Eric Light Lyle Archibald Music 1040 Personal Musical Heritage

Country music for the most part is what I listen to. I would have to say that country has been in the majority of the music I have listened to for the last 5 years. Of course this is not how it has always been. I have gone through quite an evolution in my preferred musical taste. This evolution however has brought me full circle in the genre I most commonly listen to, but the years and directions I have taken really increased the variety of styles of songs you would find in my music collection. So a generalized description of me based off my mp3 player would be a head banging, punk, mod, rockabilly, old soul, rocker, and cowboy. Aside from those generalizations I also can appreciate a little older rap, industrial/rave, and classical music. So the following paper will be a guided tour through my musical life and the influences that got me here. This assignment requires me to include my ethnic heritage and national origins so I will list that now. I am the son of a Portuguese father and a Scottish mother, so this would make me Caucasian. I shouldnt be so formal, and just say white, in fact so white that with my national combination of skin type I have burns that wont last longer than 48 hours on skin that cant tan. Other than my skin stuff, my national heritage really doesnt influence me much more than I can wear a quilt well and love Portuguese sausage. I dont know what kind of music they listen to in Portugal, and I only find bagpipes mildly entertaining in small doses. I stated that I listen to country music mostly now and that Ive come full circle, so that would make one realize that country music was the first music I listened to. My parents listened to country when I was really young so by the latter end of the 70s I had my first favorite song. It was the Gambler by Kenny Rogers. I just couldnt get enough of that song, it was something about the story that it told. I was under ten years old, and really didnt understand the story, but I knew it was a story and I loved the way it sounded when Kenny told it. Yes country music was just fine with me, it was the music my parents listened to and also my sister who is three years my senior. I needed to mention my sister because she played a major role in my transition in musical tastes. By the early 80s she had become a teenager, and was influenced by friends, as we all are, and started to listen to pop music. She also liked Barry Manilow during that time, but I dont quite remember why. Barry was a talented singer and song writer Ill give you that,

but other than the story of Lola from the Coppa Cabaa, I didnt care for him much. Anyway I digress, this not about my sister, but me, so I will go on about how she played a major role in my music. So we go back to the early 80s and my sister getting into pop music. She, like most teens of the day, listened to music constantly, and of course that means I did to. Also like most teens of the day, she joined the Columbia music club, and this meant that she got 12 albums for a penny when she joined. I dont remember what all the records she got were, but I do remember three of artists; Duran Duran, Night Ranger, and The Beach Boys. These groups introduced me to pop rock, hard rock, and classic rock. So lets say its 1984 now, and our family has gotten cable TV. There was a channel back then that, since there was no such thing as a reality show, played nothing but music videos. This was kind of like listening to the radio but now we could see the artists. The songs were storyboarded with visual images that made them more understandable, and glamorized different lifestyles. Being an impressionable tween this is where heavy metal got me. These longhaired rockers were so cool, and the lifestyle they portrayed was unlike anything a suburban Mormon boy had ever imagined. I loved Van Halen from hearing Jump and Panama. In fact Van Halen was the first music I ever bought, it wasnt 1984, but an earlier tape form them called Fair Warning featuring a song that is still one of my favorites called Mean Street. I of course kept an open mind when it came to rock music through the 1980s and listened to about everything that the pop radio station played. Still to this day I love listening to 80s music, but then the same as now, I prefer the heavier stuff. In 1985 our family moved and I found myself a new set of friends. My two best friends had older siblings like I had that influenced their music tastes, and they introduced these new forms of rock to me. These new types of music both had booming subcultures at that time. One was punk rock, and the other was new wave. These two types of music, while quite different, had a large crossover following for each other. Im not q uite sure why but hell, I like both of them so who am I to question why so many others did also. I would have to say that the bulk of both of these types of music relied heavily on an emotional message rather than musical talent. The hard rock and heavy metal music I listened to had extremely talented musicians and singers, while punk oozing with angst and rage, and new wave exploiting deeper but softer emotions really spoke to the religious rebellion I was developing through my teenage years. New wave, punk, heavy metal/hard rock, and classic rock are the music I will be listening to finish out the 80s. That is also the order of preference I had during that time. Of course I was exposed to other types of music and even liked some of it. A couple of examples of this would be early gangster rap, some pop rap, and the new wave derivative of industrial dance music.

