How do you enjoy music?

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How do you enjoy music? Do you like it familiar, or new? I like to listen to a new CD until I know it perfectly, so that when a song ends I start humming the next automatically, and I don't like hearing songs I have on CD on the radio because there is always a different song following it. I also tend to go through minor music obsessions where I will only listen to one style or artist, and I will have a minor obsession with the style/artist. Generally these run between my "main" obsessions. Do any of you have a different way of enjoying music? If so, what is it?

Everytime I play music, its revolved around radio. I pretend its being played on the radio if I am not listening to it on the radio. I listen to a little of almost everything. All depends on what I feel like listening to.

There is music that gets better the more I listen to it, and music that gets annoying or stale the more I listen to it. So I've learnt not to judge music on first listening --- most of my favourite pieces were ones that I didn't like at first.

I guess I like new and familiar songs pretty equally. My music-listening time is generally split halfway between listening to my entire music collection with Winamp on shuffle or tracking down new songs. I love discovering talented new bands, and for me, there isn't much that beats the exhilaration of coming across a really really great song I've never heard before.

Speaking of that, just tonight, I discovered Sigur Rós' "Untitled 1". I think my search for the perfect song has ended.

I'm a fan of most rock and most electronic...

I like having a wide variety of music in my collection, & I'd like it to be a greater collection. The problem is I only like music that I know off by heart - lyrics, riffs, lyrics, timing, percussion patterns etc. Hence, every piece of music in my collection, bar a couple of albums that I'm trying to get into at the present, are known to me off by heart in all of these ways.

I'm currently listening to New Orders new album (not out for a few months yet ) - Waiting For The Sirens Call. I have my MSN name update itself every seven seconds with information about the music I'm listening to, eg. New Order [Waiting For The Siren's Call #04] Krafty (0:15/4:35). I'm sure they all think I'm a bit weird with the same tracks rotating 24/7.

I can only listen to new music i dont know if i am interested in it, like i read a good review about it or something and want to check it out, or if its in the background and im not really absorbed into it. Otherwise songs i know really well gets my enjoyment !

I don't care whether a song is new or familiar.

First of all, I can usually tell what I'll like a lot (or at least what will meet my standards well) from first run-through. Either I'll be able to say to myself "Woah! That's ill!" from the ambience and attitude of it or I'll be able to catch a real slick or unique hook if it's there, stuff with that hook may not blow my mind at first butend up growing on me quite addictively.

As for what I love, I tend toward darker thicker sounds (a real good example like I've cited before; dark rolling jungle/drum&bass). Then again I do like that style mashed up with jazz or hip-hop if it's done right. For darker sounds I'm all about the way it hits my ears; a real ramped out cycling bass, stuff that sounds like tonally glorified speedbumps from the highway or dirtorted-reverbed fog-horns or train-whistles does lots for me (though note I like smoothed out and ambient industrial sound, not clompy stuff like you hear in the style 'industrial' itself). As for stuff like hip-hop, jazz, alternative metal, or the right industrial artists I do like - it's all about the ambience and attitude. Hard to explain it much deeper that that, I could give a listing of the people I like but t would be kinda redundant since I've done it a lot on other threads.

Another thing I can sayu I like in music aside from dark; I like a REALLY mysterious and foreboding sound (has to be of the right kind of character though).Stuff that has a real eerie, manic, 'give you chills' kind of beauty innit. Emotional heaviness I guess is another element in that as well, real moody stuff. To me that kind of dark & mysterious quality is almost synonymous with the intelligence of the sound. A heavy injection of soul is good too and to be honest I just care that it's in the vibe - I can be listening to a real darth-vaderish jungle track and I love it when it has a real concrete and urban underpinning in the attitude.

I love music from every genre, but I don't love all music within every genre. For me music needs to travel, rising, falling and breaking. It needs to be playful or deeply emotional. It needs to be experimental and different. I don't generally enjoy commercial or country music because I can't relate to it easily. My favorite music genres are: Electro, underground funky house, tribal, old soul music, intelligent rock and dance music which is mixed with music from other cultures (especially the east). I am a 'lyrics' person and good lyrics are left permanently in my memory. I love samples and scratching, unusual noises and patterns and rhythmes. I have made music in the past and would like to make some again (money and time permitting). For me music is energy. It keeps me sane, distracts me from sinking into depression and makes me feel like I am alive, not just existing.

I like familiar music. When I find something new I like I'll listen to it over and over until it's familiar. I like to be able to sing along, even if only in my head.

I like listening to songs on Youtube because I can fast-forward or rewind to the best parts and I can replay the entire song if I so desire.

i like listening to music over state-of-the-art playback systems. i used to live relatively close to a high-end audio shop/record store, and since i knew the proprietor i got to listen to my music over his megabuck systems. now that i live far away out in the sticks, i miss that. but i use a pair of sennheiser hd580 ovation cans with a toltec processor, and that gives me some of the high-end sound i am used-to hearing. i also used to listen to music over a pair of magnepan magnaplanar speakers, those were very neutral and clear, with no mid-bass hump or boxiness, and superior stereo imaging.
if the music is on a phonograph record such as an LP, 45 - 7" or 78 - 10" disc, i am prone to digitizing 'em and then using DSP to remove the surface noise, before i seriously consider them for enjoyable listening. must of my music is in phonographic disc form.

I like listening to anything that doesn't sound like Lady Gagy or other corporate bullcrap.

There was a time, back in the days of ALBUMS, that I needed to hear the artist's collections exactly the way they arranged them on the LP, much as you do. Over time though, I discovered that, because a lot of the bands that I liked were either Canadian or European, that the order in which the songs were arranged, was often different on the non-U.S. releases. It was jolting to hear the "wrong" song come up next.

Today though, what with being able to construct my own play lists, I don't care that much about the order. In fact, it now actually bores me to hear it all always in the same order.

One thing that has happened though, and it took many years for it to happen, is that these days, at least 50-60% of the time, I listen to the same band. The Tragically Hip has become my all time favorite band, and whenever I fire up the player, I keep gravitating to their songs. I keep wanting to hear them, over and over. That could be though, because I don't listen to other people's music very often anymore, so I never really can get sick of it.

I doubt very much any other artist will ever dethrone them as my favorite. That's because they quickly became my favorites in 1990, and have been so ever since. I'm now almost fifty, so I doubt there's enough time left in my life for any other band to accomplish dethroning them. All my other favorites lasted about two to three years each. The Hip have lasted TWENTY YEARS!

Highly doubtful anyone will ever outdo that for me!

I listen to songs one at a time. No playlists for me. I tend to listen to maybe, 4 or 5 songs in a sitting, maybe once a day or once every two days. It's rare I listen to an album, and if I do, I listen to it in two or three pieces. I like to think of songs from the catologue in my head that could accentuate my mood, or alleviate a bad mood. I like songs that have some topicality that matches what's going on in my life. I like to emotionally connect with songs.

I went through a period last year of listening to a single track by every artist unknown to me I could find. It was a bit arduous really, but I found one or two gems. These days I tend to stick to what I know I like, with occasional (usually unrewarding) forays into the unknown.