my first house music

19 - Acid house added to that mix

22 -25 hardcore and house. I was always more of a househead, but nights were limited down here so went to anything you could dance to. Started doing free parties and getting involved in nights. Pretty much stopped listening to anything that wasn't dance music

25-26 JUNGLE!

26-30 Still doing house, jungle and DnB. UKG and speed garage filled the rest of my time. Also started to like harder stuff - gabber, speedcore and the harder end of techno

30-32 add a bit of new skool breaks in (great for 18 months) then become deadly dull

32- 38 still just house, garage, d n b, but loved the transition from garage to grime and dubstep. Also hearing more electro that I liked

40 on - started listening to a broader range of stuff again, the jazz and fusion of my youth, but still 90% of the things I hear are dance music.

last few years I've been really taken by bassline, footwork, halfstep and quite a bit of UK hip hop. I'm on a real mission to try and convert my dancing mates into getting bassline and I think I should be able to get them out to a few nights now, but its been a struggle as they're mostly set in their house, techno and dnb ways

 

[ska invita]

Copied from Chilango's recent Musical Jounreys thread Your Musical Journey... but I've updated it a bit as ran out of steam in the 90s!

First musical memory was running around in a cricle to Crocodile Rock by Elton John

Miming to Just an Illusion by Imagination at primary school

Doing interpretive dance to Holst's The Planets in a different primary school (running fast in fast racks and going slower in the slow ones)

Often spending summer with my uncle who fetishised his hi-fi and records (queen, elo, Michael jackson) - eq set permanently at bass -8, treble +2. No one was allowed to touch it but him.

First single I got as a present was Chas n Dave Stars Over 45 bw/ Harem

Ate 10 packets of Jaffa Cakes and sent off for McVities Rocks Classics Vol1, played on my first walkman. Stereo effects on Canned Heat On The Road Again blow me away. Whisky In The Jar-O

Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Chaka Khan and Prince ruled at home.

Fake scratching by rubbing finger on Nike windbreaker.

Watching Blues Brothers.
Watching TOTP religiously. TOTP Highlights: Love Cant Turn Around + other Jack/House tunes charting and their videos. Doug E Fresh doing The Show. Salt n Peppa Push It video

1988. Punky older man who came into my life turned me on to acts like Chuck Crown, Parliament, Living Color, 24/7 Spyz, Public Enemy, LL Cool J and some jazz too (i was resilient). Prince obsession. Acid jazz/soul-funk revival

Paul C who I sat next to in maths lends me Greatest Hits of House double tape pack - played on a loop // fall in love with Chicago house

1989. Any little money goes on hiphop tapes.

1990. First gig on my own Deee-Lite w MC Kinky (academy) warm up followed by De La Soul with Third Bass warm up (town and country club). Buy 1st Tribe Called Quest album on day it comes out after waiting what felt like forever at HMV in Bromley.

1991. Make friends with guy who is getting into UK breakbeat/house/techno etc. Get stoned. Tape shows from Kiss FM. Analogue Bubblebath. Psychotropic. Belgium. 4Hero. US imports. Girlfriend likes pixies and violent femmes and gets me into them. start visiting record shops in West End but dont have money to buy anything - still fun though.
ETA: first proper stoned music experience listening to Orbital album (Green?) - that track High Rise with an elevator in it sends me into space ha ha!

1992. Somehow end up with a copy of Coltrane Blue Train. Lee Morgan Search for The New Land on repeat. Discover Velvet underground / Hendrix loads of other 60s stuff,
First rave - first E. First LSD. Best friend joins Kool FM and buys records. Accidentally go to a Gabba rave in Amsterdam. Hardcore dominates.

1993. Jungle mess. Loads of pirate radio taping.

1994. More jungle messiness plus first dub experience. Get taken to Shaka session in Southall but am a stoned wreck. Buy Tubby meets Lee Perry at grassroots. Possibly first carnival that year too...Demotion Man's Fire plays everywhere...love it. Exodus? Might have been 95.

