4′33″

March 23rd, 2004 | Music, Sick/Twisted

My name is Brittney, and I have music defecit disorder. I know this about myself, but I refuse to see a problem with it. Others, however, most certainly do. So, I thought I should take some time to address it.

For starters, I have a very tumultuous relationship with music. Sometime there can be music blaring and I never once hear a note or a single word. Sometimes there can be music on and people singing it, but I’m so in some zone that I don’t even know it exists. Conversly, there are times (which are a] when I am reading b] when I am writing) that I really can’t stand to hear music. Can’t do it. Sometimes I’ll be all, “I’m going to listen to some tunes and look about the interweb.” Then about 15 minutes into surfing I find something lengthy or weighty that I want to read and must shut the music off. When it stops I am often heard to sigh in relief. Sometimes music makes me really crazy and anxious and it has to go, right then. There were times when I lived alone in the studio apartment that I would go–literally–weeks or months without listening to a CD. I would spend days in that room in total silence. Occasionally I would shuffle the 200 or so mp3’s I have on my hard drive. But I rarely listen to whole albums.

I have a hard time naming ten bands that I absolutely love. Isn’t that weird? I’ve always had just an artist or two or four that move me and make me soar in the way that music is apt to do. But for me it is very seldom that I am blown away by something I hear. In high school it was Tori. In college it was Bjork. I own very few CDs and listen to even fewer. I’ve just never been that into listening to music.

I once thought it was because I couldn’t afford it. I wasn’t about to pay $17 for a CD. That will turn out to be GARBAGE. But then I got a CD burner. I just knew that I would be downloading and burning new and interesting, hard-to-find music. But nope. I flip the radio dial every morning on my way to work.

It’s because I have internet finger. I can’t keep it still. If I put a CD in I will impulsively punch it to the next song, or constantly change the volume or put in on shuffle. Most times I prefer scanning the FM radio while in the car, even if everything I hear is crap.

Which, it isn’t. Granted, 90% of shit on the radio is really shitty. I’m talking horrid. But what haters of the radio are missing out on is the huge laughter potential that comes with listening to radio. Forget those fucker DJs. I hate those assholes. I’m talking about the songs themselves. You haven’t heard funny until you’ve heard Jessica Simpson try to rhyme in her newest single. Or heard R. Kelly croon about “taking his key and sticking it in the ignition.” You can’t get that shit anywhere else. And the funniest genre of music on the radio right now is mainstream hip-hop. Which is HUGE in the South. Those songs are pure idiocy. I swear to God, almost every modern hip-hop song I here on the radio talks about nothing but women and how best to demean them. “Bend over, lemme see it.” “Hold her still, I’m gonna milk the cow.” “Can I play with your pantyline?” It’s so gross. It makes me so fucking sad. If only because it is so prevelant.

But! Hip-hop is the music on the radio that has the most interesting and innovative sounds. A lot of those Grab Your Ankles songs have some of the most infectious beats. I’ve wholely given up on new rock on the radio, and most of the straight pop is diarrhea, too. Justin Timberlake is good when he isn’t hooking up with that Nelly ass. And that new Britney Spears single was alright until I heard it four thousand fucking times.

Which is why I mostly listen to NPR. Which brings me back to my music defecit disorder. I just don’t feel the need to have it. And I don’t feel like I’m missing out. Which is why it surprises me when people just can’t get over the fact that I don’t love music, and crave it in the way that a lot of the rest of you freaks do. I just don’t. I guess it was how I was raised. My parents didn’t listen to much music. Ever. The only music I associate strongly with my childhood is cartoon themes and Chipmunk records and a bit of country. My dad used to sing me this Tom T. Hall song called “I Love” (”little baby ducks…”), which he bought me the CD for last year. But other than that no music to speak of growing up. In fact, I remember thumbing through old records in the basement, wondering what they might sound like. I remember names like Fleetwood Mac. Michael Jackson’s “Off the Wall.” Some record that had a doll propped up in front of a headstone, which always creeped me the fuck out. But I don’t remember hearing any of it.

And so in my adulthood music is sort of secondary to me as far as passions go. I tend to appreciate songs that make your heart break, things with danceable beats, or music that is melodic. I shy away from music that is atonal or abrasive or cold. I like very little punk. I love electropop.

I imagine people think I’m really missing out. Perhaps I am. Because if someone asked me what CD I’d want to take with me to a deserted island, I might ask them if I could bring something else all together.

Which makes me a soulless freakshow, I know.

50 comments ↓

#1 sabre-toothed librarian on 03.23.04 at 8:24 pm

I heard music a lot growing up. Anne Murray, Kenny Rogers, The Statler Brothers, and Iron Butterfly mostly. Silence drives me sorta crazy. Which is sorta too bad for someone who lives with someone who can’t complete a sentence or do anything complicated if there is music on (but, curiously, goes totally deaf to the world when she is reading). I’ve got fancy headphones, but they are open air, which means that they transmit just as much sound outward as inward. Somebody needs an office.

#2 Brian the Red on 03.23.04 at 10:19 pm

Perfect example of Sturgeon’s Law
“Ninety percent of everything is crap.”
Derived from a quote by science fiction author Theodore Sturgeon, who once said, “Sure, 90% of science fiction is crud. That’s because 90% of everything is crud.” Oddly, when Sturgeon’s Law is cited, the final word is almost invariably changed to ‘crap’.

