Why Great Music Takes Several Listens To Appreciate...

Too Much Is Happening

This is what is known as a sensory overload, in simpler terms, too much is happening in the music to comprehend at one point.

Your mind simply is not capable of handling that much music, all at once. It's really difficult for the brain, because your brain builds in layers.

Most pop songs in the top 40 songs only really have 1 or 2 layers, hence why they are so pleasurable on your first few listens.

But like all bubblegum pop, that gum eventually loses it's taste and becomes very bland to you.

So when you build complex music with an exponential number of layers, it can take a while for your brain to fully take it in (More comparable to a fine wine, that waits until the aftertaste to really settle in).

Some Notes You Simply Don't Hear

As mentioned above, a first time listen of a unique or diverse artists can often be overwhelming.

More often than not you will re listen to albums and be amazed at how many things you missed the first time round.

That is why giving new music (at least music that sounds just like "noise" to you) can really help you to open up to new venues.

This can be especially prevalent in progressive music, because if a song does not have an obvious structure it can take a while to recognize each section of the song.

Sorry, I didn't quite hear you; you'll have to speak up.

You don't really anticipate the next part of the music (where music with obvious song progressions are easy for you to anticipate), so once again you gain a bit of sensory overload.

The sensory overload I'm talking about is generally really obvious in genre's like Metal or Hardcore.

Listening to songs in odd meters or time signatures can be confusing to the untrained ear.

This also applies to song structure, Because most music listeners are stuck in the world of straight beats and 4-4 timing, music presented in a slight change can completely throw them off, even enough to discount the song before giving it a proper chance.

You Might Hear Something New Entirely!

Because of that Pop-Rock conditioning you hear on radio and TV, you may not be used to diversity among sounds and noises in music.

Embracing new technology and sounds in music is important because music is ever-changing and evolving and we to must learn grow with it.

You want to evolve along with music, not be left in the past.

The dangers of not evolving with current music is that you will be unable to build upon the successes of other creative geniuses.

Something entirely new (My new favorite book). Read it like...now...

Imagine if you had never heard any music in the 1900's. All you knew was really old school music, before the electric guitar was invented.

And then you decided that it would be a really cool idea to put electricity and pickups in your acoustic guitar. Wow! What a cool invention!

Except for the fact that they already invented that 60 years ago...

That's why it's important to build upon the successes of other geniuses.

Every generation is just taking what the people before them did, and doing it in a different way. It's the idea of evolution that is moving...

...and you don't want to be stuck in the past, it will prevent you from fully exploring your creativity, and will make you cease to be relevant to current listeners.

If you haven't done so already:

(That's A Clue!)

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