Reflections on the "Music & Me" lesson

This lesson was really interesting as although we are all the same age and get on really well, we all have quite different music tastes. Saying that, there was lot of agreement amongst the childhood songs, as we all agreed on how much we loved Busted, S Club 7 or Steps. We realised that this was probably because, as a child, you are less inclined to develop your own personal music taste and tend to listen to whatever is on the radio and what your friends like. I know that was the case for me, as it was only really when I got to secondary school that I started to find bands via the internet and listen to songs that weren't so mainstream. Pretty much everyone said that was true for them too, and we noticed that through the teenage years is when you start to form your own musical identity and become more pro-active in your tastes and discovering new bands.

The first festival I went to, aged 13

It was also nice to hear the variety of tracks that meant something to people, and why it was such a special song for them. For some it reminded of them of a certain time in their life, or a certain person, or a certain TV show, and for others they just felt a connection with the music or lyrics.

Busted - A childhood favourite!

The songs we chose from our childhoods tended to be aspirational. For example, me and my younger brother both used to love Busted. He, as a boy, probably looked up to them because they were having so much fun and seemed so cool, messing around and playing in a band. Other groups like S Club 7 also seemed to be so free and have clean-cut fun, especially in the tv shows that they starred in (Miami 7, LA7, etc.) so fans could follow them not just by listening to their music; they were using synergy to brand the group. Basically, they all just looked like a big group of best friends having the time of their lives, which of course appealed to us as kids.

Klaxons - My favourite band a few years back

The songs meaningful to us during our pre-teen/early teen years were often special as they marked a carefree time when we were starting to discover ourselves as music consumers. They might also have reminded us of someone we were closer to at that age, or a specific event we look back upon with fond memories.

This lesson taught me that different songs can mean very different things to different people, and our tastes change with age. This means that artists and their record companies always have their target audience in mind when being marketed; as I mentioned earlier, the bands we loved as kids appealed to us in just the right ways.

last.fm - A modern way to find new music

The most important change, for me anyway, is the internet, as pre-teenage years I would only really consume music via the radio and occasional music channels, but nowadays I would probably only know about 10% of the bands I currently listen to if it wasn't for the internet. Now I use websites like YouTube, Twitter and last.fm to find bands similar to other bands I already listen to and of similar genres. The fact that many of the bands are friends and often tour together also leads to recognition by fans, as we assume they must be similar to the bands they are touring with. If I hear of a band I like the sound of, I would normally stream their albums using Spotify, something which of course didn't exist a few years ago, so the internet has definitely shaped my music consumption significantly.