Kids music taste

[Ian Price]

I have a 6 year old girl. Her favourite music is, in no particular order, as follows:

Rolling Stones
Led Zepellin
Beatles
Abba
AC/DC

Is this normal behaviour or just my influence of playing decent music all the time?

Her favourite Blu-Ray at the moment is "Shine a Light".

I'm pleased I don't have to put up with the guff that is on the charts.

[38thBeatle]

Tis your influence I should think. My eldest son went through my CD collection when he was about 11 and generally liked most of what I had. A few years later he took up keyboards and taught himself to play listening to Steely Dan. By 15, he could play most of their stuff. He was also blessed with a great voice. Pity the little so and so had no musical ambitions when it came down to the crunch. But to this day, he listens to music that he inherited from me and has a good working knowledge of most of the greats from the last 40 odd years.

[dave_mc]

is abba decent? :lol:

Just kidding, some of their stuff is pretty good.

It might be your influence; it might be your/her genes. It also might be that all the kids listening to "guff in the charts" just haven't heard the good music, and if they had, they might like it too.

I remember when i was at school, the school choir did a beatles medley at one point- and all the kids (or the vast majority) loved it, despite most of them not having been familiar with them before coming across it in choir practice.  Funnily enough, I'm not a gigantic beatles fan, but I'll readily admit they're a billion times better than the vengaboys or whatever other guff was popular at the time.

So yeah, that might back up my last point, that a lot of people maybe just haven't been exposed to better music. I mean if you've only tried a beginner guitar or amp you're going to think it's pretty good, kind of thing. It's not that you don't like that soldano, just you've never tried one, maybe don't even know it exists (granted it's a lot more money too, but that's not the case usually with music, a cr@p cd normally costs the same as a good one).

FWIW I don't think everything in the charts is cr@p. Occasionally a good song sneaks through- I remember about 18 months ago there were actually a few quite good songs in there. :lol: (but it seems to have lost it again, unfortunately. :( ).

[mecca777]

I think parental influence is a massive part of it, from my own experience. When I was a kid the music that I liked from TV and radio was 80s chart stuff my dad had no interest in - Michael Jackson, Run-DMC, the Bangles and so on. It was listening to the music my dad played in the car that got me into rock, thanks to Hendrix, Cream, Rainbow and Led Zep; that then resulted in me getting more into the rock/guitar stuff of the day such as GnR, Faith No More and Megadeth, which again wasn't my dad's cup of tea, but which I would never have gravitated to without first getting a taste for classic rock music. My brother has a little boy who's almost 9 years old and he's the same way; he doesn't really discriminate between the pop stuff he hears through the normal channels and the weirdo prog, punk or rap that he's exposed to in our house. He just likes it all.

Personally I believe that kids are hardwired to love music. Whatever you play for them, whatever they hear, at that age they'll find the stuff about it they enjoy and ignore the stuff that doesn't speak to them. As long as they can sing along to it or dance to the beat the genre and sound doesn't really register with them until they're old enough to worry about what other people think of them.

[Ian Price]

Some interesting points of view there. I do think parental influence is huge. My parents used to have Jimmy Savilles radio show on during Sunday lunch and not much good was played. It was only when I found an album with a guy on the front wearing a funny jacket that I started to listen to non radio stuff. The album was "Are You Experienced". I must have listened to it 5 times back to back one afternoon. From then on I got into other stuff.

Megan did ask me what those funny men (Rolling Stones) did when they weren't playing guitars and singing i.e. what are their jobs. I told her that their job was playing music and that they didn't do work like Daddy. She seemed interested so I asked her if she would like to play music as her job. Her answer?

"No, it looks boring"  :?

[Mr. Air]

"No, it looks boring" 

That made me laugh!

I can easily imagine why a kid at age 6 would think playing music as a living sucks. I bet she'll come around when she becomes a teenager  :D

I would love to do some Rolling Stones gigs, but I don't think I would enjoy a life as a profesional musician. Fame is great, but "no-fame" is even better, at least to me.

[Antag]

My 4 year old & I regularly debate whether "Stengah" or "Pravus" is the better Meshuggah song...

