Does your taste get more conservative as you age?

I definitely check out new/different things a lot more than I did ten (or even five) years ago but that might just be because it's become so much easier and cheaper to do so. Sort of a side issue but this year for once I've managed (to a degree) to focus my listening habits a bit more in terms of older music which has been kind of satisfying.

also, i noticed that my tastes over time are sort of a pendulum, where i'll spend a few months or years retreating into stuff i know i like, followed by a some time spent seriously pushing at boundaries/prejudices and exploring new shit, and then whole thing goes round again. that pattern denies the basic assumption of the "more or less conservative?" question. my tastes don't move in a line from this to that. they cycle through a process, expanding and retracting, shedding the old & played-out about as fast as they incorporate the new, but always open to rediscovery.

Probably--my tastes were never that wild at any point in my life, but I probably do become even more locked into the simple (or conservative, if you'd rather) things that have always engaged my ear: melody, songcraft, etc. I probably strayed from these things more often 20 years ago. If Flipper came along today, I'm not sure that I'd connect. Another problem is that if Flipper came along today, my first reaction might be, "They sound just like Flipper." I try to stay as open-minded as possible. Sometimes I succeed.

I just realized: Flipper's closer to 30 years ago. Ouch.

Do people get more or less boringly self-congratulatory about their musical tastes as they age?

― Cow Bingo (Masonic Boom), Tuesday, July 6, 2010 4:47 PM (4 hours ago)

That's nasty.

also, i noticed that my tastes over time are sort of a pendulum, where i'll spend a few months or years retreating into stuff i know i like, followed by a some time spent seriously pushing at boundaries/prejudices and exploring new shit, and then whole thing goes round again. that pattern denies the basic assumption of the "more or less conservative?" question. my tastes don't move in a line from this to that. they cycle through a process, expanding and retracting, shedding the old & played-out about as fast as they incorporate the new, but always open to rediscovery.

― good news if you wear cargo shorts (contenderizer), Tuesday, July 6, 2010 6:09 PM

I can relate to this.

I'm not trying to say "Oh I'm so fucking cool I listened to all this crazy music before anyone else". I was just wondering if this was a common phenomenon, and wanted to open a dialogue about it.

Its not about listening to Britpop when you 30 or listening to Stockhausen when you're 12 but whether you can enter into a dialogue with the music (and the culture surrounding it) that is of more importance to me.

I do love a lot of contemporary classical but its undeniable that its just a playground for people to avoid the chasm between the intentions behind some of the music and what it actually produces/what its effects are.

So was Beethoven, in a way. Look at the critical response of the time (and even after his death) to the late quartets.

I do love a lot of contemporary classical but its undeniable that its just a playground for people to avoid the chasm between the intentions behind some of the music and what it actually produces/what its effects are.

No idea what this means.

dont listen to music to have a dialogue about the culture around it. kind of a weird idea.

but then i've never belonged to a book group

here's an admittedly gross theory: maybe music is like porn. the kind of tame titillation that got you off when you were younger just doesn't do it for you eventually, and eventually you need something a little more hardcore, perhaps even going into fetish territory to get you off as you get older and it takes more to get you excited.

I guess I have a problem with listening and just enjoying the same things but also I don't want to just find something repellant, leave it and not ask why. I called that dialogue with music.

There is a thing surrounding the reception of contemporary classical and its relationship to what is outside the concert hall. I just called it culture.

HM, you are disagreeing with an argument no one is making (ie, "about" and "with" have very different meanings)

Rudipherous - I kind of want to say something like: a lot of contemporary classical presents itself as something that is hard to enjoy widely except for its small audience who do enjoy it, something smugly so. In the end the music's form can be quite radical but because it sets itself up to reach a small scene, that this can be a source of 'conservatism'. xp

I now only listen to rousing versions of Jersualem.