1995-6. Go to Speed w Fabio and Bukem a lot. Share flat with someone who has decks and records.
ReclaimTheStreets Shepherds Bush

1997. Manasseh on the radio. plenty DnB. Try and set up a soundsystem thing...doesnt go well. Fuck up a couple of peoples wedding mainly
1998. RTS Brixton. Broken beat around now? Co-op / 4 hero show on Kiss.

2000s lots of 70s dub, modern JA reggae and DnB

Hard to remember but I reckon around 2004 I started going to Uni of Dub at Brixton Rec. Iration Steppas definitely helped me replace the hardness of DnB for a bit.

Internet access at some point in the 2000s, and the growing amount of rare music on it meant lots of discovering and digging. Even though its nearer the present day it all gets much blurrier and mixed up. Jazz, soul, african music, Deep Medi/Anti-Social dubstep, whatevers new in dance music.

Last year lots of bassline. This year shit loads of house.

 

[krink]

While what I mostly listen to changes from time to time, I think the real difference isn't so much my taste as it is my not caring to hide all my likes. When I was a punk/younger I liked all kinds of things as well as punk but had to hide it. Now I'm just happy to say I can play Discharge and Kiki Dee in the same playlist without feigning irony about the latter. Similarly, I don't feel bad about admitting what I really don't like.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Following on from "how hipster is your musical taste" thread I got to wondering if I'd done my evolving in a funny order. So here goes - ages, and what I first got into at said age. Some ages will be vague, and eventually it'll turn into nebulosity - of sorts.

0-6: I dunno, nursery rhymes and hymns I expect
6-ish-11: Beatles, Ray Charles, Abba
11-14: Anything in the charts. Bought a single a week. First album was Adam and the Ants.
14: Frankie goes to Hollywood, Queen
15: Dire Straits, A-ha
16: Pet Shop Boys, Marillion, U2, Metallica, Iron Maiden, Bon Jovi, Europe, Whitesnake, New Order
17: Pet Shop Boys, U2
18: The Cure, Stone Roses, Waterboys, Ride, Cardiacs, Leonard Cohen
19-20: Mega City Four, Senseless
Things, Snuff, Stooges, Dinosaur Jr, Lemonheads, Leatherface, Kitchens of Distinction, Fugazi, Pixies
21: Teenage Fanclub, REM, The Smiths, Tom Waits
22-24: Adorable, Underworld, Suede, Blur, Oasis, Verve, Velvet Underground, dub reggae
26: Nick Cave, Radiohead, Daft Punk
30: The Strokes, The Streets, Smasing Pumpkins, Linking Park
33: The Killers, Bloc Party
Post-40: Bruce Springsteen, The Clash, Mission of Burma, Sonic Youth, William Basinski, Aphex Twin, Explosions in the Sky, M.I.A.

If someone could please shoot me before I start getting into Bruce Springsteen that'd be marvellous.

 

[mojo pixy]

Early yrs - whatever my mum and / or dad liked. From this era I still love The Beatles (Dad) and Dr.Hook (Mum)
I remember loving on Top of the Pops during those young years Elvis Costello, Status Quo, Blondie, Captain Sensible, Adam Ant, Kate Bush.

My first true love was Beethoven, I even did a project on him at school when I was 11.
I still rate his music above just about any other music ever devised by a human being.

12 yrs (first week in 2nd year at secondary school): Heavy Metal. Specifically Powerslave by Iron Maiden, and Let There Be Rock by AC/DC, both on a C90 tape my new friend Scott lent me, which I taped and listened to endlessly.
My uncle David (hasn't everyone got one of those?) noticed this development and began playing me his heavy rock albums around this time (nowadays I give him new music).

12-17 All kinds. I listened to the radio a lot because my music collection was tiny till I started tape trading .. so a lot of pop music. UB40, The Christians, Michael Jackson, Bryan Adams, The Police, Duran Duran. Also got quite into The Fall and Sonic Youth from listening to John Peel.
But mainly .. Heavy fuckin' Metal. Speed Metal, Thrash Metal, Death Metal, Punk, Hardcore Punk, slowly getting heavier and faster and more technical like a drug habit getting deeper. Skip the boring list of actual bands, but Iron Maiden certainly shone all the way through. Slayer were a big event in there. Towards the end it got confusing as styles of metal exploded, and then...

