How have your musical tastes altered?

[Daniel]

I feel that ones musical tastes sometimes give a *potential* insight into their personality. Prior to falling ill, had I posted music on this site, and assuming it to be merely a social site as opposed to a site for those recovering from serious illness, my entire 10 or so song list would have been the hard and heavy sounds of music which, although I still enjoy it, would have been exclusively listened to before like this, for instance :

1) Metallica - Hit the Lights
2) Guns n Roses - Get in the Ring
3) ACDC - Thunderstruck : and so on and so on - ALL heavy metal and loud.
4) Tool - Stinkfist
5) Nirvana - Gallons of rubbing alcohol flow through the strip

Today, after encephalitis, I find what matters most to me in music is somewhat different : I still love loud music, but more preferable is music which has something more to say. By comparison, the alternative top five songs, a couple of which I will soon add, would be :

1) Coldplay - Clocks
2) Filter - Take a Picture (coming soon to my profile)
3) Chasing Cars - Snow Patrol (" " ")
4) One - Metallica (okay, some old habits die hard, but this is a *classic*)
5) Hoobastank - The Reason (Thankyou, Hope, for posting this on your page, this song means
alot to me personally)

The reason 5) Hoobastank - The Reason, is so significant is because it is one of the few referances to the year 2005, when I fell sick, that I still vividly recall and when I hear it I'm instantly reminded of travelling back on Singapore Airlines from Hong Kong to Christchurch with my insurance company nurse - a great German man by the name of Wolfgang (great guy), and I can almost see in my mind the image of the passenger seat on the plane with the television and music/movie selection as I played this song over and over and over throughout the trip.
I recall also because of this, the huge and long horizontal escalators in Hong Kong airport and the unique from this country architecture in the building with the voice of a pretty Asian lady on the loudspeaker announcing departure times and delays.
Most of all, this song reminds me of the uncertainty and terror of not then knowing what my illness was, not knowing if I was about to pass away or be intellectually handicapped for life. It reminds me of then wondering how my friends and family would react and asking myself if I was condemned to a life of being a social outcast, making the initial fear over life and death a far less fearful one.

I wouldn't have thought this with my old favoured music, I'd have just turned up the volume and switched off to it, but I feel encephalitis has made me grow up a little and the second group of five songs always remind me now that I'm not the same person I once was, I'm a work in progress, soon to be better than before.

My question to anyone reading, therefore, is this :
Have your musical tastes altered post infection?
Do you feel your musical tastes now and in the past reflect/have reflected who you are?
Are there any particular songs which remind you of any moments significant to you?
What music are you listening to right now in your life?

[Stephen]

Ok, you touched on a big one here for me!

My music has always reflected my personality - I guess that is true for everyone.

When I was younger I listened to music ALL the time! Metalica's "One," Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon, Lynyrd Skynyrd, most of Elton John's music, Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen - not the new stuff!, Charlie Daniels, and have you ever heard of a group named Southgang? These were some of my favorites.

Then, as a pastor, I went through a time where I spoke out against any music that wasn't "Christian." I knew of too many stories where music had such a negative influence on teens that they were self-destructive. And several popular groups were blatantly against Christianity. I hate to admit that I was one of those who spoke out against it all. I hate to admit that I was one of those pastors. Then, I got so focused on work and other things that music became less and less a part of my life. Other than the car radio I didn't listen to much music at all. And when I did listen to it, I didn't really listen to it or hear it to appreciate it.

But my feelings and beliefs slowly changed. I should have taught people to be discerning and to make responsible, informed, wise and healthy choices... about music, TV, movies, just about everything in life. It is easier to be judgemental against it all than to take the time to be informed and make personal, individual choices. That is what I do and what I teach now. No matter what a person's beliefs and lifestyle are now I can appreciate them and their gifts.

So, to answer your question...

E took out a lower range of my hearing in the right ear. It also messed up my ability to smell things sometimes. But it reawakened my visual awareness of things and behavior and it reawakened my ability to hear and appreciate music. I think it is my newly acquired ADD that helps me hear, not only the song, but every instrument. Music helps me focus because all of the distractions are in the music so I'm focused on the music and not the other distractions. When I'm driving it was hard to focus on the road and driving pose e. I found that if I put on headphones and listened to music, I could focus on the road. It's illegal, but it works! It wasn't like that before. Music was just another distraction. So now I appreciate and enjoy music again and even more so.

What am I listening to now? Here are the top songs on my favorite playlist:

Bryan Adams - the entire MTV "unplugged" album
U2 - One
Madonna - Live to Tell
Ozzy Ozbourn - Mama I'm Comin' Home
Taylor Swift - Teardrops On My Guitar
Taylor Swift - Tim McGraw
Steve Miller - I want to make the world turn around
Rolling Stones - Angie
Eric Clapton - Layla
Elton John - Believe
Bon Jovi - Thank You For Loving Me
Faith Hill and Tim McGraw - Let's Make Love
Tim McGraw - Live Like You Were Dying

All of these songs remind me of moments - mostly moments with my wife. Many of them simply remind me of our relationship and how precious and fragile it can be - how life can be.

