The specifics of like.

I haven't gone to a concert yet this year. Okay, it's still January and my kids have been sick almost the entire month, but even so it's been since Damien Jurado/Shearwater and that's a long time in between shows. And I resolved to see a ton of shows this year, so it's almost a moral imperative to get to one soon.

Since Jeremy Enigk and The Jealous Sound aren't touring right now, I have to expand my horizons and find another band to see. I noticed that this one band my friend always gushes about (he's seen them 6 times!) will be at my favorite venue this weekend. I don't work that night, so I thought I would go. But first, I wanted to check them out. I hadn't listened to them before, so I pulled up their Daytrotter session. Um, not really my thing. I mean, they were okay. I could listen to them. Definitely could see them live, but I won't be falling in love with this band.

It's weird how you can have such similar tastes as someone else, and still differ. Like my awesome friend who shares music love with me, but cannot understand why I like Silversun Pickups. Or my reader friend who hated The Hunger Games trilogy. What? Okay, both are so offensive to me, but not friendship deal-breakers.

But it does make me wonder what is that quality that can elicit such different reactions? Why do I listen Shudder To Think and hear art, and someone else hears noise? Why do I read Margaret Atwood and think, "Oh my God, yes" while someone else yawns? I mean, obviously, I'm right and they're wrong, but beside that, where do our tastes come from? Is it environmental? Cultural? Maybe. I cannot for the life of me get into Indian music, but a lot of Americans can. I mean, didn't Madonna go through that phase a while back? So maybe it's not just environment. Maybe it's genetic. Maybe we're hard-wired not just to have straight/curly hair, brown/blue eyes, but to like what we like. I've been programmed to love Sunny Day Real Estate but not Tapes 'N Tapes, Dogfight but not Dream For An Insomniac, Charlotte but not Emily Bronte. I don't know. It seems pretty cool to me that somewhere in our genetic code is an instruction to fall in love in a very specific way.

Listening to: St. Vincent "Actor"

xo. kb.