18+ University. Metal gives way to indie (Ride, Stone Roses, REM, PWEI) and house, courtesy of a housemate with three random record decks running through a portastudio mixer into speakers the size of wardrobes. Boom boom boom boom.
A night out in Brixton introduces me to Dub, which makes my youthful UB40 and Bob Marley albums seem kind of cute. Weed intake rises, alcohol intake starts to fall.

19-20. Living in France, so French Radio and nothing new really - no, I discovered The Doors, Jacques Brel and Serge Gainsbourg among other things. And I did manage to see a few old favourites while I was there, courtesy of the week-long Transmusicales music Festival.

20 ish, back into Metal when Rage Against the Machine turn up, but also finally tried LSD, first proper trip hears me exposed to Polygon Window, which blows my drug-addled mind, and then via Aphex Twin I fall back into electronic music. Also develop a bit of an obsession with non-stave and graphic musical scores and get seriously into modern classical music, Reich, Adams, Cage, Stockhausen, Ligeti, as far back as Messiaen, Stravinsky and Strauss.

22-26 More new drugs are tried, and Techno and Trance draw me in, also Jungle and Dub again. I can't be in a band any more because I keep doing mental all nighters and being too fucked for rehearsals. Electronic music takes over my world entirely and I buy a computer and start experimenting.

At some point around the age of 25, a night at a party headbanging to gabba brought metal back to me once again. I also first heard Tool, which sealed the deal and since then I've never left again. Trve love \m/

26 Went to Tel Aviv, ended up staying nearly 2 years, and this led me to a) a whole new level of Psy Trance and b) Ehud Banai .. plus:

28 came back with loads of Palestinian music on tapes bought in Jerusalem, then due to a new job teaching English in London get into music from all my students as we start burning CDs for each other.

To be honest, from this point on I can't be specific any more as it's just like everything-all-the-time nowadays. All of the above, basically, from about 30 onwards

 

[DaveCinzano]

Doing interpretive dance to Holst's The Planets in a different primary school (running fast in fast racks and going slower in the slow ones)

I did this too! And Ride Of The Valkyries, and In The Hall Of The Mountain King etc

Miming to Just an Illusion by Imagination at primary school

I still do this now

 

[stavros]

Everyone went through this phase didn't they? they were my only real musical interest for several years.

That's reassuring. I don't hate them now, although some of it sounds a bit novelty.

I listened to 'Drencrom Velocet Synthemesc' quite recently stavros - that and 'Skin so soft' are really good tracks off their album

I think the CD is still somewhere back at my parents, unless I unfairly burdened a charity shop with it. I seem to remember they had a Clockwork Orange obsession, which I had neither read nor seen, so maybe some of the context was lost on me.

I didn't buy into all the NME/MM-hyped bands. For every Campag, Terris or Mansun, there were a few Travis, Starsailor or Coldplay, who I continue to abhor to this day.

 

[ska invita]

I did this too! And Ride Of The Valkyries, and In The Hall Of The Mountain King etc

I still do this now

 

[Spandex]

I'm enjoying reading all these

Here's a stab at mine. I'm sure there's loads missing...

1979 (aged 6) – My first gig: The Baron Knights at some hall on holiday in Ilfracombe.

1979-80 – My dad’s singles: The Shadows, Dave Brubeck, Bernard Cribbins.

1981 – My first single (Adam & The Ants – Prince Charming) and first album (Adam & the Ants – Kings of the Wild Frontier.

1982–83 - bonded with my grandad over Glen Miller and Benny Goodman. Bit of a big band jazz phase.

1984 – The Beach Boys

1985 – My parents got the Readers Digest 112 Rock’n’roll Greats box set. I played it to death.

