Ask HN: How to Become a Music Buff? Music has always been the least appealing art form for me out of the music-film-literature trio. Now I am looking to get more familiar with its history, evolution and simply discover good music. Is there a music buff's roadmap, some sort of a chronologically-ordered list of the best and most influential albums that gives a coherent picture of how music evolved over the 20th century? And is that a right approach to becoming a music buff? If not, what is? |
I didn’t really consider myself a music buff from the listening perspective until I had worked through several of those. Despite the 4chan moniker, they are really good genre introductions and have excellent selections.
Consider an album a node in the great graph of music. The links to other nodes are plentiful and will likely lead to other things you love. Explore other artists on the same label, other groups composed of members of the group, other albums recorded in the same studio, etc.
Don't just listen to the music but get interested in the context, just like any work of art, the significance is often relative to the context in which it was created. Learn about the history of the members, read reviews, etc.
Learn an instrument, you don't have to be good, but a little knowledge of how to play some of your favorite music can really help to understand the craft.
Find some of those '500 best albums of all time' type lists and do my graph exploration for the ones that resonate with you. It's fine to not like everything but awareness of the really impactful landmark albums will help you understand the evolution of music. It can be interesting to learn about what an album is a _rejection_ of as much as it is a homage to.
tldr - bread first explore from what you already like
if you are interested in harder edge lineage of rock music, then start with the american beatles-- the velvet underground. the 8 minute version of 'what goes on' on live 1969 is the single greatest rock recording of all time and will be studied by scholars for as long as the recordings remain. a good starting point would be the self titled album or the one with nico
also listen to ALBUMS over and over, not playlists-- in general, that's how that artists intended for their work to be consumed
the key is to put in the listening hours.
how you start doesn't matter much. maybe wikipedia + youtube?
2. Enjoy said music
3.
Can you share what your diagnosis is?
A benefit of exploring this music is that while the tradition is both deep and broad it's also very much alive, and there are tons of ways to get into it. A great start is to listen to WWOZ (wwozy.org) and to google all the artists that you like. I could do that all day if it paid.
Alternatively, search Google for "top [insert genre here] songs".
The most important thing IMO is to start listening to as many different things as you can and dive deeper from there. Then you can get all academic on your preferred genres like everybody mentions here.
My mind was blown when I heard the 2013 remaster of The Eagle's "Taking It Easy".
Original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0ZZHNRHA2g&t=1m36s
Remaster: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4v8KEbQA8kw&t=1m36s
I never knew there was a backing bluegrass guitar on the track!
At any rate, the easiest thing to do would be to dive into classical music, rather than popular music. In classical, there's only around a dozen composers with whom anyone expects you to be familiar.
1) Tune into HD college radio stations so you get exposed to a lot of stuff and you can see the artist/track names.
2) Make and explore play lists on Spotify.
3) Google artists that interest you.
My recommendation would be to look at the most famous/most popular musicians in the respective genre you're studying, and then follow the links from there. Learn who influenced them, and who they influenced. And then follow the organic web from there.
While I feel like I've been doing a fairly good job of keeping up with music for the last decade, their knowledge of music, even from before they were born, is extensive and got me interested in exploring stuff that came out before I really cared about music.
soundopinions.org
Go to YouTube, pick one of the more niche things you like, hit autoplay, and then if something random you like comes up start the process over with the new thing as the initial search. I promise you this works.
I'm not generally a classical lover, but the energy he brings when discussing the music, with a bit of context, works for me.
1) Find your passion. I generally despise this as advise for careers and the like but when it comes to matters of personal preference, de gustibus non est disputandum. What do you like?
2) Hit Discogs for your bands. Don't just look at main albums, look at appearances and rarities, songs covered by the band, appearances on soundtracks (which can often be one-offs) and the like. For certain bands, I literally own everything they performed in because I like all of it. This is depth. After that, follow each member of a band to hear if they did anything before or after you enjoy. Even try session musicians. You may find a talented collaborator that way, too. This is breadth.
3) Find a radio program adjacent to your tastes and examine the weekly playlist. What did you like? Here you are riding in the slipstream of a great big truck, as the DJ is doing a lot of the work for you.
4) Ignore most recommendation algorithms but Pandora, which are based on what other people play rather than what is actually related.
5) Don't be afraid to reach out. I have written musicians letters (snail mail, self-addressed stamped envelope enclosed) and said, "I really like X, Y, and Z" or "Your performance on this track moved me" then asked what inspired them, influenced them, or if they have influenced others. I usually hear back.
