I feel like it’s been a long time since I last wrote a decent article about music. Even though I don’t have any musical background, I’m just another guy who grew up listening to his family’s and friend’s favorite music, and since then my tastes have drifted various times.
When I was very young, I was very addicted to most musics from the 80s/90s: Bryan Adams, Roxette, Guns and Roses, Bon Jovi. I believed, and still do, that those two decades were for me the best ones in terms of mainstream music. But of course every person 10 years older than me will say the best decade was the one 10 years before mine.
Over those years, I was flooded by different musical genres and I grew a taste for a lot of them. I didn’t obtain that taste because I only listened to the very best bands in their own genre, it was many years before I heard of what are now my favorite bands, but there some bands simply appeal to more people, many more than the best bands in their niche.
Part of the reason why I liked the 80s was because many bands were still maturing, there wasn’t any extreme sound experimentations like we see nowadays (or cheap rehashes of old still-warm-in-the-coffin classics). It was easy to start from Bon Jovi, then Guns and Roses and move further on and explore the rock genre.
If I were to tell you to listen to my favorite Progressive Rock bands you’d find them awful, because you aren’t attuned to their kind of sound. So don’t start with the best, don’t start with Tool, Pink Floyd. Start with the most mainstream band of it’s kind, something that’s easygoing and easy to appreciate and associate to the sounds you know and love.
Start with Porcupine Tree, listen to one of their middle albums like Deadwing, then move on to any other progressive rock band.
Start with Sade, then listen to Diana Krall.
Don’t listen to their albums only once. It takes a few times for you start noticing the intricacies and details, and truly appreciate each genre. Register yourself on a website like last.fm and discover new and similar artists through there.
I’ve heard all of Porcupine Tree albums, and they are one of my favorite bands, yet I still had to listen to their latest album about 3 or 4 times for it to “grow on me”. Not because it’s not easy to like, but because it’s hard to fully grasp all the details on your first go.
When you grow accustomed to the new genres, try something new. You’ll find that you’ll get accustomed to new types of music much quicker than before, and you’ll have a much broader musical sense.
Great advice, man. You’ve given porcupine tree a lot of mention before. I’m going to check them out. Never heard of them.