Here is an internet radio staion where only 10% of the music is crap - http://www.radioparadise.com - YMMV

#3 dreyfusslugado on 03.23.04 at 11:12 pm

What about classical music? Beethoven, Schubert, and the rest of the Dead White Europeans?

#4 brittney on 03.23.04 at 11:13 pm

I like it okay. As much as I like, say, big band.

#5 yezbick on 03.23.04 at 11:53 pm

“SHAKE IT LIKE A SALTSHAKER!!!!!”

I can’t listen to anything but college radio. I like to be surprised by something new. Commercials drive me insane — except for Jareds commercials — that jeweler has a crazy jingle, yo. We’ve got a runner at work who races through the kitchen shrieking - “It can only be Jareds!” That rocks.

#6 brittney on 03.24.04 at 12:05 am

I want Jared and his jingle to eat ass. God, I hate it so much.

#7 iLLa on 03.24.04 at 12:54 am

wow. MDD. i was wondering if it had a name. my DJ is forever asking me how i can get work done with the studio volume up — the only time he really listens to the music is when he’s in the mix. right now kelis is singing about her milkshake at decent volume, but i had to look at the log sheet to realize that. i totally don’t pay attention. but at the same time, three and a half minutes later when i need to talk, i’m ready. maybe it’s cos i hear it so much every day. but yeah. and about the demeaning women thing: i never thought i’d long for the days of P.Diddy in shiny suits and the Cash Money Millionaires bragging about bling-bling, but singing about money is infinitely better than getting low or wabity-wabity-drop-dropping-it-like-its-hot. when junior high kids dance like video hoes, i fear for the future …

#8 lex icon on 03.24.04 at 12:59 am

Do you like The Postal Service? If so, you might like this LA radio station: Indie 103.1 fm. Listen live on the internet. It does not suck.

http://www.indie1031.fm/listenlive.html

#9 jamie on 03.24.04 at 3:47 pm

sweet fancy moses, the postal service is blowing up. i’m sure the inspiration for this post was not “what should i listen to,” but for fuck’s sake, i’ve got to. postal service is the best electropop i’ve heard in ages. i loved erasure, new order, pet shop boys, etc. and honestly, i moved on, but dammit, postal service is really good. sorry for the unsolicited suggestion. i now hate myself, but if you listen to postal service, it will be worth it.

#10 Anne on 03.24.04 at 4:22 pm

My ex was just like you… maybe even more so. He owned all of 5 cds, no MP3s. He liked techno somewhat, but I can’t decide if it’s because he liked the beats, or because it had less lyrics to annoy him. It freaked me out, but I don’t think you’re soulless.

Oh, and yeah…I’m related to Tom T. Hall. Aren’t you jealous? No one ever knows who the hell he is. So I had to share.

#11 Cory on 03.24.04 at 5:43 pm

My mother was kind of a headbanger in my childhood. I was the quiet one. Which is the reverse of how all of my friends and their mothers are. In my formative years, I liked Yanni, Kenny G, The Yellowjackets, Ray Lynch and all these other smooth jazz/new age bands.

Weird kid I was.

I don’t like the format any more, really, but I still like what I liked during that time. But other than that, I like 80’s brit pop and college radio, especially Of Montreal, Orbital, and others. I’m not into anything punkish. I like synthesizers, acoustic guitars, and a good beat.

#12 mikro on 03.25.04 at 1:31 pm

I have a related disorder. I cannot stand not listening to music. I can’t push it to the background or ignore it. If it’s on, I hear it. I can’t read, I lose my train of thought in conversation, but I’ll always put something on when I get home.

#13 bsti on 03.26.04 at 4:16 am

I think I’d prefer silence to music on a deserted island. Sometimes silence is the best music tnere is.

But I’d end up making bongos out of stuff, then making stings over a gourd.

This post has sent me into fantasyland. Love when that happpens.

#14 Jason on 03.26.04 at 1:32 pm

Nice John Cage reference.

Best. Song. Ever.

#15 mikro on 03.26.04 at 1:57 pm

Not much of a song, but a hell of a live show. I bet. I’d love to see it performed some day.

#16 Paul Gutman on 03.26.04 at 2:05 pm

I, not usually the contrarian, am a huge music person. Always, everywhere, and it can be background or foreground and I get to choose. But the reason I’m writing is to say that I liked Eddie Vedder (of Pearl Jam)’s reference to a “popular” rock band:

“I think it sounds like a popsicle that’s been shoved up someone’s ass tastes”.

#17 Cory on 03.28.04 at 1:31 am

*almost forgets to wonder what 4′33″ refers to*

#18 Marcos on 03.28.04 at 12:37 pm

“…treat ya like my sticky icky or my sweet ooey gooey, for real though.” You are right about hip hop lyrics; they are comedy for one and for all. I was just thinking the other day about people who don’t sing in the shower, or in the car, or at least sometime every day…to me it is very sad. What kind of existence must one lead to never sing something, regardless of how bad you may sing. I hope you’re not one of these…

#19 Edgeling on 04.04.04 at 10:52 am