1987 – Got into new music and started buying as many records as I could afford: Guns’n’Roses, Fleetwood Mac, Sisters of Mercy, Marillion.

1988 – Metal! Iron Maiden, Metallica, Anthrax, Slayer. My first gig without my parents – Iron Maiden. And with my parents – Fleetwood Mac. Also, Now… 11, especially side 4 with all the acid house tracks.

1989 – Goth: Bauhaus and Joy Division. And All About Eve.

1990-91 – A friend took me to a punk gig/club at Greenwich Uni in early 90. It blew me away. I dived into the world of south London punk gigs in bar backrooms and basements. I even went north of the river sometimes. Going to The Venue most weekends to see just about every up and coming indie band that were touring. Plus, I discovered industrial dance and EBM: Front 242, Nitzer Ebb, Al Jourgenson’s various bands. My first festival: Reading 91.

1991-92 - I moved to Wellingborough late in 91 for a year. Cultural Siberia. But! On the floor of the local HMV I found a TDK cassette, so I picked it up and took it home. Someone had taped Dub Syndicate on it. An enduring love of dub was born.

1993– Back in London! Around Easter I was out with a friend at a terrible gig at the Robey. He said he knew a free party in Brixton, shall we go? Anything was better than the band that was on so we headed down the Victoria Line to Brixton. Turns out he didn’t really know where this party was, but some passing crusties said they did and I ended up at a Tribal Energy party at Cooltan. My first rave – a real Year Zero moment.

1993-95 – Tribal Energy, Megadog, Megatripolis, Drum Club, Orbital, Underworld, Sabres of Paradise. Trance and progressive house and the like. At first I was taking acid at raves and free parties. From 94 I started on pills too. Smoking Loads of weed and hash. Some On-U nights and dub clubs too (Jah Shaka!). And from early 94 a bit of jungle. Plus, in 94 I got together with my girlfriend, who is big into funk and soul. Our record buying has strict demarcation: she buys funk and soul; I can buy everything else. Funk and soul have been a constant in my life since.

1995 – Tribal Gathering 95. Orbital came on; I needed a piss. I wandered off. Into the happy Hardcore tent – nah. Had my piss. Oh yeah! All my friends are watching Orbital! Wandered back. Into the techno tent, just as Robert Hood was on. Followed by Plastikman. Followed by Jeff Mills. My friends found me at dawn with a crazed look on my face. Detroit techno was my new favourite.

1996 – Lots of techno. The Detroit side leading me into deep house. And disco. Oh yeah, I’d had a soft spot for disco for a while, but it was Jeff Mills playing Gino Soccio’s Dancer that made it all make sense.

96-99 – Techno, DnB, Deep House, Disco, Tech-House. Pills and weed and nightclubs. My best friend was into progressive house and hard house, so I ended up at some of those clubs, but never really listened to it at home.

1999-02 – I kept hearing UK Garage on pirate radio stations. It grew from ‘I like this’ to ‘I’ll buy some of this’ to DJing UKG at parties. My greatest DJ compliment was when I was playing upstairs at some pub when a bloke ran up to me and asked what station I played on. The more I denied playing on a station the more convinced he became that I was some pirate radio DJ. As UKG turned to dubstep and grime in 02 I started losing interest. Also lots of DnB, early 90s Hardcore, some breaks.

2003 – I went to Sonar in Barcelona. On the second night I took the strongest pill I’ve ever had. I didn’t know left from right. My girlfriend took me by the hand and led me into a room just as Ladytron came on. It was another of those moments that changed my musical direction. DJ Hell came on afterwards and played loads of italo, electro disco and EBM. I came back from Spain and dived into the electroclash/punk-funk/italo revival that was in full swing by that time.

2003–08 – 80s revivalism. Synthpop, electro disco, italo, post-disco, punk-funk, new wave, no wave, new beat. And a bit of Minimal techno – Kompakt!

2005-11 I was at the Big Chill and Underground Resistance took over the dance tent one night. I totally rediscovered my love of techno and from then on techno nights were the backbone of going out.

