Share some of your most hated music

"Wonderful Christmastime" by Paul McCartney is the one song I hate more than any other. It's not even close.

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Just to reduce my response to a simple question, I'd like to know if we are defining depth as there being multiple layers of meaning to peel back, if intent is required for something to have depth?


I think there are lots of works of art, especially in situations where we cannot directly get answers from the artist about what their intent was, where very convincing and scholarly and valuable things have been written on elements or interpretations that are completely at odds with what the intent of the artist was.


As an example, if we can definitively prove that all of the previous interpretations of what Rosebud means in Citizen Kane are proven to be incorrect, that they were never the intentions of Welles (that Rosebud was exclusively meant as nothing but an inside joke about Hearsts pet name for his wife's genitals), does whatever depth these interpretations have spoken of suddenly become completely irrelevant or at least considerably less relevant? Can we no longer view or interpret the rest of the movie in the shadow of them, because they aren't correct. Does that depth dry up, or can we still use the wrong interpretation of Rosebud to keep it being a deep dive about the unknowability of other humans. About the small tragedies we all suffer? Or does it just now got to be viewed as a crass, sexist jab at a rich and powerful man?


At what point can we discard intent? Are we beholden to it, if it is known? Would it be fruitless to find deeper meaning in something if it can be proven to not really be there?


Or, rather, I guess I'll reduce my response to quite a few not so easy questions.

This is a good clarifying question. I will say: mostly, yes. I say "mostly" because I think something where a layer of meaning was merely obscured would meet the criteria I'm presenting. The only two things I feel are crucial for my (perhaps idiosyncratic) definition are that the meaning in question cannot be a) surface level or b) noticed or created only by the recipient.

Agreed. But I incline towards putting that to the credit of those scholars more than the work itself, and it's one of the reasons I think of criticism as an art form unto itself.

I think situations where the author has died or never spoken about it present interesting topics of conversation where reasonable people can disagree about this kind of depth, of course.

Depends on what the question is. They definitely do not become irrelevant for the purposes of evaluating quality. I don't think they matter much for the discrete purpose of evaluating depth (again, the way I'm using the term, which no one else is obligated to mirror, but obviously we're talking about the concept and not the word choice).

Depends on what the question is. If we're just talking about value, certainly not. If we're evaluating the author and the depth of their work, then I do care about those things. Mostly because I'm using intended depth as a predictor of future depth, which for me correlates with interest level more than the incidental/unintended kind.

I like the feeling of someone hiding a thing for me to find. I feel intensely connected to the creator when that happens. There's something magical about a creator leading your neurons down the exact same path as theirs. It reminds me of little easter eggs in video games where you try to "break" something in the game only to find the developer expected you might and put something there for you to find when you did.

Yeah, this post was lousy with scope creep.

Huge Paul fan (natch), but I hate this song too. Haven’t heard it in decades.

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I’m here only on Mondays, Wednesdays & Fridays. That’s why I’m here now.

Me too! I dread that song when it comes on the radio at Christmas time...there's a few others I hate but that's the worst.

Discussing jazz and music is so boring. Lots of beard-stroking discussions using complicated words and it all boils down to some people having bad taste anyway. :P

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Look, I'm not judging you - after all, I'm posting here myself, but maybe, just maybe, if you spent less time here and more time watching films, maybe, and I stress, maybe your taste would be of some value. Just a thought, ya know.

The station I listen to only plays carols at Xmas thank goodness.

The wife and I don't listen to the radio will driving, except at Christmas time. Luckily there's two stations that plays Christmas songs, so when a sucky song comes on, I change the station!

We (I should say I) only listen to WRTI out of Philadelphia. Classical & jazz only. CT public radio has no classical music in the a.m. I used to listen to Springfield, MA public radio, but couldn’t keep a signal, strangely enough.

You're lucky. This thing is the bane of my existence just about any time I go to a store or restaurant in December. And if it's not this one, it's some horrid cover of it.

Meh, I don't mind it, but I've never had to deal with it on an infinite loop either.

Sublime

Rage Against the Machine

The Doors

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Shania Twain
Insane Clown Posse
A Simple Plan
Def Leppard
Post Thriller Michael Jackson
Whatever 90s nu metal band that covered Sound of Silence
Sammy Hagar Van Halen

AC/DC post Bon Scott

I find it hilarious this needs to be explained. That the idea of liking something (music) and wilfully seeking out more of it (even with the looming threat of maybe not liking some of what is out there), is somehow some reckless daredevil behavior that you should refrain from because....you might end up liking more music.


Or, as an ******* might put it, you might start to pretend to like it. And then become the horrible kind of person who might even talk about how such a strange thing came to be.


Basically, I'm starting to think some people simply get confused by the idea of anyone actually liking things.

These guys could be on my list too.

One of my best friends concurs. As far as she is concerned there is no AC/DC after Bon Scott. Me... I think Brian is fine.

I have never heard a cover of A Wonderful Christmastime. But I do not hate it. so maybe I never noticed.

Your friend is right! I was in high school when Bon Scott died and me and my friends were totally into AC/DC...but after Brian 'screech' Johnson came in I couldn't listen to them anymore...Yet for some reason I seen AC/DC in concert during their For Those About To Rock tour. It wasn't my favorite concert that I seen.

I think people who hate jazz do not realize what a vast array of music is labeled under the heading of jazz.

Believe me there is something that you like that is actually jazz.