Your Favorite Music Genres

[The Mad Plumber]

I noticed MJ bringing up that there seems to be a lot of negative threads in regards to music lately. So, to somewhat offset this wave of negativety, let's just chime in with our favored music genres, or as to if we can be defined by only one genre.

For me, my main favorite genre is classic rock. When I discovered Pink Floyd during some point in my junior high years, my mind was blown and I was immediately converted to classic rock. Although, tragically, classic rock has no other that can rival Pink Floyd, I still enjoyed the genre for quite a long time. The majority of my CD collection is classic rock albums.

As I got older, I became less in denile of good music that existed outside of classic rock. I began to accept my appreciation for pop music from my childhood in the 80s as well as some alternative music such as REM. Also, discovering Alisha Keys helps give me some assurance that the latest pop music is not entirely garbage.

Gradually, however, my appreciation for classic rock as a whole has worn down. There are hits, such as "Lola", that I am quite sick of hearing and I never really cared for George Thorogood. Ultimately, it does beg to question, "What is classic rock?" The genre, at least as it seems to be defined by Toledo's classic rock stations, seems to encompass a variety of styles. It is nice that Collective Soul's "Shine" and some newer Tom Petty songs have been included in the catalog of the local classic rock stations. Yet, while they will play David Bowie songs of the 70s, they don't play Bowie songs of the 80s. The same can be said of Elton John. Also, as I've become older, I've gained a little appreciation for things such as some Beach Boys hits, some Four Tops hits, and maybe a Wilson Pickett, but you'll never hear these on a classic rock station. Blood, Sweat, and Tears, Chicago, Willie Nelson, and Johnny Cash never seem to find their inclusion on our local classic rock station. Classic rock seems to begin with the Beatles and ends with Tom Petty, and it now it seems very isolated.

An odder and more embarrassing favored genre of mine is video game music. Admittedly, I've been very influenced by video games in my life and listening to game tunes does help pass the time. When I worked in the upstairs office at the college (the attic space above the bathroom in the boiler room), I would put Winamp on my terminal and play a variety of NSFe files I organized. It would be a little embarrassing when another student would come up to the office, hear the computer, and say, "Is that Super Mario Brothers?"

[Mighty Jack]

Man do I hate this thread -D-OH! Teasing o' course.

I'm a child of the 60s. I love Psychedelic rock - not just the biggies but groups like the Electric Prunes, the 13th Floor Elevators and the Count Five.

I admit I like folk rock - Dylan of course, but also the wandering troubadours I've seen live. I remember a guy playing "Peggy-O" at a bar once, his finger picking and the tone of his voice made it more beautiful than I've ever heard it before. Of course, "A Mighty Wind" is my favorite Christopher Guest movie - he not only captured the cheesiness of the genre, but also the tender, poetic beauty that can be found there as well.

As I moved into the 70s I found myself drawn to Alice Cooper, which seems not at all my style at first glance. But understanding that he was also a child of the 60s, had great love for that music and it's easy to hear those catchy melodies in his hard Detroit rock.

But what really got me back into the rock scene was the American punk/New Wave movement. The Ramones, early Blondie, Gary Numan and most of all... DEVO! Lord was I nuts for Devo. I think New Wave drew a lot from the 60s psychedelic too.

I'm mostly a rock and roll kind of guy. Can't get into jazz, not too much even into classical. I'm pretty straight forward, I like my hook laden catchy rock with a dash of spaciness (Tomorrow Never Knows is pure heaven

[giofav]

I tend to enjoy all kinds of rock music from the 60s and 70s, specially progressive rock. I was kind of a metal head in my youth, but now only occasionally i listen to metal bands that i grew up with, like Iron Maiden and Metallica. I don't care for new metal bands.

Oh, i also have a soft spot for Bossa Nova. Can't help it, living in Brazil and all.

edit: The Mad Plumber, i'm with you on VG music. I just love to hear old 8-bit tunes, they allways put me in a good mood.

[Mr. Atari]

I don't know if I have a favorite genre. I love blues-rock, funk, bad '80s synth-pop, early '90s rap, hair metal, grunge, progressive rock, piano rock, punk, thrash metal, showtunes, classical, bluegrass, you name it. In fact, there are only a couple genres I don't like. I won't mention them, though, since this is a positive thread.

Basically, anything with a good melody, a confident groove, emotion, musicianship, and creativity will win me over. And sometimes only 2 or 3 of those 5. If I had to pick one style, I'd probably go with a nice blues-based, rock & roll band that writes catchy tunes and has cool guitar solos. Along the lines of Zeppelin ('70s), Huey Lewis ('80s), Black Crowes ('90s), and Foo Fighters ('00s).