(Although I think he's gradually coming round to my opinion that Elastic is the best of all...) :)

[Roobubba]

The Beatles?

Child Cruelty!

[mikeluke]

I've tried everything to get my 11 year old to listen to rock and he hates it with a vengeance! "Take it off my iPod, Dad!"

He loves Capital Radio/Now 77 - if you listen to either you will get the picture - Flo Rida, Tinie Tempah, Rhianna - or as I like to call it - melodic chorus interspersed with rap verses (I'll leave out the adjectives!) - and is DOES all sound the same to me!

Pah - young people!


Mike

[Philly Q]

Megan did ask me what those funny men (Rolling Stones) did when they weren't playing guitars and singing i.e. what are their jobs. I told her that their job was playing music and that they didn't do work like Daddy. She seemed interested so I asked her if she would like to play music as her job. Her answer?

"No, it looks boring"  :?

I think Megan probably has a point!  :lol:

I've never experienced life as a touring musician, of course, but the older I get the less appealing it looks.  It must be great the first few years, but 10, 20, 30 years later..... 

Imagine being the Stones, on tour, away from your family and friends, with a bunch of scrawny old drunks (all presumably on or off the wagon, but not at the same time).  They probably have nothing in common except the band, probably don't even like each other any more.  No matter how comfortable the tour buses and private planes may be, it must be dull as hell.  Then back home, still churning out records occasionally but knowing the audience are only interested in the old stuff.

I'm sure it suits some people, addicted to the lifestyle, desperately trying to look and act like they're still teenagers, with their silly hairpieces and hideously inappropriate skinny jeans, using their "rock star" status to pull tragically stupid young girls who wouldn't look twice at them under normal circumstances..... (why have I got the images of Ratt, Motley Crue and Don Dokken in my mind?)

Hmmm, I think I was making a point but can't remember what it was now... [/rant]  :oops:


On topic.... I think parental influence plays a big part, if you have parents who are enthusiastic about music.  If you don't, your friends' taste is probably an influence, but less so because you're older by then and your personality is more developed.  I think ultimately you're probably drawn to music which seems to "gel" with your personality, especially when you're a teenager, and that's when it really "sticks".  I don't think the stuff you listen to later in life ever means as much as the stuff you were into between 16 and 20.

[ToneMonkey]

using their "rock star" status to pull tragically stupid young girls who wouldn't look twice at them under normal circumstances..... (why have I got the images of Ratt, Motley Crue and Don Dokken in my mind?)

Oh dear, that sounds absolutely aweful.  I hope it never happens to me  :lol:

[ToneMonkey]

I don't think the stuff you listen to later in life ever means as much as the stuff you were into between 16 and 20.

That's a mighty fine point.  When I was a teenager, every song was about me.  Nowadays, you're lucky if I actually listen to the words.

[Prawnik]

I don't think the stuff you listen to later in life ever means as much as the stuff you were into between 16 and 20.

It is a truism in the music industry that for the average frustrated consumer, the music he listens to between the ages of 18-21 is the music that he will listen to for the rest of his life.

Did not really work out that way for me, though.

My 2-year old daughter has absolutely wretched taste in music. No, playing decent music has not had any impact on her so far. She actually likes syrupy pop cr@p and baby ditties.

Then again, I am not sure I am really prepared to meet a toddler who goes out of her way to listen to Albert Ayler or Muslimgauze or Ike Turner or any of my other leanings.

[Ian Price]

The more I read your post the more I agree with you Philly. Endless touring, lots of hangers on, pressure of fame, not being sure who are real friends, being away from your family, writing new material for a living, doing the same stuff over and over again. Maybe being a session musician and out of the public eye would be far more interesting!

[nfe]

I don't think the stuff you listen to later in life ever means as much as the stuff you were into between 16 and 20.

I think that is true of passive music fans, not at all of more active music fans. In fact, pretty much everyone I know posting on music forums listens to completely different stuff in even their early twenties than in their late teens, though some of it will still crop up obviously, and it keeps developing as they get older, I think it starts to settle more in the late 20s/early 30's, but I've still plenty pals in the 40s and 50s discovering new (and new sounding, not Joe Bonamassa, y'know? :P) stuff all the time.