Subject me to your favorite music! - Music Diaries

AfterHours

Gender: Male
Location: originally from scaruffi.com ;-)

Thank you for sharing and being open to discussion. Here is my criteria: https://www.besteveralbums.com/phpBB2/v...hp?t=15503

Feel free to discuss/request clarification as deemed necessary.
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Rhyner
soft silly music is meaningful magical

Gender: Male
Age: 36
Location: Utah

AfterHours wrote:

Thank you for sharing and being open to discussion. Here is my criteria: https://www.besteveralbums.com/phpBB2/v...hp?t=15503

Feel free to discuss/request clarification as deemed necessary.

I've read your criteria page. Here are my jumbled thoughts:

I enjoy music already. I don't necessarily need to know why, or what specific properties in said music causes my enjoyment of it. I'm really only interested in consciously identifying my personal criteria if doing so will enhance my enjoyment of music enough to make the undertaking worthwhile, and I'm not so sure that's the case. I have no clue why I like what I like. It's far from clear-cut. Also, there's the risk (however small) that I could end up damaging my ability to enjoy music. "What ridiculousness!" you must be thinking. How could that be?

I'll explain.

Right now I enjoy music just fine. Let's say I go ahead and figure out why, and identify specific criteria to look for. Now, when when listening to music, I'll be looking for these criteria and judging whether I like the music based on whether I find them or not. But if this becomes a habit, and I always base my evaluation of music solely on whether it has these properties, am I really truly enjoying the experience? It's like when someone loves movies, so they get an IMDB or letterboxd account and start rating all their favorite movies, but now whenever they watch a movie all they can really think about is what score they should give it instead of simply enjoying the experience. Then the whole point of watching a movie becomes deciding on a score for it. Movie-watching becomes a chore in service of movie-rating, and all the joy that got the whole thing started in the first place has been drained out.

And what if I misidentify my criteria and look for the wrong things? Or I identify a restricted set of criteria that doesn't actually represent the totality of what I truly value in art? Either I'll realize that I've done so, in which case I'm clearly not just using the criteria I've identified to evaluate art, and so maybe it was unnecessary to identify them in the first place, or I won't realize my mistake, which has its own obvious problems.

This makes it sound like I'm totally against the attempt to objectively delineate one's art evaluation criteria. I'm really not. This is just me thinking out loud, so to speak. Honestly these aren't huge concerns. I trust myself to avoid any pitfalls like these.

One of the things you say you look for is "emotional conviction", and I think that makes sense as something to look for in art. It's probably the main thing I "look for" (albeit not consciously; I just enjoy the experience when it happens to move me). But you say it doesn't matter what the emotion is. You even mention apathy and boredom. I find that extremely odd. Do you have any examples of compelling expressions of apathy, or boredom?

And then there's "conceptual significance". I'm not sure I totally understand what you mean by that, and especially how it can be present in instrumental music. I mean, I guess there are music theory concepts. Is that what you mean?

When I think of appreciating conceptual significance, I think of philosophy, mathematics, science, logic, etc. Not art. For instance, the most compelling and awe-inspiring concept I can think of at the moment would be Gödel's incompleteness theorems. I don't know if you're familiar, so I'll summarize it as simply as I can:

Some folks were worried that math's foundations were faulty, so they decided to rebuild it from the ground up. Specifically they wanted to avoid self-reference, because of problems it caused. So they created an impressive formal system with two goals in mind: it should be able to derive every mathematical truth (completeness), and it should not be able to derive any falsehoods (consistency). The system they created was so impressively powerful and flexible that they thought they were successful. But there was no way to prove for sure that they were. Then another fellow came along (Gödel) who showed that the system's very power and flexibility made it's own completeness impossible. And not just this specific system. It's an unfixable, inherent problem. Any system that crosses a certain powerfulness threshold (that's necessary to cross if it really wants to be both complete and consistent) cannot actually be simultaneously complete and consistent. You can pick only one. This was a bizarre thing for mathematicians to discover. It went against the entire quest of their discipline. And not only that, but the way that Gödel proved it is so astoundingly clever, it's scarcely conceivable that a human mind came up with it.