2007 (maybe 08) - A friend was raving on about an afrobeat club she’d been to. I wasn’t convinced, but she dragged me along, gave me a pill and I danced all night. Those huge horn lines over a big sound system! I’ve been digging through African music since.

2007 -11 I discovered Lindstrom & Prins Thomas and their Scandinavian cosmic disco. I dived right into the disco revival scene that turned into “nu-disco” at some point. It was also around this time that I was buying loads of rock’n’roll – it was kicked off when I went on holiday and there was a ‘Best of Rock’n’Roll” CD in the cottage I stayed in which we canned the whole time we were there.

2012-17 Since I had my daughter in 2012 I’ve not stepped foot in a nightclub. I can’t be doing with lost weekends and come downs with little ones (my son followed in 2014). But I’m still driven to hunt out new music. There’s always something new and brilliant out there somewhere just waiting to be discovered. I guess my main thing these last few years has been various shades of synthpop and techno, but I’m always finding new stuff and I still like most of the music I’ve been into over the years. My kids love rooting through my records and CDs, digging out old music that I haven’t heard for ages.

 

[Mogden]

Birth, 1975, to about 12, 1987, was a mix of whatever the folks played. Dad much better taste than Ma but still a mix of ELO, Fleetwood Mac, Dire Straits, Wings, The Beatles, Jethro Tull between the two of them. Some Rod Stewart and Michael Jackson courtesy of my aunt, Ma's sis. And sis Mogden was born in 82 and did insist on a particular episode of Top of the Pops being played endlessly so Nena with her red balloons and bloody Wang Chung were in there somewhere repeatedly. I did like a bit of Duran Duran, Culture Club, Adam Ant and the like but with no pocket money to splash on vinyl, I was limited to what was on the telly and Top 40 cos there was no bloody internet

Then I started to find my own taste, bit variable and dubious to start with. Wet Wet Wet, then a bit more alternative so stumbled into Mad-chester with The Happy Mondays, The High, James, The Stone Roses, The Charlatans, The House of Love. Lots of The bands essentially. Many hours spent wandering round the record fair in the Brighton Centre and schlepping round The Lanes. Also picked up INXS by this point after many months of complaining about the smattering of penpals in the back of Smash Hits asking for Inks fans as I assumed it was pronounced. Welcome to Wherever you are soundtracked my job as a golf caddy and I still play it regularly now. Bit of REM for good measure too.

1991 was a bit of a drift to heavier stuff. Nevermind was that year and the Use Your Illusion duet. Then 1992 was the year I discovered Pearl Jam. September 1992 to be precise and the whole game changed. Once I'd found them there was a whole mountain of new music to explore. Became a metaller to my core and Pearl Jam stayed glued to my life. Was doing my A-Levels by this point and was the only female metaller in my school. Shared albums with my English teacher who was a tyrant to most other pupils but I'd endeared myself to him by croaking out an AC/DC comment in a quiet classroom during my first lesson with him and won his respect. Found the scant few other metallers and swapped recommendations with them mostly by borrowing copies of Headbanger's Ball from them on video and playing on repeat. So found White Zombie and The Almighty and a very tasty Vanessa Warwick. Later to find out how psycho she was from a muso mate Also hung out with a lovely chap with deep taste in 70s music and humongous flares. He went on to star as a contestant in the Great British Bake Off but I can't picture him without floppy hair, epic flares and a cheeky fag hiding in the estate across the road from the school. So T-Rex and a few others graced my ears too from his quarters.

Bought an album called Greetings From Uncle Sam which led me to Faith No More, although already aware of them, Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Mudhoney and many others. Oh yes and the Singles soundtrack of course. Plenty there too.

See this is what happens when you nudge my writing brain cells, you'll get a bloody essay.

