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EXPLAINING_THE_INEXPLICABLE

During a dinner table conversation in
the group house I used to live in              We called it Luck House.
in Palo Alto, one of my housemates             I suppose I should say
asked me what was up with the odd              something about it someday.
music I was into.  I very rapidly
reeled off something like this:                   LUCK

   "There are two ways you can go.
   Most people fixate on whatever
   music they happen to listen to in
   high school, and they spend the
   rest of their lives listening to
   the same thing over and over.
   Obviously people like this are
   not axe-murderers, and I don't
   have any right to look down on
   them (even though I do), but
   there's another way you can go,
   which is to consciously seek out
   new kinds of music.  And if you
   keep doing that, year after year,
   you develop a pretty strange set
   of ears."


Maybe that wasn't
a bad answer.

I get this question now and then,
in different forms.  I think
these are the important points:

  (1) The people who like this music really
      do like it, they're not just copping         INCOMPREHENSIBLE_DESIRE
      a pose.

  (2) There are things going on in the music
      that they can hear and that you can't.

      (a) This is probably objectively provable.

          Experimental design: collect a
          set of new recordings that no
          one can have heard as yet.
          Play them for the afficiandos.

          Claims: They will (sometimes) be
          able to demonstrate an ability to:

          (1) predict when a piece
          is coming to a close.            WHEN_THE_END_IS_NEAR

          (2) recognize a
          performer by style                PLONSEY_IN_THE_OCEAN

                ("the same guy is
                playing tenor on
                track B and on
                track D");

  (3)  There is something like a
       learned language in play
       here: An ear for the music      (Though it is not universally
       can be acquired with            arrived at, even by
       experience.                     experienced listeners).


  (4) It goes against the populist grain to
      think that this is even possible:
      accusations like "con artist" abound.           HONEST_JOHN
      The suspicion that this is all empty
      snobbery is common.

  (5) Empty or not, snobbery is indeed common
      among the insiders (the flip-side of an
      inferiority complex, I think, from being
      continually misunderstood, continually
      denied most forms of access or reward).

      But don't let it get to you: it isn't
      worth worrying about.  It would not be
      easy to make a case that this music is
      crucial in any way.

      You can live without an ear for it,
      you can be a good person without an
      ear for it, you can even be a great
      artist, a great musician without an
      ear for it.


          If you do want to get
          inside the outside; if
          you want to know what
          it is we hear out
          here, you can probably
          get here yourself,              Though maybe "effort"
          with some time and              isn't quite the right
          effort...                       word.

          But I couldn't tell                 It creeps up
          you why you should.                 on you when
                                              you think
             HOME_PLANET                      you're going
                                              in other
                                              directions.

                                                 MISSING_THE_SUN



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