Does what you know about a song affect how you perceive it?
Feb 20 · 2 months ago · 👍 aRubes, pirkka · 🤔 1
5 Comments ↓
👻 a-short-term-effect [OP] · Feb 20 at 05:23:
For context:
When I was first listening to the A Kiss in the Dreamhouse by Siouxsie and the Banshees, one thing that struck me was how the singer seemed to be whispering throughout the whole runtime, only showing her voice in the few more intense moments in the music, which is completely different from the band's earlier output, in which she sported a punky shouting style, because of that, I thought the album was kinda underwhelming.
Later I read that the reason why she was whispering was because she __couldn't__ shout because, as it turns out, yelling all the time is not good for your throat, and so they had to adapt to that. That made me like the record better for some reason.
that's interesting. Do you have other examples?
It does for me, big time. When I was a school kid, English was my third language, and even though I was lucky to have started studying at a modest age of 6, by the time I was 14 or so, my audial comprehension was crap. By being a friend of a popular school kid, I was able to obtain some albums from System of a Down and Linkin Park. I appreciated the music, but didn't really think about the lyrics. Over the years, bit by bit, also through growing as a person and learning about the world, I was able to understand what's up. This all made me appreciate the songs way more than just the awesome music, composition, sound/mastering, and such. There were negative examples, too, but rare
🦉 ResetReboot · Feb 20 at 12:00:
Uh, yeah. It has happened me a few times. Since English is my second language, it is where I can find more examples as I managed to understand certain lyrics. But there's also some songs to which the back story about it has made me appreciate it more or even despise it.
It also has happened with even knowing about the author. One case was Mistabishi. He made a cool drum and bass song using bubble jet printer sounds and I wanted to delve more, finding out he's an outspoken racist. I've never played anything from him anymore.
English is my second language as well, and I largely focused (and still do) on the music. I was (and still am) surprised by the stupidity of the lyrics of some of my favorite songs.