Both are important I think, but if I like a song first time I'm 95% certain I'll be bored of it by the 4th or 5th listen. Conversely most of my favourite bands/songs are ones I wasn't sure about when I first heard them. I take this into account when I hear something and it governs how much of a chance I give songs to grown on me.
I see a lot of reviews (and a couple for our entry this week which motivated me to do this) saying "doesn't grab me"; this is fair enough but is it important in the long term if it's a good song?
and now, a quote:
spOOn wrote:listened thrice and really connected third time
If a song doesn't grab me on first listen, then it's not going to get a second or third (unless it's by an artist I already like).
Life's too short to waste it repeating stuff you didn't enjoy first time round, on the off-chance that you might enjoy it more second time. If I eat at a restaurant and I don't enjoy the food, I'm not going back, even though it could just be that the chef was having a bad day.
obscurity.
"Only the great masters of style ever succeed in being obscure." - Oscar Wilde.
obscurity wrote:If a song doesn't grab me on first listen, then it's not going to get a second or third (unless it's by an artist I already like).
Life's too short to waste it repeating stuff you didn't enjoy first time round, on the off-chance that you might enjoy it more second time. If I eat at a restaurant and I don't enjoy the food, I'm not going back, even though it could just be that the chef was having a bad day.
Wow. Just wow. This is EXACTLY how I think and I think that this is a <b>great analogy</b> adding that you wouldn't want to spend money (which equates time IMO) on food you didn't like the first time.
However, every once and a while... a song will creep up on me after a while. This usualy happens when I'm listening to a sound track, a compilation, a songfight... things that I would listen to as a collective anyways. I consider those songs lucky in Hoblit world. This is more like going to McDonalds all the time and ordering the Big & Tasty instead of the Big Mac because you always get the Big Mac and you find that they both have lettuce and condiments that you like.
The food analogy didn't work for me because there are a lot of different dishes on the menu. Now, if I don't like the way a restaurant is managed, I probably wouldn't go back until they offer a three for one deal and I'd ask for extra bread sticks.
....oh wait, what were we talking abooot?
Oh yeah, if a song grabs my attention by a band, I will give their other stuff a chance. I believe every band need a flash in the pan along with some deeper talented songs. You have to get someones attention if you want them to listen, it's as simple as that.
Bottom line, both.
I'd prefer to have my head turned inside out the first time I heard a song, personally. Bands/artists/whomever who push me to rethink art will always be re-experienced.
Short list, the first time I heard... John Zorn, Soul Coughing, The Aquabats, Toy-fucking-Dolls, Beethoven (Eroica), that guy who did a symphony with sampled copy machines, Wall of Voodoo's cover of Ring of Fire...
I had heard OF these guys, but the first time I had ever actually HEARD them I was in a used record store. What was cool is that my first thought was...this sounds like a modern day Oingo Boingo and I went up to the front to see the 6 CD cases representing the current mix in the CD player. I saw The Aquabats and instantly knew that was what I was listening to based on everything I had heard about them.
Yay, Aquabats. I got to see them opening for, umm, Let's Go Bowling and Bad Religion, I think... I had a friend who wanted to see them but needed transpo / a semi-responsible adult along, so I got a free ticket. Totally loved the Aquabats, Let's Go Bowling was okay, but after the Ab's, seemed pretty low energy, and I think we left during Bad Religion (even though that was the band he had wanted to see).
As for the poll, yeah, if a song (or a band) doesn't hit me on first listen, I probably won't get around to a second listen for a while. There have been a few exceptions, one I can think of is "Cherokee Louise" by Joni Mitchell, which didn't do much for me at first, but it was surrounded by so much other brilliant stuff on a great CD (Night Ride Home) that I kept listening to it, and then one day I happened to really hear the lyrics and realized I'd missed a total work of genius.
But, yeah, usually it has to hit me right out of the gate. And I think that that's a reasonable assumption to make about songfight stuff as well... with as many as 40 songs in a single fight, most songs are pretty much going to get one listen and they'll either be a keeper or not. I'm not quite sure how someone would write differently so that their song makes a good first impression at the expense (maybe) of long term sticking power... but I think it's something to aim for in the songfight context...
Charles (KA)
"...one does not write in dactylic hexameter purely by accident..." - poetic designs
There's something special about a song growing on you after a while. When I first like a song, I tend to stop liking it after a short while. However, that's not necessarily what happens every time. Sometimes I get hit with a song right from the start, and I love it forever.
Here's a song that slipped through the loop hole. When My Sharona came out by the Knack, it was loved by all, but hated with in a month of radio whoring. Now, many years later, any time I go to a fair and My Sharona is pumping through the PA on a ride like the zipper, with people screaming, I love it all over again.....for about 10 minutes. In fact, I think I'll have me a listen right now. They just don't make songs like My Sharona anymore.
edit:
The dude on the Les Paul looks like Caravan Ray.
Edit 2:
This also reminds me why I love Paco Del Stinko playing guitar on my songs.
Interesting spread of comments here. The first time I read obscurity's post I was going to make another food metaphor, decided to leave it a couple of days and I have concluded thusly:
1. That metaphor is silly. The only similarity between going to a restaurant and listening to a song is that you can have an opinion on both of them.
2. This comment - "Life's too short to waste it repeating stuff you didn't enjoy first time round." - ironically, isn't worth anybody's time.
Furrypedro wrote:Interesting spread of comments here. The first time I read obscurity's post I was going to make another food metaphor, decided to leave it a couple of days and I have concluded thusly:
1. That metaphor is silly. The only similarity between going to a restaurant and listening to a song is that you can have an opinion on both of them.
2. This comment - "Life's too short to waste it repeating stuff you didn't enjoy first time round." - ironically, isn't worth anybody's time.
Well, fuck you too.
obscurity.
"Only the great masters of style ever succeed in being obscure." - Oscar Wilde.
It may well not be worth the time of a person who thinks listening to a song once is equivalent to paying for something perishable. It will also require more patience and open-mindedness than that person has, considering how thought-out their opinons are and how eloquently they have been expressed so far.
I think that there has got to be something appealing or interesting about a piece of music on first listen to invite repeated listens. There is just too much music and not enough time to invest it in trying to appreciate everything that's out there.
Steve
"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture" -Unknown
"Seems to me this is the point of Songfight" - Max The Cat
Furrypedro wrote:It may well not be worth the time of a person who thinks listening to a song once is equivalent to paying for something perishable.
A single listen to a song can easily be compared to a perishable meal by the restaurant representing the band even.
Single listen = cheeseburger
Did you like the cheeseburger? Yes, No? Why?
Did you like the song? Yes, No? Why?
Band = Restaurant, Money = Time
Was the cheeseburger bad or good enough to order something else on the menu? Would you order another cheeseburger? Was the cheeseburger so bad you'd not ever want to go back to that particular restaurant and spend your money on another one? Or would you go back and order that cheeseburger again whenever you got the hankering for it?
Personally think its a great analogy that shouldn't be so easily dismissed let alone down right insulted.
mmmm.... cheeseburger. Tampa now has a Whataburger... hmmm..
It's like looking at a new font. Does it look cool? Is it legible, attractive, distinctive, unique-yet-functional? Does it subtly (or not-so-subtly) reinforce the message of the text that's set in it without being cloying or clichéd?
Would you be able to handle reading seventy thousand words in this font without going completely bugshit nuts?
Okay, maybe that analogy doesn't work so well. Next?