Exploding on the scene during the early 90s, I was taken by grunge music blasting out of Seattle and the surrounding areas of the Pacific Northwest. Looking at what I was listening to, it would only figure that I became a fan. Grunge took the commercial appeal of hard rock and mixed it with punk angst and dark new wave themes, creating a hybrid that resonated with my preferred musical genres. Being American and alive, I of course couldnt ignore the popularity of Garth Brooks and to a lesser extent Shania Twain during the 90s. These artists, and others that were compliments to them, helped to allow country music to once again gain a small percentage of my listening time. It was during this time that I discovered another style of music that my absolute favorite band emerged from, and that is rockabilly. Rockabilly took a more country version of classic 50s and 60s rock and mixed it with an up tempo punk angst. Social Distortion is in my opinion the best band of this genre and Ike I said, still my favorite band to this day. So just to make sure we are still on the same page, I rode out the end of the millennium listening to grunge, rockabilly, new wave, punk, heavy and hard rock, classic rock, reminisced with 80s pop, and rediscovered my original roots with popular country. During the late 90s through end of 2006, I worked in a nightclub. This club catered to 35+ year old men that were of upper incomes so at work for the most part I was able to hear the older style of music that I liked. It was while at this club that I also learned to tune out music, so even while it was blaring constantly, if it wasnt something I wanted to listen to, it was simply ignored. I credit Brittany Spears for this valuable talent. It was during this time that I became a fan of talk radio. I was bombarded by music for 12 hours a day, whether I was ignoring it or not, it became quite soothing to just listen to interesting conversations without music. I also had satellite radio, so I could pick stations that played only music genres I liked, and songs I knew. I would have to say that other than the minute and half rise of modern swing bands I was able to let new music pass me by. I was in my mid 30s and really didnt care if I heard a new song again. Even my favorite bands that released new albums during this time didnt appeal to me for the most part. After I left the club, I still stayed with this pattern with the added exception that I no longer needed to ignore new music, because I wasnt constantly exposed to it. I moved away from what I consider my hometown to Salt Lake City UT in 2009. This is about the time I finally gave in and realized that I would have to listen to new music again. Always listening to the same old music, brought back memories of the same me. I was changing my life, lifestyle, and friends so I needed to add a new soundtrack so I could move on. I found taking an almost 10 year hiatus from pop music made it impossible for me to get back into it. Age and absence do that to you, it is just human nature Im sure. This is when I have finally come back full circle and started listening to country music again almost exclusively. Nostalgia has now become a source of pleasant memories rather than a reminder of loss and

change, so everything that I previously listened to is mixed in with large portions of country. So as it stands this is where I am currently at. Now to complete this assignment I need to include a few other things starting with analyzing my musics origins. I stated before that my national heritage really doesnt influence my musical tastes, and I am standing by that, but of course the music I listen to does derive from English and Celtic traditions mixed with African inspired rhythm. All American music has large doses of this in its DNA, and the different balance of this is what makes up the different genres. So the national heritage I most associate with is American, and as such the music I listen to is American, or American influenced music that may include a geographical naturalized flare of whichever international community it comes from. The next thing I need to address is the influences that developed my taste. I talked about family and friends, and even friends families that have influenced my music. I hinted at religious rebellion, and would like to expound from there. Previously I stated that the gritty but glamorous lifestyle the heavy metal hairbands presented to a young impressionable Mormon boy sparked my interest, and became an object of envy. Morally speaking the lifestyle I was expected to have and the one I was longing for were very far apart, and not being able to bridge the divide fanned the flames of normal teenage angst. Punk music and the emotions that it inspires became a logical step in my musical progression. Anger, frustration, and angst arent the only emotions that get heightened during the teenage years, brokenhearted lovesickness is something I frequently dealt with. Im sure Im not the only one, or Air Supply would not have had a career. Rocker ballads and a lot of new wave music, usually on a mix tape, is what got me through these times. So my musical influences were, family, friends, deviance, and my own life experience. The last thing I need to include is the common factor that my musical taste has. This falls under interaction, and that is all the music I like is lyrically driven with meanings I can connect to. Tempo, melody, and rhythm are important, but if the lyrics are not well written and relatable in my life, then I probably wont like the song. I also can say that I am more interested in a singers ability to deliver a believable line with the correct emotion, then unmatched vocal talent. If you look at all the music I like, starting and ending with American storytelling music (country), you can see that the lyrics are about the only common factor that links them together. Well here is where we end this introspective tour into the soundtrack of my life. I was only assigned a paper and not a book. I do have to say that this has helped me connect dots I never thought to connect, and explain things I never wouldve otherwise. I also enjoyed the wonderful trip down my musical memory lane.