Anyway, I've never encountered anything like that in music. Nothing with even close to the same conceptual significance. In fact, I don't think art is at all the appropriate place for that sort of thing. Which makes me think I just don't understand what you mean by "conceptual significance".

I don't know what to say about ingenuity. It seems to me to be an inessential ingredient, neither necessary nor sufficient for music to be good. It certainly doesn't hurt, but there's plenty of music I really like that's not particularly ingenious.

The whole idea of boiling down one's taste in art to a few relatively simple criteria seems, to me, to be a fool's errand. Clearly you've found something that works for you, so I'm wrong, admittedly, but that's how it seems to me. When I think about what it is I like about the things I like, there are a few common threads, sure, but they're far from the whole picture. Some art works for me, and some doesn't. It's complicated, and I don't pretend to understand it.

Here's my attempt to sum up what I like about music:
I tend to prefer music that's the result of a strong individual artistic vision. This means I gravitate toward singer-songwriter stuff. But I like other stuff too.
I tend to prefer more introspective, contemplative music. But I like other stuff too.
I tend not to like dancier, four-on-the-floor type stuff so much. But sometimes I do.

And... that's about it. What works, works. What doesn't, doesn't. It's a mysterious magical alchemy. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and all that.

So, is there any hope for me or am I a lost cause?
Either way I'd still appreciate your thoughts on Freak Out!, if you're willing to provide them.

AfterHours

Gender: Male
Location: originally from scaruffi.com ;-)

Rhyner wrote:

AfterHours wrote:

Thank you for sharing and being open to discussion. Here is my criteria: https://www.besteveralbums.com/phpBB2/v...hp?t=15503

Feel free to discuss/request clarification as deemed necessary.

I've read your criteria page. Here are my jumbled thoughts:

I enjoy music already. I don't necessarily need to know why, or what specific properties in said music causes my enjoyment of it. I'm really only interested in consciously identifying my personal criteria if doing so will enhance my enjoyment of music enough to make the undertaking worthwhile, and I'm not so sure that's the case. I have no clue why I like what I like. It's far from clear-cut. Also, there's the risk (however small) that I could end up damaging my ability to enjoy music. "What ridiculousness!" you must be thinking. How could that be?

I'll explain.

Right now I enjoy music just fine. Let's say I go ahead and figure out why, and identify specific criteria to look for. Now, when when listening to music, I'll be looking for these criteria and judging whether I like the music based on whether I find them or not. But if this becomes a habit, and I always base my evaluation of music solely on whether it has these properties, am I really truly enjoying the experience? It's like when someone loves movies, so they get an IMDB or letterboxd account and start rating all their favorite movies, but now whenever they watch a movie all they can really think about is what score they should give it instead of simply enjoying the experience. Then the whole point of watching a movie becomes deciding on a score for it. Movie-watching becomes a chore in service of movie-rating, and all the joy that got the whole thing started in the first place has been drained out.

And what if I misidentify my criteria and look for the wrong things? Or I identify a restricted set of criteria that doesn't actually represent the totality of what I truly value in art? Either I'll realize that I've done so, in which case I'm clearly not just using the criteria I've identified to evaluate art, and so maybe it was unnecessary to identify them in the first place, or I won't realize my mistake, which has its own obvious problems.

This makes it sound like I'm totally against the attempt to objectively delineate one's art evaluation criteria. I'm really not. This is just me thinking out loud, so to speak. Honestly these aren't huge concerns. I trust myself to avoid any pitfalls like these.

One of the things you say you look for is "emotional conviction", and I think that makes sense as something to look for in art. It's probably the main thing I "look for" (albeit not consciously; I just enjoy the experience when it happens to move me). But you say it doesn't matter what the emotion is. You even mention apathy and boredom. I find that extremely odd. Do you have any examples of compelling expressions of apathy, or boredom?

And then there's "conceptual significance". I'm not sure I totally understand what you mean by that, and especially how it can be present in instrumental music. I mean, I guess there are music theory concepts. Is that what you mean?

