So there I was, in college, knee deep in other people's cultures for the first time. It was, for the second time, a right turn on the path of my musical life.
I was introduced to Thursday and Poison the Well early in my freshman year by some friends I made in the Pep Band. As fellow music geeks, they had taken a dissimilar but parallel path to mine throughout their musical taste progression. These two bands served as an inlet into the scene known by most as Hardcore, and it was there I truly bloomed as a musical being.
The hardcore scene allowed me to find a home in music, in a subgenre which rewarded obscurity, and which more or less resembled the tastes I had developed for myself prior to my introduction to the scene. It helped that at the time, my older brother had also discovered the genre, and had served as a liaison to meet many of the people in Syracuse (the closest "big" city to my hometown). Syracuse has been called home to many bands which have gone on to influence the Hardcore culture, which was another boon to the development of my interest in the scene. For all of college, and a few years after, I immersed myself in the music of this genre and allowed it to dictate my morals and my lifestyle, which was, on the whole, a very positive thing. However, after graduating, and getting the rest of my life underway, I found myself outgrowing Hardcore music, and generally losing interest in what its bands had to say. Most of this can be attributed to my change in lifestyle from the poor college kid, into the adult firmly implanted in the business world, with all the weights and responsibilities thereof. Its not that hardcore changed, as much as I changed, and hardcore stayed the same. Unfortunately, that meant that hardcore wasn't what I needed it to be anymore, and with that, I left much of that life behind. Even more unfortunately, that meant I left many of the friends I had made along with it behind, as well.
Without a real musical identity, I spent about a year completely devoid of musical interest. I went to no shows, I found no new music. However, I spent a lot of that year doing some real searching into the person I wanted to be - who I was as a person, without the influences of others to rely on. In doing so, I managed to realize that it wasn't any single one of these styles or genres which defined my musical taste, but rather they all combined, along with some smatterings of other phases I'd gone through on the way (ska, post rock, hippy, etc) which really defined my musical preference. It was possible for me to enjoy a wide array of music, if I simply refused to identify myself with a particular group of listeners. If I intentionally live my life outside the scope of any of the musical scenes, I can float at the edge of all of them.
In an attempt to reach out to those friends which I had set aside when I dropped out of the hardcore lifestyle (for all intents and purposes), I began to go to shows again, but quickly realized that I wasn't interested in the same type of show. On suggestions from a close friend, I checked out some bands like Baroness, Torche, Isis, Mastodon, etc. I fell in love. I realized that the combination of the ambiance of post rock bands like Mogwai, Explosions in the Sky, etc, combined with the heavier presence I had come to enjoy through my youth combined to make something wonderful. I needed more. And this, my loyal readers, is where the Internet finally came into play. I dug. And dug. And found a multitude of bands I enjoyed. Then I used their styles to find more bands I enjoyed. And the blogs rolled in, and RapidShare and MediaFire worked their asses off. I discovered a world of music once again that I had no idea existed, and I loved it. But this time, I was a little more hesitant. I refused to become another cliche, and let the music I enjoy define me. I've become engrossed in the Doom/Drone/Stoner metal genres, and I feel like I've reached the culmination of a multitude of influences which have set me on the path to this style. I've narrowed my tastes to a point where I can see myself staying forever, but at the same time, I've left myself open to enjoy other forms of musical art. I've thrown a door wide open, but this time, left the other doors open as well. And it's a gratifying feeling - to know you've found a music you're passionate about in the same way as you saw your parents were in their youth. Something you'll be proud to pass on to your children to help them develop their own love of music. Maybe they'll learn to appreciate the music I listen to as a stepping stone to their own passion, much the way I believe I did with my parents. And if you think about it, it makes a lot of sense. Take the psychedelia from Floyd, mix it up with the sludgy riffage from Sabbath, and what you get sounds an awful lot like Mastodon. Much in the same way that I resemble an amalgamation of my parents, my taste represents the same mix of theirs.
Thank god my mom waited until after my impressionable youth to turn on American Idol.
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