Amanda responded to my riff on the Guardian article regarding women and downloading, and an interesting discussion on how men and women define themselves by their artistic taste ensues.
It is no secret I am a music nerd. Luckily I’m also dating a music nerd. We discover and share new music all the time, even making claims to “his” band or “my” band as per who discovered what first. The last long-term boyfriend I had didn’t like my music much at all and, believe it or not, I sometimes took it personally. I’m one of those people who is in part defined by my artistic taste. I appreciate opposing points of view, but if someone straight insults what I consider “my” music, I am truly offended.
I can’t believe I just admitted that.
I don’t feel this way at all over my other artistic bents though, and you can rip on any book, movie, or show I like — leave my music alone. Conversely, the current boyfriend is just as insulted if I get overly critical about a movie he shows me. I’m not a big movie fan, to say the least, but I do trust his judgment (except when he made me watch “The Specials” — I’ll never do that again).
And like Amanda, I was a completist once as well, but discovered that I like a whole rash of music, even the bad stuff.
I don’t try and impress passersby with my musical tastes, but if you’re a friend and spend even a bit of time with me, you will get exposed to a mess of musical styles. Just like I take pride in being able to select a book that a non-reader will like, I do take some pride in exposing music that mere dabblers can really get into.
It must be the thirteen years of piano lessons that did this to me. I can’t think of anything or anyone else that would have influenced this adoration for the art form.