When I think of appreciating conceptual significance, I think of philosophy, mathematics, science, logic, etc. Not art. For instance, the most compelling and awe-inspiring concept I can think of at the moment would be Gödel's incompleteness theorems. I don't know if you're familiar, so I'll summarize it as simply as I can:

Some folks were worried that math's foundations were faulty, so they decided to rebuild it from the ground up. Specifically they wanted to avoid self-reference, because of problems it caused. So they created an impressive formal system with two goals in mind: it should be able to derive every mathematical truth (completeness), and it should not be able to derive any falsehoods (consistency). The system they created was so impressively powerful and flexible that they thought they were successful. But there was no way to prove for sure that they were. Then another fellow came along (Gödel) who showed that the system's very power and flexibility made it's own completeness impossible. And not just this specific system. It's an unfixable, inherent problem. Any system that crosses a certain powerfulness threshold (that's necessary to cross if it really wants to be both complete and consistent) cannot actually be simultaneously complete and consistent. You can pick only one. This was a bizarre thing for mathematicians to discover. It went against the entire quest of their discipline. And not only that, but the way that Gödel proved it is so astoundingly clever, it's scarcely conceivable that a human mind came up with it.

Anyway, I've never encountered anything like that in music. Nothing with even close to the same conceptual significance. In fact, I don't think art is at all the appropriate place for that sort of thing. Which makes me think I just don't understand what you mean by "conceptual significance".

I don't know what to say about ingenuity. It seems to me to be an inessential ingredient, neither necessary nor sufficient for music to be good. It certainly doesn't hurt, but there's plenty of music I really like that's not particularly ingenious.

The whole idea of boiling down one's taste in art to a few relatively simple criteria seems, to me, to be a fool's errand. Clearly you've found something that works for you, so I'm wrong, admittedly, but that's how it seems to me. When I think about what it is I like about the things I like, there are a few common threads, sure, but they're far from the whole picture. Some art works for me, and some doesn't. It's complicated, and I don't pretend to understand it.

Here's my attempt to sum up what I like about music:
I tend to prefer music that's the result of a strong individual artistic vision. This means I gravitate toward singer-songwriter stuff. But I like other stuff too.
I tend to prefer more introspective, contemplative music. But I like other stuff too.
I tend not to like dancier, four-on-the-floor type stuff so much. But sometimes I do.

And... that's about it. What works, works. What doesn't, doesn't. It's a mysterious magical alchemy. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and all that.

So, is there any hope for me or am I a lost cause?
Either way I'd still appreciate your thoughts on Freak Out!, if you're willing to provide them.

First I find it kind of strange when someone “has no idea why they like what they like” yet makes criteria-related, comparative decisions about it (ratings, rankings and so forth). It's rather contradictory and doesn't make a lot of sense. And then criticizing someone who has this very thoroughly worked out and very thoroughly understands his/her views, as if a state of confusion and low understanding of such things would be more optimum, is rather odd (imo). Though you go back and forth on this in your response, so it’s not a big deal, but I did want to throw the idea out there because I think it’s illogical/flawed thinking.

The only times the “drained out” phenomena you’re describing occurs for people would be when they make an attempt to judge something “objectively”/according to some criteria other than their own. The “drained out” phenomena shouldn’t be a concern if your criteria is an accurate description of what YOU favor, as all you are then doing is simply “active observing/listening” for this -- actively observing/listening to the details of what work of art you’re experiencing and the things about it you like/don’t like in varying degrees. If you’re not doing this, I don’t see how one is very serious about what they’re experiencing, and I don’t see how their resulting judgement is very reliable (even for themselves).

Re: emotional conviction, examples of compelling expressions of "apathy" and "boredom"...

For instance, various songs/albums by the Velvet Underground, Lisa Germano, Leonard Cohen, Low, Red House Painters (slow-core in general) are rampant with such expressions of “apathy” or “boredom” and the like, compellingly relayed, usually with a dilated or majestic sense to them, so that they draw a thin line between apathy or boredom and ecstacy/interminable (false or drugged-induced) happiness.

