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Greetings Dakkanauts!

I'm sat at work (well, in my car having a sneaky smoke actually), and it hit me. I'm 32 next Sunday and this got me thinking about music. More specifically how my own musical tastes have changed and evolved over the 22 years that I've had my own musical 'identity'. I grew up with a music obsessive in the shape of my old man, he sold top end Hi-Fi for a good deal of his working life and helped set up and stabilise a good number of stores on his early years. Whilst I was a nipper I was introduced to a good deal of music by my dad, including Led Zepplin, Deep Purple, The Doors, Pink Floyd, The Eagles, Thomas Dolby and all sorts of awesomeness.

As I got older and made new freinds at school, this list grew to encompass Iron Maiden, Def Leppard, The Sex Pistols, The Ramones and Pantera. The evolution here is obvious. The music I liked (and still do) had gotten heavier and more Thrash-y. As I got older and went to College the music got heavier, leaning towards death metal and black metal. Mostly Children Of Bodom and Bolt Thrower. In turn I added Korn and Marilyn Manson to an ever growing list. Throw in some Deftones and a little bit of PitchShifter and you have what I listen to now..

So, what I'm asking is this, how have your musical tastes changed or evolved over the years? If they have at all?

Old school rock to metal to country...some R&B...occasional rap....perks of living in the barracks

I grew up with Classic Rock (Zep, Eagles, Floyd, Fleetwood Mac, and on) thanks to the tutelage of my father. My mother gave me Elvis Presley, Classical, and Opera. Growing up in Louisiana, I also had a lot of influence from Jazz and Blues. I still listen to all of these things today.
When I was about 8-9 I guess I started listening to Smashing Pumpkins and grunge. From there I moved into Nu Metal (like Korn) and then to Industrial (Skinny Puppy, Nine Inch Nails, Velvet Acid Christ, Front Line Assembly) Hardcore (I particularly loved 18 Visions before they turned into... whatever they became). After that it was Death/grind (Cannibal Corpse, Dying Fetus) and thrash (Slayer of course). At long last I discovered Black Metal, and that's been my favorite since. I also listen to occult psychedelic metal and well, pretty much anything.
When I was in undergraduate school I ran the Metal department of a local radio station, so I talked to the labels and got lots of free CD's, which was nice!
I keep up with the Metal and hardcore scenes as much as I'm able. Music is chiefly a spiritual endeavor for me, so my tastes tend to run toward things that affirm my experiences.

When I was a young teen, it was strictly metal, thats it, no ifs ands or buts.

Now its sorta metal, and ranges from folk,bluegrass,rock,softrock,techno,industrial,dubstep, pretty much any other musical sounds with a computer & keyboard. Theres probably others Im missing but you get the idea

As a teen I listened to popular music (not Britney Spears or boy bands, though I was a teen during those years) and punk music. Now there only 2 'punk' bands that I still listen to, and they've changed their styles quite a bit, and are more alternative-Alkaline Trio and Offspring. Neither really falls under the punk category anymore. I've also really started getting into Foo Fighters, Red Hot Chili Peppers and 3 Doors Down.

Yeah, the Chilli Peppers earlier stuff is better. If you don't have a copy, might I recommend picking up 'What Hits?!'. It's bloody brilliant....

Up until about late middle school, all I listened to was Classic Rock, that being what my dad listened to.

Once I started making friends, I started to listen to Metal as well. Now it's gotten to the point were I'll listen to anything except songs were people piss and moan about losing their Girl/guy. Or Songs where they brag about what how much money they have.


The second one is Thankfully rather uncommon.

Over the years from classic rock to harder stuff, like folk- and melodic deathmetal. Also picked up the drum and bass genre couple of years ago.
I pretty much listen to everything nowadays except pop music.

First it was pop and boy bands( I was the only boy in a family of nothing but girls) then it became Rap, Then Metal and that is where i am now.

First off, Bolt Thrower! good choice mate! Games Workshop records.