6) Attend concerts and listen to the opening acts, buy their (typically cheap) CDs. The openers appreciate it and you can find some great somewhat related music that way.
7) Back in the days when record stores existed, I would hit the "M" section or whatever letter, any band that didn't have a tab of their own, and just flip through it, looking for anything to catch my eye, then listen that way. Many duds, but some real wins.
8) Now that you have a sense of what you enjoy, you probably have some names associated with them, various microgenres. List 'em. For example, "grave wave."
9) Look up those microgenres on Bandcamp and the like, listen through that way.
10) Hit "Every Noise at Once" and surf your microgenre that way, too. Bop around between band and microgenre names.
11) Iterate.
Also if you want to check out mostly quite recent popular songs, and some highlights of the tracks with commentary, see Rick Beato's What Makes this Song Great playlist. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScRG40_7zb0&list=PLW0NGgv1qn...
However -- I've always listened to a lot of music. I still probably get through 10 or so new releases a week, a fair amount of older stuff I've never heard, and a lot of 'comfort' records. The problem with top XYZ lists is you have to be 'open' to listening to them, and for some records it definitely helps to have some reference points in the form of 'stuff you know' to frame why they're significant. It took me years to see the genius in some records that later become favourites.
Whilst I became much open to exploring genres as I got older, and whilst my tastes are now far more varied, primarily I still listen to a lot of alternative/punk and hip-hop. I'll occasionally listen to more electronic music, but with the rare exception anything too house/techno/etc. just doesn't work for me as much. I also find when exploring back catalogues it helps to hear the song over the production - a punk rock record from 1985 probably sounds like shit - but when you learn to hear the song you see how amazing it was. Definitely something a younger me struggled with (in a world of over produced music!).
I guess what I'm saying is personally I feel music is a lot like anything else. The more you surround yourself with it, the more you 'get' it, the more genres bleed into one another. And the more you hear, the better frame of reference you have as to why some of the 'best' records are what they are and sounds like they do.
TL;DR: Listen to lots and lots, keep exploring. Spotify is an incredible tool. Pick a genre, listen to what Spotify recommends. See what grabs you. If nothing does, try another genre. Keep trying until something grabs you. Then delve into the genre - you'll find pretty soon that genres start to crossover. Music should be fun.
God I love music.
Randy Bachman's Vinyl Tap is an amazing look into (somewhat Canadian-focused) classic rock, 60's, 70s, with amazing anecdotes about how it connects with the biggest namns of the last 65 years. Truly awesome radio show. https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/2-4294-randy-bachmans-v...
For current music (yes, even pop) I HIGHLY recommend Benji B on BBC Radio 1. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00v4tv3/episodes/player He has been doing yearly "Best Of" mixes for over 10 years, and if you want to contextualize what's been going on in the last decade-plus of everything club/underground, rap, techno and pop, they're required listening. Whatever bias you have about current music, I promise there's something for you in his programming. Easily one of the best radio DJs in the world.
Second mention is Gilles Peterson, more jazz/world focused than Benji but they crossover numerously, and his programming is just stellar. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01fm4ss/episodes/player
Lastly, I'd recommend Pete Tongs "Essential Mix" if you find an artist/DJ that you appreciate, its essentially masterclass mixes on their most inspiring work and adjacent music.
Enjoy
33 1/3 book series https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/33%E2%85%93
deep cuts youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRYhCg0DHloE9gn-PAiAYNg
This is a huge undertaking as a LOT of music has been made during that time period, covering a huge amount of genres and cultural movements. I think you're going to get overwhelmed.
Is there a reason why youre more concerned with the history of the medium than current releases ? We are living in one of the best times in history to access new music. It can be as simple as finding a reviewer/website you like and following their recommendations.
With that said, there are a lot of amazing albums that have been released in the past, this goes without saying. But like other people have mentioned, the best approach is an organic one. Find compilations of famous albums or singles, listen to them, focus on what you like, read up about the genre and find other recommendations. I find youtube is especially good at taking you down rabbit holes.
If you dont know where to start, you can look at 4chans music boards "essential" albums [1] and see what appeals to you. Never thought I would recommend something from that site but it actually did expose me to a lot of new stuff 10 years ago. Other popular sites like Pitchfork and Sputnik music tend to write articles about influential albums or genres.