So 92-94 was A-Levels. Rage Against The Machine also featured in this time period. I was adamant they weren't metal but a dear friend of mine used to twist my arm about listening to them. Wish he was still around to do so

94-95 was A-Level retake year so it was The Wildhearts thanks to a mate who used to give me a lift to college. I couldn't get into them at all to start with then a repeated mix of Caffeine Bomb and Suckerpunch played at volume convinced me otherwise. Bruce Dickinson was doing his Radio 1 Rock Show around this time so I taped a few of them and got some Everclear , Cold Water Flat, Warrior Soul and countless others. Also picked up Therapy? by this point and Troublegum was on repeat. Terrorvision thanks to my car lift mate too. And Radiohead were good for me despite not being strictly metal. Magazines had jumped from Smash Hits to Melody Maker and NME and now at this point was Kerrang, Metal Hammer, Terrorizer and any American magazine special supplements I could get my paws on about Pearl Jam and Nirvana. Also met my first love this year and he got me into some more hardcore metal and ethereal stuff like Death, Cannibal Corpse, Tiamat and The Tea Party.

Off to uni in September 1995 and OHhhhhhh shittttt student loan plus decent record shops. I bought up the back catalogue of Pearl Jam and the bands that went before and during it. So Mother Love Bone, Green River, Brad, Satchel. Went to see bands at Rock City over the 3 and a bit years I was studying and it was evolving at that point from metal \m/ to nu metal Meh. But I did get to see Marilyn Manson, Machine Head, Paradise Lost, Tura Satana, Human Waste Project, White Zombie (still my best gig ever) and had the accompanying music. Met Korn when I snuck off to Monsters of Rock in 96. I dabbled with the Linkin Parks and Papa Roachs and Limp Bizkits but my heart was always still hardcore metal.

My tastes surrendered a bit when I left uni and started to pick up things like The Chemical Brothers and appreciated The Prodigy and the like a bit more. Allowed myself to enjoy dance music for the first time in about 2000 so a Ministry of Sound Millennium album still remains a favourite of mine. Fatboy Slim popped up on my radar. 2001 met my ex and Belle and Sebastian, The Delgados, Granddaddy, Har Mar Superstar, John Cale, M.I.A. found my ears. More fey taste in music than mine. My metal was not appreciated

Pearl Jam still a constant through all of this. Waddled through to about 2009 I think with The Strokes, Daft Punk, Bloc Party, The Killers and the rest, kept up with the Chili Peppers to a point too. Started at festivals in 2007 so tastes got a bit more folky and dancey. Now I don't pick up new bands quite so often and currently I'm having to listen to chart stuff to use for work but I'm loving the fact that I can put Arcade Fire next to Taylor Swift, add in the Manics and finish off with Nightmares on Wax Elbow feature highly these days, alongside Pearl Jam of course, and my heart is still metal for the likes of Queens of the Stone Age. Bit long, but you get the idea! What irks is that now I'm not such a tubby bitch my band t-shirts swamp me but I will never surrender them, well I might have to make them into a granny blanket at some point but I'd rather not

 

[mx wcfc]

Ignoring trite stuff as a child, I think I started with the likes of Slade, Sweet and Suzi Quatro.
I then dabbled briefly with metal - Hendrix, Black Sabbath, Led Zep, Wishbone Ash (!) before punk came along.
After punk of course there was post punk (Wire, Gang of Four, Delta 5), before I went all Echo and the Bunnymeny.

Then I saw The Birthday Party.

I didn't listen to music much for a long time whilst getting over the trauma of Mind Department's abject failure to break into the bigtime, and being completely baffled by my uni peers' obsession with The Smiths (good music but that whiny twat of a singer with flowers stuck up his arse....). Britpop reawakened my enthusiasm, and I've been back into music ever since.

Britpop faded for me a while ago, and I have regressed to good old fashioned, traditional punk rock on the whole. UK Subs are still out there gigging, as is TV Smith, and Eastfield, Alcohol Licks, Emergency Bitter are just three of the many excellent newish punk bands on the circuit.

