I liked New Order from late 2018! Bizarre Love Triangle was a glamorous, sparkly, evocative, dizzying song I always loved, but never paid attention to who it was! Here's a story of me and my music taste and how it got shaped!
I
never would've thought that I'd like any punk music in general. When I was 12 years old, that's when I really went out of my way to enjoy music. I loved Justin Timberlake, Ashanti, Ciara, Usher, T-Pain, Trey Songz, Alicia Keys, Dwele, Kanye West, Omarion, Ne-Yo, Amerie, Chris Brown etc. I also loved a lot of hip-hop too, but mainly 90's hip-hop and also rappers like Mos Def, Common, Lupe Fiasco, 50 Cent, Clipse etc
I was always an R&B/Hip-Hop/Urban music kind of guy! I liked all kinds of hip-hop and R&B. I really loved neo-soul music too when I was in high-school! I loved D'Angelo, Maxwell, Erykah Badu, Sadé, R. Kelly, Lauryn Hill, Lucy Pearl, Floetry, Musiq Soulchild, Bilal but also really loved Ginuwine, Aaliyah, Playa, Tweet, Timbaland too.
The other genre I also loved whilst being in High school was Disco & Funk. Because of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, I absolutely loved that West End Records, funky, groovy, summery kind of funk! Couldn't get enough of artists like Rick James, Teena Marie, Cameo, Slave etc and also just dug so deep into disco/funk - Don Blackman's self-titled was a fave of mine! And I loved P-Funk, Soul and New Jack Swing too!
Then from memory, it all changed when I started listening to The Weeknd's 2011 mixtapes (which would have been when I was around 19 years old in 2013). I really liked that trip-hop/R&B kind of sound. Then I got into trip-hop, so Portishead, Tricky, Morcheeba etc and my first album that really introduced me into music that wasn't 'black' music, was FKA Twigs LP1 in 2014! I still liked my Britney Spears' "Blackout" and M.I.A. "Kala" etc, but LP1 was the album which opened up my mind so much! I then got into similar artists like James Blake, Sango, SBTRKT, Burial, Grimes and before you know it, I was anticipating upcoming albums from Kero Kero Bonito, Blood Orange, Kelela, SOPHIE, Tory Y Moi, Neon Indian, Tame Impala, Sevdaliza, Clarence Clarity etc
Then when I joined VMP, I was introduced into 'indie' music! And in July, 2018
@Joe Mac introduced me to Kate Bush! I remember because I swapped Mitksi's Be The Cowboy for Fiona Apple's Tidal at that time, which felt like a big change in terms of my music direction/music taste! I fell deeply in love with the Fiona Apple pick and really loved Kate Bush ( I was obsessed with her album 'The Dreaming')! Then Tom Waits, Talking Heads, New Order were artists/groups I liked. Then Joe introduced me to The Smiths! Then after I appreciated The Smiths, I liked The Cure, David Bowie and similar music acts.
With rock, I think the first album was PJ Harvey's Rid Of Me. Joe also introduced me to PJ Harvey! Is This Desire? is one of my favourite albums of the 90's now! In general though, I was already slowly warming up to rock because of VMP's ROTM's, like Arctic Monkeys. In addition, I enjoyed indie rock acts such as Tame Impala, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, MGMT etc, but PJ Harvey was the one who really made me get into acts from Radiohead to Jimi Hendrix to now Pink Floyd and Joy Division! VMP doing exclusives of Slowdive's Pygmalion, Sleater-Kinney's The Woods, Broken Social Scene etc also helped increase my music taste and love for indie/alternative rock!
I pre-ordered the upcoming IDLES album! I loved that track Kenny Beats worked on; Grounds! That's a funky banger! I also picked up Jeff Rosenstock's latest album too (have that on pre-order as well). So, I'm really warming up to punk music! Cannot wait for the upcoming Spiritualized ROTM
VMP Classics really opened me up towards Blues too! Whilst I always loved jazz, funk and soul, I never liked Blues. I love Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Albert King, Buddy Guy and really enjoy the blues influence on the John Mayer & The White Stripes ROTM's! Loved Ali Farka Touré as well which is Blues, and can't wait for that exclusive, which is an album I would've never loved around a year or two ago!
I've always enjoyed world music, reggae, afro-beat, salsa, latin and VMP and this forum has helped me discover heaps! I feel like in the last two years, my music taste has expanded so much! it's unbelievable and I'm so grateful for that
So yeah, that briefly sums up how my music taste has formed! Sexy music, so Marvin Gaye, Minnie Riperton, D'Angelo, Maxwell, Leon Ware, Prince and just sexy jams like Between The Sheets by Isley Brothers or All Night Long by Mary Jane Girls is my absolute favourite! And jazz rap, so acts like Digable Planets, Madvillain, Tribe Called Quest, Bahamadia, The Roots, Freestyle Fellowship and Guru's debut - Jazzmatazz!