If you are interested in the "why" behind some of the history, David Byrne (formerly of the Talking Heads) wrote a phenomenal book on the subject called "How Music Works", that explains a lot of important shifts in the mediums history.
I absolutely love music and the emotional effects it has. But I can never remember the names of songs, or how they sound. It means when I try to play music at a party, first I have to look it up by finding the playlist I put it in, and then it inevitably falls flat - missing the mood in the room by being too sad or happy or heavy or melodic. Many of my friends do this instinctually - they can throw songs into the queue and they fit the mood.
The one area I can seem to remember is actual bands I've seen perform. Something about engaging with live music sets it in my mind.
So while I think investing time into music if you enjoy it is worthwhile, there's no point forcing yourself. It might be that you're just not wired that way. And that's ok!
As a bonus: gigs are free and in most cities happen every night (at evensong, which also comes with free mindfulness and meditation sessions, as well as a chance for a singalong with the crowd.)
The choirs range from school and college scholarship level to outright professionals and they will often have albums where you can explore their repertoire, and branch off from there. In essence: they put together the need-to-know pieces on your behalf, which assists massively in increasing buff-level.
I find the ensemble of male voice to also be incredibly relaxing:
https://open.spotify.com/track/12hKtoAt7uiDgqIzrqWWr4?si=O8d...
I think a good start for you might just be going to RYM Charts (https://rateyourmusic.com/customchart) and selecting a genre. You'll find the top rated albums, and can further filter by the decade. That's my #1 music discovery source.
For anyone starting from nearly-scratch with popular music I'd recommend a chronological approach to lists like this. Don't start at #1—cut the list off with however many you're willing to commit to listening to, then order them by release date, and start at the beginning. For the earliest entries consider hunting down the major influences on their genre or a couple major popular acts from the preceding 10-20 years before them to get a sense of where they came from—maybe a few tracks of ragtime, a crooner or two, a couple big-band acts, some early and mid-period jazz, maybe an album of "standards" or something, a small selection of early rock. That's a decent set-up for starting on 60s-and-on popular music, which is mostly what these lists treat (Kind of Blue is almost always the highest-ranking exception to the "60s and later" rule)
[EDIT] incidentally, I don't see a CSV or Excel export option for the list on this site, even in the list of "subscriber" features that I could unlock by paying $15. I am entirely certain I'm not the only person who needs my lists to end up somewhere like that so I can mess around with sorting, checking-off, and so on :-)
In fact, most of this music has been as much a cultural phenomenon and and a statement of a generation, as it was... music. Not being rude to individual artists, who were at times very talented, a lot of this music is musically rather simplistic and doesn't require any preparation, but a cultural context. Granted your film-literature preferences, a good territory to start explorations from would be watch a few music movies, like the history of the Doors etc. that could give you the context needed and you are all set for many months of listening. But is all largely about youthful energy, about love, a man vs society, about dance and drugs. So - if you are not too young anymore - it can be a bit boring ;)
One exception would be jazz, that is a bit more complex to grasp, but again - you have a good series from Ken Burns to start with. That being said, to enjoy jazz truly in it's more complex genres, I would argue at least certain musical background is beneficial, maybe some youtube talks etc.
Classical music... well this is a true ocean. Just Beethoven piano sonatas could be a passion for a year or two. You're talking about XX century, and there's been great classical music published in that period! But probably - if you go that route - you really want to start with renaissance and baroque. Here a lot of great introductory courses are available. If you don't have musical background, Robert Greenberg series on Great Courses is really an entertaining and valuable intro.
And then there is world music, ranging from African roots bands playing drums to Indian classical music.
Now - having all that said - my personal perspective is that to enjoy music, you want to enjoy music. What I mean by that, is that you might want to dance, sing, play! Even a simple baroque dance, played by your self, could be way more gratifying that latest dull pop hit. If you really want to enjoy music and not just be a pop music encyclopedia who knows names of The Beatles - you should do one of these!
Other than that, music is really too diverse and varied to approach systematically IMO, especially from the perspective of individual taste (as opposed to, say, academic ethnomusicology). My suggestion would be tasting assortments of artists within subgenres until you stumble upon something you love, and branching from there. The free NTS internet radio station (https://nts.live) has a lot of searchable shows curated by musicians, so I really recommend that resource for exploration.
