Music Questions and Half-Answers

This is something I made for a CD cover. My printer decided I'd do better if I just used a Sharpie...
*sigh*
I can never decide what songs to put on my CD's. I have a lot of material.
After twenty years of playing music I still don't have an answer for that dreaded question: "What kind of music do you play?"
Fuck. I hate that question.
My only answer is "listen." But who has time for that?
Ha! At least I get regular FM airplay even if I have to play the goddamned CD myself!

Not long ago I was trying to put another band together and I went to visit a singer/pianist I'd met at the station. I was playing some of my songs on a CD when her boyfriend came over- he listened for a second and asked:

"What do you call this?"

"Not sure. It's new- no words yet."

"No. I mean this kind of music. What do you call it?"
I could tell he hated it.

But I had no snappy reply. Uh, rock?
That's lame. It means nothing.

Until then, I'd thought that I'd found a new friend and possibly a singer- the woman in question is pretty good writer and we got along really well. A jam/audition/rehearsal was scheduled for the following week...

-but-

My confirmation emails were not answered.
My phone call was not returned.
Practice came and went and I haven't heard a word since that visit.
I guess she hated my songs.

You might like them . What sort of music do you like?

For me, it's easier to list the music I don't like, because I like most styles.

I don't like most Top 40.
Ever.
From any year.

I don't like anything with the word "contemporary" in it, such as "contemporary Country" or "contemporary Christian".

I detest "smooth" Jazz.

I hate anything spelled "Lite". This universal condemnation is not limited to music- it's also quite applicable to foodstuffs and quality in general.
"Lite" is a sort of code for "unsatisfying" these days.

I like Billie Holliday, Frank Zappa and Gong. I like Tom Waits, Bob Dylan and Peter Tosh. I like
The Clash, Iggy Pop and Brian Eno; Funkadelic, Hank Williams and Steve Earle. Danielle Dax, X and Can.

I also like a lot of the new music I hear at the station , but I'll be buggered if I can remember the names of the bands-as a new pal was telling me the other day: " What the fuck is wrong with people over 35? They all stop listening to new music!"

True, sorta. When I was 16 I could list every member of every incarnation of Hawkwind and Motorhead. I could name all the Mothers of Invention- on every album! I knew the words to every Grateful Dead song ( I eventually learned that the Dead did a lot of covers) .

Now?
I can't even name what's being played right now, but it's some sort of disco/techno/trance/house - you know- the 180 beats per minute drum-machine stuff, with lots of female vocal samples that sound like they were lifted from porno flicks.

It's like being rapidly and repeatedly struck in the head with a rubber mallet while listening to the same fake orgasm over and over and over... this must be somone's idea of a good time, but it's not mine.

I feel like listening to Jethro Tull instead- or maybe Lucinda Williams. I like listening to her sing about guitars and loneliness.
She knows what's what.

*click*

See you in a while.