Re: conceptual significance...

By “conceptual” I am referring to any concept or confluence of concepts being evoked by the artist, whether earthly or metaphysical, whether a dangerous or mysterious circumstance, a relationship torn apart or coming together, an existential crises or spiritual revelation, etc. Again, it is not so much which concept is being expressed, but how and to what degree? How strong or compelling is its expression?

Re: ingenuity...

What you've said about ingenuity appears to be contradictory and it doesn't seem like you understood what I meant.

("I don't know what to say about ingenuity. It seems to me to be an inessential ingredient, neither necessary nor sufficient for music to be good." versus “Here's my attempt to sum up what I like about music: I tend to prefer music that's the result of a strong individual artistic vision.”)

If you re-read what I say about ingenuity you will find that you’re basically repeating it in your description of what you DO like.

By ingenuity I mean, ideally, "an expression that took singular intelligence and creativity to conceive". There are reasons why there isn't another Beethoven, or Orson Welles, or John Coltrane, or Michelangelo, or Captain Beefheart. These are each artists that truly embodied singular visions and are virtually inimitable. I also want to acknowledge that, to greater or lesser degree, each and every artist could be considered "singular", as there are no two that are exactly alike. However, there are degrees of ingenuity and I am most impressed by the most extraordinary and the most singular examples.

Also, and this is key: ingenuity is important largely in proportion to its contribution to the emotional or conceptual expression of the work. Therefore, ingenuity without such a purpose is proportionally less significant to me, and also points to why I stress “singular intelligence and creativity to conceive”. There is intellect and creativity involved, not just coming up with some random innovation that serves little purpose. A less creative or purposeful application can be impressive in ways, but can only go so far. It can even get a good, possibly excellent, rating from me, but only so high before it appears lacking in relation to the most creative examples.

All art is, fundamentally: an expression of creativity/ingenuity (to greater or lesser degree). The words “creativity” or “ingenuity” are interchangeable in my descriptions.

In regards to your "fool's errand" comment, yes, I would disagree. And you are making a fundamental error in deciding that art and its evaluation has to be "complicated" and "can't be understood" or "to understand it is a pretense" (if this is infact how you feel). This is BS that has likely been propaganda from "elitist historians/critics" (and the like) across the centuries that don't want art to be understood so as to validate their own superior understanding (they are the only ones that can understand it). In this sense you are right: you will never get to the point of understanding if you are closed off to the possibility to begin with.

What you seem to be missing is that my criteria is a description of the fundamentals behind all art (including your own favorites) and is all-inclusive. So you are making an error in reading it as restrictive (and any of my lists can go some way towards demonstrating this with how varied and eclectic they are). Simply put, you will not find a single work of art (any genre/form) that is not (a) an expression of emotion(s) (to greater or lesser degree); (b) an expression of concept(s) (to greater or lesser degree); and (c) an expression of creativity/ingenuity (to greater or lesser degree). All 3 are present in all art across the entirety of human history. All 3 are the impetus behind all art, from all artists. Therefore my criteria is inclusive of every work of art of all time and takes my own experiences and knowledge with these into account in my judgments (and in that sense, subjectively, is "fool proof").

If you do not understand the fundamental impetus from the artist and their work, you are far less likely to be aligned with what they're doing while you are experiencing it. Such alignment is likely to be random and not an active, concerted observation of what is being attempted/accomplished, without which, understanding is much less likely to occur.

Furthermore, my criteria page is not meant as a detailed description of analyses, but simply the fundamentals that such analyses are based on. It is also written in general descriptors of these factors because it is describing a uniform criteria for all art forms simultaneously. In terms of seeing these fundamentals in much more detailed application, in direct relation to particular works of art, examples can be found such as with my Citizen Kane review/analysis or Nostalghia review/analysis (see Movies and TV forum), or for paintings, on my "Greatest Paintings" list (Mona Lisa, etc) (see Lounge Forum) or in various other film and album reviews that I have posted or will post here at some point in the future.
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Best Classical
Best Films
Best Paintings