[quinnmartin]

My favorite genre would be "power-pop". Most of my favorite bands - such as The Beatles, Big Star, Guided by Voices, The Kinks, and good-sized chunks of the Clash's & Mats' catalogs - could loosely be lumped into that genre. Melodic guitar rock with rich harmonies tends to make my ears very happy.

I love 60's pop in general, as well. Esp the Beach Boys, whatever genre you want to put them in.

I also really enjoy country-rock/alt-country, whatever you want to call it. Punk as well, though not nearly as much as I did in my 20's. And you'll find quite a bit of rap/hip-hop, country, and cheesy 70's soft-rock in my iPod as well.

[Satchmo]

I love jazz and old school soul/funk. There are just too many great artists in those genres to comprehend.

Rock is kinda hit-and-miss for me. It has some great artists like The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Steely Dan, et cetera, and even some new artists that I like (I'd never thought I'd find myself saying that Vampire Weekend is pretty damn good, but they are). But that being said, there are a lot of crap there too. So I guess it really depends on the artist.

I enjoy a lot of blues, classical, folk, and world music (nine years of playing djembe will do that to you).

Also, I consider Tom Waits to be his own genre. And anyone who's read my posts knows I'm a pretty big Waits fan.

I guess I'm a little more eclectic than I think I am, though I'm far from being one of those people who claims to like a little of everything. I can't understand the appeal of rap, pop, or any sort of metal. It's all just static and noise to me.

[solgroupie]

i was like, ohmygod, a total 80's chick and filled my empty head with everything mtv had to offer back when they actually showed this thing called music videos. but i grew up listening to what my parents liked, which was everything from elvis and frank sinatra to the statler brothers and oak ridge boys. when i was with my sister, i heard nothing but pink floyd, rush, aerosmith, the marshall tucker band and everything else we now hear on classic rock stations.

somehow through all of those influences, i ended up preferring the blues and jazz - the older the better. i also love many types of international music, like celtic and middle eastern. i have begun to appreciate classical music over the years, though i don't know enough about it to actually tell one composer from another by just listening to them. i've even started liking opera, but again, i know little about it.

EDIT: i completely forgot my love of big band music. my nephews think i'm the biggest dork in the world for listening to it as much as i do, but i love it. i never get tired of it.

[stevehadcrackers]

New wave. My absolute favorite; no ifs, ands, or buts about it. In fact, I like pretty much anything that has a new wave or modern rock edge to it. This means I like a lot of music that came out of the 80s. Talking Heads, Blondie, and The Smiths are my top new wave/modern rock/punk bands of all time. I'm also a fan of ABC and The Human League. A lot of amazing one-hit wonders came out of the new wave movement: Soft Cell, Gary Numan, Flock of Seagulls, After the Fire, Thomas Dolby, Re-Flex... And Cyndi Lauper and David Bowie released some new-wave tinged stuff around the early 80s, too.

I guess my second favorite genre would be classic rock, though that's a very broad term. I guess '70s classic rock: Fleetwood Mac, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. And I think Hall & Oates kind of loosely falls into this category; they're probably considered more blues?/soul. I don't know. Now I'm confused.

[Emperor Cupcake]

I gotcher back, stevehadcrackers. If I absolutely had to pick a favorite musical genre, it would be that amorphous umbrella term of post-punk, which encompasses new wave, gothic rock, "college rock," and all those kind of tangential sounds that came out after punk blew open the doors to DIY experimentation. Pretty much all my favorite bands -- Bauhaus, Nick Cave/The Birthday Party, The Fall, Swans, Joy Division, The Smiths, The Damned, The Cramps, Echo and the Bunnymen, The Teardrop Explodes, Killing Joke, XTC, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Einsturzende Neubauten -- would fall somewhere on the post-punk continuum, though most of those bands don't sound anything like one another.

I also really like old punk, both British and American, especially Cocksparrer (an oi! band) and Bad Religion, and Minor Threat and the Dead Kennedys. I also like some industrial, and a little bit of older EBM or dance music like Nitzer Ebb and Frontline Assembly. As for other dribs and drabs, I like a lot of fifties rockabilly, I love the Velvet Underground, I like some folk like Leonard Cohen (and some folky punk like The Pogues and Gogol Bordello and DeVotchKa). I like cabaret music, and some classical, particularly Beethoven and Mozart. I don't particularly like classic rock except for the Beatles, David Bowie, the Who, the Doors, and the Kinks, but we're supposed to be keeping this positive so I'll shut up now.

:-)