If you want to be a music buff, my suggestion is to learn how to play an instrument. This will give you the understanding to appreciate music; you can't truly understand a musician's talent until you try to play what they can and fail. You can't appreciate the complexity of a piece that has changing time signatures (for example) if you don't even know how to count time. You'll end up listening to the same chord progressions over and over (G-C-D come to mind...) if you don't know how to identify what you're listening to.
If you want to be an audio buff, buy some expensive speakers and then just follow you ears.
The book walks through musical concepts, one per chapter, and points to illustrative examples.
I've also found it interesting to check out top posts on these music appreciation/discovery subreddits:
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1260/3883/products/hip-hop...
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1260/3883/products/alterna...
1st exploration -> then exploitation.
Start by randomly listening to the most popular stuff from random genres, until something somewhat sticks.
Then reduce your search range to the type of music you liked, go to the "enthusiasts forum" for that genre (usually a subreddit) and find the 'true gems'.
Then do periodic MCMC random walk, where I go from my current genre to the most likely adjacent genres to branch out.
For the music I listen to, the chronological journey goes as follows: (with each genre capturing a couple of decades)
Jazz, Blues -> Rock -> psychedelic rock, metal -> prog rock , Frank Zappa, death metal-> prog metal -> experimental prog
Really, there is no such thing as being a "music buff", but you can be a "jazz buff" for example! I'd say pick something mildly pretentious to feed your clearly slightly overinflated ego and dig deep into the history of that genre.
Follow your current taste, and go backwards from there. What are the influences of the musicians and groups you like? What are the influences of their influences? This is how most people I know, including myself discovered music.
Go down the rabbit hole.
Listening to music isn't gonna do you a lot of good unless you have context. For example, The Beatles and Beach Boys influenced each other. Rubber Soul led to Pet Sounds which led to Sgt. Pepper which led to Smile.
Another consideration is that some of the real influencers aren't well known or popular, and some of them were not the singers but the music writers, producers, and musicians.
Given your list I would suppose maybe you like things with a complex narrative, or as is the case for me - music with clever/complex lyrics.
So you could look for music that has a complex narrative, but obviously that helps you find music best suited for you and not helping you build an understanding of what is appealing about music or what makes for 'good' music artistically speaking.
Although maybe you can jump from music appealing to you to a broader feeling for music in general.
Is there some music or musicians you find more appealing than others?
It's difficult to expand your musical horizons just by shooting in the dark at things you should like. But often you can build bridges to new things by exploring their musical ancestors and descendants. Like classic rock? Start listening to some blues, then go from there to jazz. Like hip hop? Move backwards through disco, funk, soul, and, well, there we're back to jazz.
Classical music is a somewhat harder nut to crack if you don't gravitate towards it. What I've found, however is that some people think they don't like classical because they don't like Mozart, but then you play something a bit more modern (say, Stravinsky or so) and that grabs their attention.
If you like electronic stuff, one great book that I read years back, and have since passed on to several people is this:
https://www.amazon.com/Electronic-Experimental-Music-Technol...
It does a very good job of drawing a line from musique concrète and impressionism all the way through modern stuff like DJ Spooky. There are older editions of the book that are cheaper used and should be just fine.
If you list some of the things you do like, then it'd be easier for riff off of that to give you some suggestions for what might expand your horizon. There's no shame in having unsophisticated tastes at first. I remember having a student who started off wanting to learn Limp Bizket, and we worked from there to Rage Against the Machine, then from there to things like King Crimson and eventually a couple years later he was into pretty sophisticated fusion stuff.
(Edit: fixed the link)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140313070112/http://www.getint...
Maybe I'd count, with years in pro music performance, degree in Jazz and a lifetime of listing to and performing an insanely wide variety of genres... but not a buff for all styles.
Computer systems are actually not a bad analogy. How many people do you know that have an in-depth knowledge of Assembly in different systems (including the oldest ones), GPUs, ML, Python, JS, Haskell, C++, Rust, ALGOL, Compilers, Hardware development, etc. Then add into the mix having an in-depth knowledge of the creators of those things, what else they did, failures, influences, their mentors.
You always have the choice of breadth versus depth, within your time constraints. I think learning about a single artist or band, looking up the producer, label, members and following up on all those leads to see what else they have done - and see if you like it is a great beginning.
Some genres like jazz might seem difficult to get into, and that's fine. No need to delve in until you find a hook that peaks your interest. And then when you find out about a genre (and jazz is an excellent example) - you'll find sub-genres you like, and don't and maybe you are interested in the evolution - like many people love bebop, but don't listen to "dixieland jazz" or big band swing, or modern fusion.