I have though become a lot less dogmatic in my taste. Time was, I wouldn't listen to anything John Peel hadn't played in the last fortnight. Now I like all sorts of stuff as well as punk, as long as it's rabble rousing, for want of a better word. Merry Hell, Leatherat, Grace Petrie, Efa Supertramp, The Bleeding Hearts - there's loads of excellent live acts out there - political, punky/folky or just fun.

Of course, liking bands that most people haven't heard of is particularly satisfying too, but I clicked on the Underworld v Orbital thread assuming it would be about computer gaming. The whole dance thing passed me by completely.

 

[Sea Star]

pre 11 - parents not really into music by the time i was around and pretty much only music i remember is Junior Choice - was it radio 2? Stand out tunes for me were, however, Laughing Gnome and Space Oddity.
around 10/11 i played my Dad's records - faves were early Beatles and Johnny Cash's prison albums.
around age 12 (1978/79) I suddenly discovered a world beyond JC by twiddling the knob on my radio. So suddenly found myself enjoying Elvis Costello, The Police, Blondie, XTC, Ian Dury and many others from that era.
in 1979 aged 12 I discovered Tubeway Army and became a massive Numan fan - bought Pleasure Principle as my first LP - also bought "Union City Blue" by Blondie
Then Two Tone - I first got into the Beat in early 1980 but also loved the Selecter, Specials, Madness. Also UB40 - but had a parallel interest in Blondie and Numan.
1980 went mad for electronic sounds - and started listening to Peel so was discovering all sorts. Simple Minds, Cabaret Voltaire, Human League, OMD, etc.
Also Dexys, and Bowie, Ramones, Hazel O'Connor.
in 1981 I bought my first Bowie album, still into Numan, went off Blondie and modern ska, started getting into later Beatles, Dylan, early Floyd - stuff i found in the library.
1982 - The Who and the Rolling Stones took up a lot of my time, and the Kinks. Found a Talking Heads live album i absolutely loved. Started listening to Lennon's solo stuff and got that all out of my system early - bought a lot of Bowie stuff in 1982 with my paper round money.
1983 (aged 16) I saw Blancmange live, then Numan. Not many gigs in Plymouth in those days. Had completely lost interest in the charts. Was making tapes from the radio and listening to them - in particular I love Echo and the Bunnymen. Discovered the Damned. Discovered Iggy and the Stooges.
1984 - Jesus and Mary Chain and the Fall. Slowly discovering reggae and Indie. Still a Bowie fan and pretty much spending my money on Bowie records. Saw Billy Bragg live.
1985 - I was kind of losing my way - my cousin's influence i think - getting me into 70s stuff like Clapton and Floyd, but in September i went to London and lost touch with cousin. I immersed myself in indie!
1985 - 1987 was pretty much abandoning Bowie but embracing Iggy and Lou Reeed and the VU - going to see the Mary Chain, the Fall and the Weddoes as often as I could. I'd left all my records at home so was starting again from scratch. Saw Bowie live and hated it. After 88 I basically went out and bought every "indie" album I could find and immersed myself in it. Loved New Order through this period as well. Found the Smiths after years of rejecting them. Half Man Half Biscuit.
1988 - 1991 - Went more American in taste - Throwing Muses, Dinosaur Jr, Sonic Youth etc. but also Cocteau Twins who I'd always liked but now i could afford the albums so got to listen t them properly. My Bloody Valentine, The Fall, The Fall, and The Fall. Also found myself drifiting inevitably towards country music via Cash, Steve Earle and Nanci Griffiths.
92, 93, started listening to jazz, soul music, had another go at reggae but after 93 i listened to less and less music - pretty much stuck to albums that i already knew i loved.
Around 2001 I started listening to Bowie again with fresh ears, and bought a digital radio so 6Music became my main source of music, but also Radio 2 a bit too.
After 2008 I was single again so got back to exploring music - country, alt country, indie stuff I;d missed, more jazz, more soul, and 70s funk, more reggae, worked my way through 90s Bowie which I had mostly managed to ignore at the time.
2014 - i listened to a lot of electronic stuff that my flatmate gave me - and 70s punk and alternative that my other flatmate gave me. Always had refused to get into electronic music past about 1983 but suddenly all that changed and I haven't looked back - just trying to catch up now. Also pre Rock n Roll stuff - as I'm old i feel i can now, not only jazz but a lot of stuff that would probably be called easy listening. Still country, still stuff like Sonic Youth, Suicide, still The Fall, a late convert to St Etienne, and 70's "Krautrock" too. It's just nice to be able to explore now as i feel i want to and as i find things, especially on Youtube.