2nd. When i was a wee lad, (a loooooong time ago) my ma would play elvis all the time, then good ol' public school came into my life, Elementary was Deep Purple, Rush, Floyed, and Zepp, and that song every and ivory got stuck in my head. Jr. High was Def-leppard, Motley crue, saxen, Iron maiden. High School: Slayer, Metallica, megadeth, black flag, sod, mod, coc, Death angel, Dark angel, ST, raven, The exploited, king diamond, alice cooper, TS, Anthrax, the list goes on.

now im open to Clasical/Metal. Still dont like Country/Rap. never been me, will never be me. Alot of my mates love it, and i feel for the guys, but we are still friends

I went from Classic Rock to Hard Rock to Grunge to Screamo to Punk Rock.

@drunkorc, a lot of NWOBHM in there, good choice sir! 'salutes'

Pretty much went from listening to mainstream dreck and oldies to mainstream metal to... well, far less mainstream metal. I basically.. I dunno, I guess I wasn't "into" music as anything more than background noise so I listened to whatever my parents listened to or whatever was on the radio, but all that changed when I got, of all things, Linkin Park's "Hybrid Theory" and Metallica's "Reload".


Now I have fairly varied taste in music but my genre of choice is metal. Favorites include Emperor, Megadeth, Cannibal Corpse, Iron Maiden, Dimmu Borgir, Sabaton, and Ghost.

When I was 10-12 it was mostly classic rock as that's what my mum listened to, then I got into greenday, then metal/screamo then I kinda branched out into liking a little bit of everything.

My tastes have changed more than drastically...

I wasn't really in to music as a kid, though family bought me cd's of random bands from Steps and Take That ( I know...) to garage music.

Whilst at school I found a cassette labelled "Slipknot" and "Korn". And I was hooked. Straight off to HMV, Slipknots self titled album & a copy of Life Is Peachy later and I'm moshing my little heart out in my bedroom. I was using my mums cd player as I was so detached from music that I didnt even bother replacing the one I broke.

Started listening to Kerrang, MTV2 and all that, and very much had the "metal only" attitude. All other music sucked and I had no interest in it.

Then I started studying at Music College in Leeds (I'm a drummer oh yeeeeah) which opened me to all other kinds of music, like funk, soul, rhythm n blues, and (to a lesser extent) jazz & classical.

Now I list my favourite bands as Slipknot, Maroon 5 and... I dunno... RHCP or James Brown or something.

So yeah, I still love metal, but not this new stuff I keep hearing - it just seems like soulless noise for the sake of noise to me, there's no feeling and no heart to it imo.

A rough timeline of my musical tastes, starting with what I listened to first up to what I listen to now:

S-Club phase

Busted phase

Freefaller phase

Fall Out Boy phase

Hard-Fi phase (also Enemy phase)

Lostprophets phase (still like the older stuff)

30 Second to Mars phase (again, still like the older stuff)

Green Day phase (still listen every now and then) NSFW - 'plicit Lyrics

Slipknot phase (also Avenged Sevenfold phase) Still listen sometimes.

Hammerfall + Within Temptation + Two Steps from Hell phase [Present Day]

I'm quite surprised at how much my tastes have changed over the years

I've flirted with everything, and continue to do so.

I started out listening to what my parents listened to. In otherwords, overwhelmingly classic rock. At that point in my adolescence, I was going through the common phase of "it's classic rock, so it must be good, and anything new must suck."

Thankfully, I quickly grew out of that. I then ended up moving more towards alt rock and post grunge, and then from there, into classic British punk (Stranglers!). Also, Jethro Tull.

From there, I moved more into new wave and back into alt rock. King Crimson, The Smiths, New Order, and Joy Division were topping my playlists.

My love affair with David Bowie ended up leading me to Brian Eno, which lead me to Iggy Pop, which lead me to The Velvet Underground. I still regard Bowie, Eno, and Lou Reed as my "holy trinity" of music.

After watching trainspotting, I fell in love with the soundtrack, as well as every band on it. Pulp and Underworld are still some of my favourite groups to this day, and it's rare to find a day where I don't play at least one album by either band.