You will never hear all the music. But depth (in my opinion) breads a lot more passion than breadth just for the sake of it. So rather than listening to all the top 40 singles of the last decades, you'd probably be better off listening to some whole albums, and exploring from there.
Spotify (and similar) make it very easy for breadth, and can help discover new music you like - but you'll need to put work into delving in deep yourself.
As you do have a passion for film I'd suggest this.
For interesting modern music Quentin Tarantino files always deliver.
Danny Elfman has some interesting stuff (like this Simpsons theme which is a great example of the Lydian mode...)
John Williams & Hans Zimmer have made loads of epic soundtracks, and if you like them - look up Holst, Tchaikovsky and Wagner
If you want a weirder launching off point, watch koyaanisqatsi and look up Philip Glass who made the soundtrack - that's an interesting avenue, albeit not very mainstream.
Another epic film score is 28 Days Later, John Murphey - parts of which have been used in loads of other huge features like Kick Ass...
You could also go a different route, and look up how the pre-classical Pachelbel's Canon contains the chord progression that is arguably the most popular of all time and watch this mash up of songs that use it (or the first part) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOlDewpCfZQ
Hahahaha, I could go on forever! I hope you find something you love, and actually want to go deeper into.
Omg that film is absolutely amazing (maybe the best thing I've seen in the past 10 years) and easily half of the effect is the music.
For epic scores you can't also go wrong with "Requiem for a Dream"...
Electronic and Experimental Music: Technology, Music, and Culture by Thom Holmes.
I'll add a few other resources:
1) Soundcloud (the free version) is the best way I have found to find new music: https://soundcloud.com/
2) NPR's All Songs Considered and Tiny Desk Concerts are also excellent:
https://www.npr.org/sections/allsongs/
https://www.npr.org/series/tiny-desk-concerts/
https://www.npr.org/series/761983313/tiny-desk-playlists
3) Bandcamp has a surprising amount of music from around the world and you can almost always listen to everything before you buy. When I find music via bandcamp it is usually via small labels I found via someone I found out about elsewhere (small labels are not usually the "sign your life away" type so one artist is frequently on a bunch of small labels that have similar music). The website is not that great, look for label links in the upper left of the page (and when you go to a particular album it will often go to the artist's page outside the label and you can find their music on other labels from there). In addition to the Bandcamp Weekly that someone else mentioned they have a bunch of lists with short (meh quality) articles and a bunch of music that you can listen to right there. Note: beware of excessive PayPal currency conversion fees if you buy something in a different currency, either use a credit card if those fees are reasonable or transfer money to PayPal and convert to different currencies on the wallet page and use those pre-converted funds.
https://daily.bandcamp.com/lists/electronic-folklore-list
https://ostinatorecords.bandcamp.com/
https://zzkrecords.bandcamp.com/
https://wonderwheelrecordings.bandcamp.com/
https://palenquerecords.bandcamp.com/
https://galletascalientesrecords.bandcamp.com/
https://analogafrica.bandcamp.com/
https://sahelsounds.bandcamp.com/
https://theoutlawocean.bandcamp.com/
Also, the history of music can be broken down into the history of instruments and of the movement of people.
So the order I would suggest is:
1. Find music you like particularly
2. Seek out music related to #1
3. Start thinking about why you like what you like
So, start by establishing a visceral connection to the art before delving into the analytic side.
You'll learn a lot more reading about / listening to podcasts about music[0].
Step 1) Read the American music history Wikipedia article[1]
Step 2) Familiarize yourself with each genre listed.
How? Listen to the biggest hits in each. Explore the full discography of the genres popular artists. Understand the history and cultural context of each era.
Learn about how each generation was inspired by the previous. And don't forget to Read about the music.
If you don't know how to find info about this stuff try your local librarian!
Edit: don't just take it genre by genre. Go through the decades.
[0]]https://www.switchedonpop.com [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_history_of_the_United_St...
IME there is nothing that makes you appreciate music more than learning how it works at a really intimate & deep level. You have a super deep connection with the music when you're playing it instead of just being a listener.
I know for me there are whole genre's of music I couldn't appreciate till I started learning to play pieces in those genres. You start to see the interesting and innovative stuff in the music and you appreciate it.