 

[chilango]

Thread is a good read. Thanks everyone

 

[Knotted]

I was born in 1974.

I really liked chart music around 1985-1986 - before that I was living abroad and didn't listen to much. I do remember really liking an Incantation album (the Chilean-Scottish-Irish political panpipe band that was briefly popular in the early 80's) that my dad had bought as well as a Mike Oldfield collection.

But anyway I became disillusioned with chart music around 1987. I listened obsessively to a handful of albums by Incantation and Mike Oldfield and Sky. These were just things I liberated from my father. I was a bit of a loner, and was frankly afraid of the protocols of shopping for cassettes (seriously). Also very prone to special interests and developing a distrust of anything normal or mainstream that was on the unhealthy side of fanatical. It took real effort broadening my horizons.

Around 1990 I started getting into Status Quo (yes I know) and from there I started getting into the Blues. I had worked out how to buy music by this point. My first CDs were John Lee Hooker and Lightnin' Hopkins. There was a bit of a blues revival in the early 90's but nobody I knew was going out and buying John Lee Hooker albums, it never occurred to me to pay attention to what other people were into. I was an asocial person and music was asocial to me.

Also I made a random purchase of Saucerful of Secrets by Pink Floyd which sounded completely outside anything I had ever heard so naturally I loved it (I'm lukewarm about it now btw).

So from then it was progressive rock (plus Black Sabbath and various other 70's bands). I read Audion magazine and fledgling internet forums on progressive rock. I've never picked up a copy of Melody Maker or NME, even now it would feel dirty to read them. Whereas my tastes were very narrow and obsessive at this point, I was definitely broadening and delving into more difficult, jazzy and avant garde territory. A friend played the first Henry Cow album to me and it was like a light switching on. All of a sudden a world that encompassed Sun Ra and Ornette Coleman but also Stravinsky and Shostakovich opened up to me. I was trying very consciously to leave my obsessions behind and push myself to my limits. I also started listening to early industrial bands like Throbbing Gristle and Cabaret Voltaire and graduated to full on noise and abstract electronica. Eventually I got into punk and bands like the Fall via krautrock and industrial. My interest in progressive rock became an interest in things which could be described as progressive rock if you are desperate to stretch that label beyond recognition - you know things like Can, This Heat, The Work.

I spent the entire summer of 1996 listening to Trout Mask Replica occasionally interspersed with the Faust Tapes.

I didn't listen to the radio. I missed out on John Peel at least until very late on. I was just going for more and more difficult music to the exclusion of everything else. Oh and I also discovered Bix Beidebecke and Sidney Bechet and old jazz so maybe it wasn't to the exclusion of everything else - that was just my stupid driving ideology.

Eventually I got sick of music because of my stupid driving ideology.

You have to understand two factors in my evolution. 1) My obsessive and asocial character 2) The fact that back in the olden days you had to go out and buy music meant that it made sense to be narrow - you couldn't buy everything so why try to be broad minded.

Then I realised you could pirate music off the internet (this was very late on - 2008 or 2009 or so). And after playing my old favourite obsessions to death I became a social music listener - listening to the opinions of people with different tastes to myself and so on. I was a real prick when I was young. I still have a distrust of rhythmic electronic music which just sounds dead to me (OK there are exceptions). Still struggle with hip hop (again there are exceptions). My taste in pop music is highly selective but not above cheese. I won't have heard of half the things you know about and you won't have heard of half the things I know about because of my stupid obsessions and driving ideologies.

Oh yeah and I listened to various folk music on and off too throughout my life but this post is too long already.