(Thanks for listening to my "confession." Hope it doesn't diminish your thoughts about me!!! :-) )

[Daniel]

Quite the contrary - I appreciate people who express themselves in detail : yourself progressively moreso through the above.
Just, out of interest, you mention your hearing loss issues and you've previously mentioned dizziness also as being a concern for yourself. I've often harped on about dizziness related to the inner ear resulting from my infection and I believe the vestibular nerve is potentially significant to your issue. This nerve runs from or close to the inner ear and I believe regulates balance and stability in the brain. With proper retraining, your balance and resistance to becoming dizzy or requiring the use of walking aids can be reduced - learning to breathe better at moments of stress, when the heartrate quickens and blood circulates to the brain faster, helps aswell - see one of my other discussions about this (has a link to the 'Cawthorne Cooksey' exercises - I've been doing them for 2 years now, twice a day with significant progress in my ability to focus what I see and maintain balance while having greater self confidence in my movements)

One question which I feel compelled to ask you is that there is a strong theme of realization on your past history, reflected in your musical tastes, that you felt aspects of your former self required changing : was there any one significant - pre encephalitis - event which made you think this way?

Incidentally, 'Run to you' by Bryan Adams is a fantastic song, and the theme he did for 'Robin Hood' also (forget title) : I think you also mention Pink Floyd - I love Darkside, but I personally feel the video for 'The Wall' which is kinda like, if you haven't seen it, a stage play soundtrack which melds the entire album into a very deep and significant story, is utterly fantastic.

If I may comment on you being a pastor in the past - I get the impression that you feel as if you were a little over opinionated in your former position, which seems kinda like a contradiction to being a pastor as I'm under the impression their role is to listen and guide people spiritually - have you ever considered returning to anything like that, given that you come across as the complete opposite of those negative things you mention of yourself now? Perhaps life has just decided to show you how to better some aspects of yourself? I *know* I got taught a lesson, and now I thank god every single day for the improvment I've shown, rather than destroying the opportunity he/she gave me prior to illness to be a better person.

[Daniel]

I think, also, through the course of my recovery, I've discovered that more often than not a truly great song is one which you relate to not only on a lyrical level, but a melodic one also : while there are some on my list which I put in because I think they're snazzy (Bright side of life, Bodies), others carry, for me at least, a much higher degree of personal significance - here are a few examples of what I mean :

1 - Fade to Black / Alive (Metallica / Pearl Jam) - both of these titles are *extremely* sentimental -
the Metallica one is a virtual suicide note - while I don't have any such ambitions, these are both
songs with 3 page guitar solo outros which I spent entire summers trying to learn when I was
youbger than now - I got the solo in Fade to Black for like a day or so, then it became rusty in a
few areas, then I got annoyed and it became *very* rusty, then I got unwell and it disappeared
from my head like a fart in a breeze, but they remind me of being 18 and sitting for *hours* on
my bed with my guitar and amp practicing

2 - One / Fix You (Metallica / Coldplay) - these are songs which have really assisted my recovery.
The first, One, is a song based on the movie 'Johnny got his gun' about a soldier who gets
injured in WW1 and loses his sight and bodily function but can still think - this idea, while not
applicable to my health, carried my self centred and arrogant teen butt through turbulent times,
and the second, Fix You, made me feel the same way during encephalitis.

There are others, but you get the idea - music reflects your identity and tells others how you see the world and your place in it : if you read this and think, "hang on, it just sounds nice and makes me wanna dance" - then all power to you, but I think you're missing out on a major aspect of music and this is why I *detest* dance music with a passion (it's like the ebola of music, I reckon) - it says so little and has no variation, and worst of all is largely made by computers...just my opinion, though.

I'd love to hear your interests / arguments for dance music - PROOVE ME WRONG, I DARE YOU TO.

[Daniel]

AH! Lynard Skynard - I *love* the song 'Freebird'! Man does that have an AWESOME solo in it - those guys were fantastic, and who doesn't love 'Beautiful Day' by U2? You have some great taste in music, Stephen.

[Hope]

Oh Yes.....
oh I'm sorry...... someones at my door, I'll be back to post!
Sorry!

[Daniel]

It's funny - when I was 16-20 and a complete and utter dropkick, I became *obsessed* with guitar and there's one song on my page by Metallica, 'Fade to Black' - this has a three page outro solo which I tried and tried and tried to learn, and only managed to master page 1, because I'd try page 2, but have to play through page 1 in order to reach it, then I shakily got page 2 and couldn't for the life of me play page 3, so I eventually just gave up.
When I hear that song now, it reminds me of being 16, though moreso than any musical tastes having changed, my ability to listen to a song not as an opportunity to try and show off, but to instead just listen and enjoy it's brilliance has emerged : I hear this song differently now, it means more to me, as does the song 'One' (thanks for video, BTW) - what would be the worst music you've ever been hooked on?

I once got attached to the song 'Cotton Eye Joe' by a techno redneck band I forget the name of now. *shudders*