If you're just going to listen.. do not listen while multi-tasking. Sit down and dedicate time to appreciating the music.. put on a nice set of headphones or get a nice stereo system and sit down and listen to a piece all the way through and pay attention to it.
When you are learning to play a piece you will tend to listen to it very carefully to pick out the parts.. if you try to listen at that level it will really pay off even if you're not learning to play the piece.
If you can't make that investment, I'd say watching some videos about theory, or reading up on production, or technique on any instrument will help gain a deeper understanding. Bernstein did the Norton Lectures in the 70s around a language of music (https://youtu.be/8fHi36dvTdE) but even watching somebody like Cory Wong or Jacob Collier go through their composition, playing and process (there are many other artists that do this stuff to) is great for appreciation / buffery.
Those are a good start:
A couple tips from me though:
1) Use Spotify, and the personal generated playlists that expand out (ie Discover Weekly, and Release Radar), avoid the ones that just play what you listen to a lot, it just reinforces a limited set of songs/albums/artists. And use the 'Fans also like' section of artists. Spotify's recommendations tend to really impress me, especially niche stuff
2) Never prejudge music. I used to do this, and since I grew up and stopped, my music taste has expanded in every direction. Own the embarrassing stuff, it's music for your enjoyment
3) Give everything a chance. Listened to something which was too experimental/loud/ambient/whatever? Come back to it later, some genres and even albums are growers, so never discount anything quickly.
4) There's no bad music. There is music you may not like, there's music which may be poorly produced/poor musicianship/etc, but music is about more than the sum of it's parts
__Edit__
Nearly forgot the most important IMO.
5) Songs are (for the most part) designed to sit in their place as a chapter in an album. They typically make more sense in the context of the other songs, so try and listen to full albums rather than songs or playlists. And make sure to turn off shuffle!
I went through the genres, working from the past to the present and ended up with a much broader experience in music because of it.
They still seem to have most of those features.
For example, they have a list of genres (https://www.allmusic.com/genres). If you go into a genre, say blues, there are lists of significant albums and artists. You have to click on the "list view", but that exposes the year of the album or artist. At the very bottom of the genre page (almost hidden) are lists of sub genres that you can break out. Each of these has the same highlighted album and artist information. If you go into detail on an individual artist, say Robert Johnson, they have bio, discography, and related artist / influences (https://www.allmusic.com/artist/robert-johnson-mn0000832288/...) information.
All that said, the site does not seem as easy to use as I remember (but that could be my memory). But, hopefully, it is at least a start towards what you are looking for!
Before all of this information was readily available on the internet, The Rolling Stone Album Guide was the de facto reference and a used copy can be had for around $5. Like any critical rating of art, ymmv, famously Led Zeppelin.
https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/117198.The_New_Rollin...
For current artists I usually turn to Pitchfork for news and criticism, RS tends to have a strong boomer bias.
There are also a lot of movies out there - Béla Fleck made a movie tracing the banjo back to africa Throw Down Your Heart, if your looking to chronological type stuff in America, Ken Burns did a series on American Jazz and Country music - https://www.pbs.org/kenburns, Muscle Shoals, Buena Vista Social Club, The Nu LatAm Sound may be of interest for non western movies
https://www.npr.org/sections/allsongs https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/500-greatest-... (take with a grain of salt)
so much music, so little time!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_Stone%27s_500_Greatest...
These are great starters, I would recommend going through and finding out what periods and artists speak to you and then joining Spotify and using their auto generated playlists to dig deeper. They do an AMAZING job if you <3 the songs you really get into. My personal taste is really scattered, gen z pop, old school country, punk, hip hop, 90's hi-nrg and house, disco, and they somehow consistently find new music that speaks to me.
The search is part of the enjoyment. Start listening to whatever you can find that you think you might like and if you don't like it just put it aside and look for something else. If you do like it, you will probably be compelled to find more music like it. Look for interviews with the artist or band members and they'll probably talk about their influences and other artists they themselves like. Go listen to those artists and repeat the process. If you like those artists keep digging. If not, go somewhere else and find some other music.
There must be at least one song or artist who interests you. I'd recommend starting there. One of my favorite albums is Love Man, by Otis Redding. Maybe give it a shot and see if you like it :) https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_kyK5LvO6EbPrUC...
Also, go see some live music. Seeing music live is almost incomparable to listening to music through headphones or car speakers.
Though if you really don't like music why do you think you can get good at it?
