From: crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu (Lauren L. Crawford)
Newsgroups: rec.music.christian
Subject: Re: Top 40 CCM albums of 1992
Date: 8 Jan 93 20:41:51 GMT
Organization: University of Pennsylvania

In article <1993Jan8.152505.8673@cbnews.cb.att.com> ajw@cbnews.cb.att.com (andrew.j.whitman) writes:

>I know a lot of people who fit into the same general category.  For
>many people college/young adulthood tends to be the most musically
>adventurous time of their lives.  There's always strange new exotic
>sounds filtering out of somebody's dorm room, and there are lots of
>concerts nearby, and there's always the subtle but nevertheless real
>hipper-than-thou pressure to check out some band that you've never
>heard of but that the guy with the cool ponytail really likes. 

And, as you hinted, that's the time in life when the largest percentage of
one's income (such as it is) goes into one's music collection.  I'm lucky
if I buy a CD a month at this point in my life.  I think the live music
scene also had a big impact on my musical tastes in college ... I was
heavily into the coffee house circuit and was playing (singing) with a
bluegrass band; I spent hours and hours learning new folk/bluegrass/blues
tunes.  I was introduced to a whole slew of people I'd never have
encountered otherwise ... David Bromberg, Debbie McClatchy and the Red
Clay Ramblers, Madcat Ruth, Gemini, Bessie Smith ... 

And then, suddenly, I got sick of it all and discovered New Wave.  Elvis
Costello and the Attractions.  The B-52s in their Rock Lobster days.  The
Clash.  Blondie.  The Specials.  Madness.  Much more mainstream stuff.  I
discovered it, as you said, through friends and through parties.  I dabbled
a bit with Christian music, but didn't find anything I liked outside of
John Michael Talbot.  It was only a couple of years ago that I started
paying attention to CCM at all; before that, I'd written it off as a great
wasteland.

Eventually, I found myself moving toward world beat/international stuff. 
Probably because I spent a significant amount of my 20s overseas.  I
developed a strong interest in Indian music, both traditional and pop, and
some interest in reggae, ska, rai, Japanese (traditional), Chinese (ditto),
Vietnamese (pop), South American (pop, mostly), Middle Eastern, African
(traditional and pop), and Irish stuff.  

At this point in my life, I find I like all of the above, plus classical. 
In fact, the more classical I listen to, the less interested in pop I
become.  I never thought I'd like opera, but I've been to the Met several
times this past year and am leaning toward becoming certifiably hooked. 
On the live stuff, anyway.  Again, much of this is through friends who
have long loved classical music and are sharing that affection now with
me.  

I still buy pop once in a while.  I bought Suzanne Vega's latest ... I
bought a Bing Crosby Christmas album (stop wheezing, Andy) ... that's
about it for the past six months or so.  I suspect I'll buckle and buy
Kate and Anna Mcgarrigle's latest soon, though I don't know as I'd
classify them as pop.  Oh, I also bought Amy Grant's pop album -- I
actually like it quite a bit.  First thing I've bought of hers.  

At this point, I'd like to more deeply explore classical music and also
CCM.  I really only know the mainstream folks; this group has piqued my
interest in getting to know the lesser-knowns a bit better.  I'd
definitely like to get my hands on some great black gospel stuff.  And maybe
some jazz.  I *hate* fusion; I classify it with heavy metal as the only
two forms of music I can't seem to develop a taste for.  But I like Pat
Metheny, Branford Marsalis, Larry Corryell (sp?), and a few others I've
heard.   

The past couple of days of postings in this group have also made me decide to
reinvestigate the blues.  I used to love that stuff; time to dig it out
again.  
   
>And I thought about this.  I considered my own parents, who were mainly
>listening to the music of their young adulthood, and my grandparents,
>who were mainly listening to the music of *their* young adulthood,
>and I asked myself if I wanted to be hearkening back to the good old
>days of Phil Keaggy and Led Zeppelin at age 65, and the answer was "no."  
>So I made a conscious decision to try to expand my horizons.  

An admirable decision.  Think I'll take it to heart.

>I can appreciate the desire for music that is "easy on the ears" and
>that doesn't make too many demands on one's attention.  But I guess 
>I'm also finding that the more one listens, the more comfortable one
>becomes with genres of music that were once strange and inaccessible.
>To a certain extent you have to work at it.  But it gets a lot 
>easier with increasing exposure and familiarity.  

As I say, that's worked for me for every genre I've encountered except the
two I've mentioned above.  It's possible I could eventually like fusion
jazz.  But I expect I'll be raptured first.  I also think I've just plain
outgrown some pop music.  Maybe if I shut out the lyrics ... 

Oh, one other genre I'm having some trouble with:  rap.  I tend to like
rap spin-offs, the ones that include some melody somewhere, and there've
been a couple of rap songs I've actually enjoyed somewhat, but I've yet to
hear anything in that genre that's tempted me even remotely to buy it. 
Except Sinead O'Connor's "I Am Spread(?) on Your Grave."  Who would've
thought to combine rap with traditional Irish music?  

Which brings me to what is probably my current favorite musical trend: 
mongrelizing.  Mixing genres, blending countries.  It's why I love a lot
of world beat music -- Indian jazz (Sheila Chandra), Middle Eastern pop
(Ofra Haza), and the above-mentioned Irish rap.  This stuff I could listen
to forever.  I don't suppose anyone in CCM is doing anything like this? 

>It's sort of like visitng the mall bookstore where your only choices
>are Sidney Sheldon, Jackie Collins, Stephen King, Anne Rice, and 
>Barbara Cartland.  You can read the stuff, and maybe there are times
>when it's appropriate to kick back and turn off your mind and read
>the stuff, but a steady diet turns you into mental mush.  I find
>the same ideas apply to music that is easy on the ears and readily
>accessible.  It may not be harmful in the short run, but before
>you know it you're buying Harry Connick Jr. and Michael Bolton albums :-).  
>It's just a short step from there to watching "Entertainment Tonight" and 
>studying the Billboard charts.  At that point radical measures may
>be necessary - either intensive study of Sartre's "Being and Nothingness"
>for non-Christians or a forty-page term paper on The Book of Leviticus
>for Christians.  Either way it's not pleasant.  Better to buy some
>jazz today.  

Uh-oh.  What about watching "M*A*S*H" reruns for the 20th time and reading
Dorothy Sayers?  Am I playing with fire?  Is it just a matter of time
before I'll have to explicate the mildew passage in Leviticus 13?



-- 
The trick of reason is to get the imagination to seize the actual world --
if only from time to time.     -- Annie Dillard, "An American Childhood"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lauren Crawford  //  crawford@ben.dev.upenn.edu