After that, I kind of expanded in a bunch of different directions. I ended up downloading a massive sampler collection of electronic albums from various genres, which got me greatly interested in (and buying a tonne of albums of) trip hop, downtempo, ambient, house, and synth pop, among many other genres.

Now, at 21 years old, I listen to a very wide breadth of genres. Electronic music tends to dominate my playlists lately, especially ambient or downtempo artists like Brian Eno, Helios, Bonobo, Boards of Canada, or Amon Tobin, and bonus points if its influenced by jazz. Additionally, David Bowie and Lou Reed/The Velvet Underground are very common on my playlists as well, and there's always a sprinkling of folk in there somewhere too.

Really though, I've found that my musical tastes are very open-ended lately. I'm not so much interested in a specific genre, so much as the quality of what I'm listening too. Although it can be noted that rock tends to become less and less included over the years.

They've become more refined. You could call it snobbish. I wouldn't really say they've changed excessively, I still listen to artists I listened to a decade ago on occasion. I still listen to bits and pieces from nearly every genre. The only change is that I don't follow mainstream music at all anymore.

My musical tastes have not changed overly.

I still like the music I liked as a teen (I'm 44 this year).
I saw Def Leppard and Heart for my birthday last year (they toured together) for the first time in over a decade (and Heart have never before toured here - I missed seeing them back in Seattle in the early 90s). I saw The Cult, tour twice (10 or so years apart) - once as a teen, once as a 20-something. I saw Alice cooper many times (he keeps coming back for the golfing).
It hasn't stopped me embracing newer acts - although, yes, they are mostly in a "narrow" focus - although the range is from bebop jazz, to classical, certain "crooners" and then onto what people used to call "AOR".

I STILL don't like hip-hop, rap, and most electronic "dance music". The beats are not pleasing to me, the rhythm isn't particularly rhythmic and the over-use of auto-tune gives me headaches.

Now, I DID have a hearing issue as a child (severely deaf but it was surgically "fixed" leaving me with approximately 80% hearing - there are large frequency 'gaps' where I can barely hear things, and others that just cause pain (auto-tune default being one of them). That's probably why I don't like them. I don't HEAR them the same as most people.

I started off with 60s/70s music when I was really young as it's what my parents always listened to, I could sing along to all of the big songs from that time. I developed my own tastes in school, moving into nu-metal, rock, alternative etc at about 16 along with most of my friends. 17-18 I moved into alternative, metal and general quality heavy stuff. At uni I was an obssessive Muse fan, coupled with things like Placebo, Funeral For a Friend, Finch, and loads of poppy punk stuff like Head Automatica, and Bloc Party/Futureheads. I also liked Battles and other Math-Rock types, along with yourcodenameis:milo. Now since I finished uni I love quieter, intricate music like Sigur Ros, Mogwai etc but love dipping back into my old rock, rap, and metal tunes to mix it up.

Current favourite bands:

Mogwai
Sigur Ros
Radiohead


As a general rule I HATE 90% of the music in the charts today, basically on all the mainstream radio stations, Radio 1 etc here in the UK, I can't stand any of the songs they play, they all sound the same to me. manufactured generic crap.
I also can't stand metal/whatever where it's just screaming, what's the point? The "alternative" kids now seem to be really into this, my step-brother for example, I just don't get it. Compare it with a band like Finch, they scream a bit sure, but the actual musicianship within the songs is astounding, really creative interesting songs.

My musical tastes have changed, but not really to the exclusion of previous favorites. Back when I was a angsty ill-mannered youth, I did have a brief thing for industrial music, KMFDM and My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult in particular. Lords of Acid were also classy. Beyond not really listening to those any more, my tastes have only expanded. I grew up on my father's music, which was mostly from the 60s/70s. Frank Zappa is still my favorite weirdo. I found a love for the music of the 90s, and then nowadays the only modern music I've been able to find that I can stomach is those few Ska bands still in operation.

Never. My tastes in all things have remained static since birth. That said, all I ever listen to is Mozart, naturally.