Like I feel like I have almost no knowledge of painting, and that it's important in some sense, and I'll go to exhibitions but... None of it goes in. I can't answer questions on what I've seen. (But music mostly did.)
Probably not, because it doesn't start from where you are. For example, my I happen to like the music of the second Viennese school (well, Schoenberg and Webern; I don't much like Berg's work). My parents both regarded it with confusion. So I sat them down and played a whole series of pieces, first going back from common practice into the Renaissance to get outside common practice tonality, and then forward through Puccini to Stravinsky, each stepwise leading their ears so when we got to Schoenberg's 4th string quartet they could hear it and say, "Alright, I see how this isn't a crazy departure and I kind of hear what's going on."
Now, my parents were steeped in Baroque and classical period music, so their starting point is unlikely to help you.
Someone else suggested a music appreciation course, which probably is the right way. You need some kind of framework to explore in and enough sampling of the space to be able to get a hint of what you like.
If you just want to get started right now, I suggest starting with the Beatles, which are the only artists that I think pretty much every western musician of the 20th century is conversant with, from Baroque music specialists to grunge metal players.
I like KEXP [0], a well-known community radio station from Seattle. They have many shows with all kinds of genres, as well as live music and discussion.
"The Rest Is Noise" by Alex Ross
"Modern Times, Modern Places" by Peter Conrad
"America's Musical Life: A History" by Richard Crawford is also great, focusing on America obviously and covers more than just the 20th century.
Bandcamp is a great place for music artists. Here a huge chunk of the profits go direct to the artists, so it's got every possible kind of music from nobody you've ever heard of.
They have a weekly radio show called The Bandcamp Weekly. It's super varied but they're friendly and they often do themes each week. Give it a go
Most of the music I’ve come to like in recent years I heard first on the BBC. Radio 3 is a particular treasure.
A lot of historical context can be built from that. And you also find more artists that way. Also if you really want to get into it, look up the instruments that are influential in the process of the albums you find. For example, J Dilla's MPC was one of the most important tools of the 90s Neo-Soul and Hip Hop scene (it's actually in the Smithsonian). But other producers have mastered it and its decedents... like Araab Musik, Pete Rock, or Kanye.
If you want to be a person who respects all different genres of music, look into the history of genres as you explore them and find the most influential albums in that genre (usually this correlates to albums sells for "popular" music, influential is usually tied to the network of artists someone has influenced, worked with, produced for, etc).
Hopefully that helps. I'm a huge music buff, so I'd be happy to discuss.
For example, Common's Album "Be" is the album that started me on my path back in 2009. I really liked the album and using those relations I was able to discover so much more music:
1. Kanye West produced it
-> Check-out other Kanye production credits
-> Jay-Z's "The Blueprint"
-> Lil Wayne's "Tha Carter III"
-> Kanye's solo albums
-> Check-out Marvin Gaye's album "What's Going On"
-> Check-out John Legend's album "Get Lifted"
About a year ago I started a project called Poseur to Composer. My goal is to play an instrument and learn enough music theory to compose songs I'm proud of (it's been a slow and humbling process, and I'm still working at it). Along the way I've discovered many new artists and genres, and I listen to music - no, engage with music - in a much different way now.
In case anyone's interested, here is where I've blogged my progress: https://poseurtocomposer.postach.io/page/sitemap and a recent newsletter I sent that encapsulates what I've accomplished thus far: https://mailchi.mp/60c7dfc7bcbb/rediscovery
Music married with electricity and that helped to create a cambrian explosion of creativity. This is the major contribution from the 20th Century to the history of music and nothing will be the same after this.
That spawned 1) Rock first, based in the electric guitar, and 2) an sea of Electronic music later, based in the synthesizer.
To focus in the second part, here you have a selection of albums to experience several flavours of electronic and experimental music, from dark wave to big beat, space rock or synthpop. Just one album representative of each group was chosen; not necessarily their best or the easiest to listen, but all deserve to be here for different reasons.
Kraftwerk - The Man-Machine
Yello - Stella
Pink Floyd - The Dark Face of the Moon
OMD - Dazzle Ships
Tricky - Maxinquaye
Massive Attack - Mezzanine
Bjork - Homogenic
The Prodigy - The Fat of the Land
Moby - Play
Smashing Pumpkins - Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness
Chemical Brothers - Dig Your Own Hole
Pet Shop Boys - Please
Fatboy Slim - You've Come a Long Way, Baby
Depeche mode - Violator
Radiohead - Kid A
Gary Numan - Hybrid
Jean Michel Jarre - Oxigene
The Cure - Disintegration
In parallel, learning music is best when you're having fun. You should start with your favorite artists and dive deeper into their discography. Research the label they were on (fruitful if the label is independent). Look into their contemporaries. Who were those artists? Maybe they were associated with a larger movement/scene, and so on.
Finally, listen to more music! Everything (almost) is on Youtube or Spotify. Make it a point to listen to music everyday.
Once I find some music I like, I start looking into the details of that genre. How it's constructed where it came from, what genres influenced it.
It's fascinating when you start getting into it.
But, if you don't enjoy it, I'm not sure how well it's going to go. It's hard to be a fan of something you don't really like that much.
How to use: a) For overview of most important albums which is at the same time a reasonable overview of modern music history, use the default sorting https://rateyourmusic.com/customchart b) after you get into specific sub-genre's, use the sorting. For example, you discover you like Japanese 90s city-pop? Here's the query for you https://rateyourmusic.com/customchart?page=1&chart_type=top&... c) for music discovery, browse recommendation lists of people there. It is a true gold-mine of great music
For completness, to rollingstone.com and npr, I add pitchfork.com which is arguably the most important "independent" medium
I knew that Django, the Python web dev framework, had been named after some obscure dutch musician. But after reading the book I had a wholly new appreciation for Django Reinhardt [1], the artist. Man was truly a great jazz improviser, whose legacy now lives on in the framework.
He has a very active youtube channel talking about various records. He usually talks about new releases, but here is a playlist of his reviews for albums considered "classics" https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLP4CSgl7K7or_7JI7RsEs...
Being a music buff among music buffs is as much about having a well-developed taste in music as it is a knowledge of music that influences others.
So start by developing your taste in music. Here’s how:
Using a site like albumoftheyear.org, listen to the first one to three tracks on the top rated albums from every genre.
Do this every week on Monday. New albums come out later in the week and it helps to see the how reviews change after more critics and fans listen repeatedly.
Your goal should be to find albums that you want to listen all the way through.
Sometimes, You’ll listen to the whole album and want to start it over as soon as you’re done. Other times you’ll find the album doesn’t live up to its first few tracks.
Albums you consider great you’ll be lucky to come across once out of a dozen times, so you have to be patient with the process.
You’ll know you found something you like when It feels exciting to know about a piece of music like you’re in on a secret. And it makes you want to tell other people about it.
Share the album with someone and tell them what you like about it.
Going through this process won’t only be a great experience—-you’ll learn your own taste.
And you’ll have convinced yourself that you in fact do enjoy discovering and listening to music as much or more than the other art forms you mentioned.
You’ll find you naturally learn about historically important pieces of music from reading reviews and from talking about music with other people who are impassioned by it.
The key is to then follow up like you would when you hear a word you don’t know the definition of, or library that solves something you were considering coding by hand.
Make a note, listen to the album and think about the context it was mentioned in.
If it appeals to you go back and listen to the greatest hits if that appeals to you go through their entire catalog.
But I agree it has more of "viceral" to it than anything else.
My advice to OP: find the radio stations, podcasts or playlists that tickle your fancy and just keep track of what you like as you listen.
OTOH, if you want a more historical approach, read about the music (or watch documentaries/tv shows) before you seek it out. That works for me when reaching out to music that are not on my radar. For instance, during the Xmas holidays I tend to read many Best Albums of YYYY lists, such as the Rolling Stone magazine one. That's how I found Amy Winehouse, Radiohead's In Rainbows among others that would have gone inadvertently for more time. I enjoy reading the "why I should listen to" part.
Speaking as a music fan, former producer and DJ I say that the secret is to follow your instincts. Find some things you do like, can be anything even if you currently only like a few things. Explore from here. Explore the artist's catalogue, find similar artists, look at related genres or the genre's roots / DNA. Spotify and YouTube algorithms are great at finding related content so just fall down a recommendation hole and see here it takes you. You can quickly make some interesting transitions into other genres even like this. Don't overthink it but see which things make you hungry to explore further.
Don't seek to be a buff. Seek to explore your taste, follow your gut, follow your feelings and see where it takes you. You'll naturally end up knowing a lot but it's not about knowing, it's about the joy and fulfilment of music and nothing more.