The Things We Do For Love: Stories of Current/Ex's Questionable Taste In Music

Thought some of you might like to share. Who knows, it could be therapeutic.

My ex-wife had five favorites: Barry Manilow, Barbara Streisand, The Bacon Brothers, Josh Groban, and Clay Aiken. Barbara is a taste I never acquired, the Bacon Bros. were fun and initially I found them surprisingly talented but after constant exposure...Barry, Josh and Clay were a bit beyond the pale for me. I've seen the Bros. several times, spent a fortune on Streisand tickets, got drenched at a Barry Fest and saw pretty much every Clay tour including his Christmas show. All that effort and...well, she is my EX-wife. Next time around I'll try a no-tolerance policy and I bet I get better results.

 

I had the same type experiences with my ex. She loved the Dixie Chicks and the Eagles, neither of which I can stand for more than a song or two. Like you I spent a ton on tickets, but happily she bought her own CDs. The only saving grace about those pricey Eagles arena shows was that Joe got to play several of his songs. On the other hand, she once dragged me to a Sarah Brightman and the NSO concert at Wolf Trap - which I was dreading. Turns out she was fantastic.

 

I am pretty easy going with music, as long as I get to play my stuff. My ex's music taste was ok, she just took some of my music when she took off.... I would have rather her have had bad taste and left my music alone.

 

Communication is the problem to the answer.
You've got her number and your hand is on the phone.
The weather's turned and all the lines are down.
The things we do for love, the things we do for love. - 10cc

 

Mostly simpatico, but she'd play her Joan Armatrading and Joni Mitchell records when I was out of the house.

 

My wife likes top 40, which personally, I find dreadful. Slowly but surely I have been bringing her over to the classics. Quadrophenia, Dark Side etc, etc. If I can get her on those, I will sprinkly in more radical goodies. Various methods have worked wonders for things like The Verve's Storm In Heaven. I'll leave it to imagination what could get the mind in the right state for an album like that. That is a different topic for a different forum though.

 

I only had one ex that was into exploring my music stash. The rest were “the greatest hits” types that would pick out more pedestrian titles out of the 1,000’s of lps I have. Never was a make or break thing, just one of those things.

 

I suspect I may be the one with questionable musical taste in my household. Hard to say.

 

How is it there was never an Aiken for Bacon tour???

 

I love my wife but her taste in music is terrible. Her favorite band is Def Leppard. She thinks Player and Ambrosia were great bands. She has Sirius XM in the car and only listens to the 70s, 80s, 90s and Love songs channels. Weekend road trips usually involve replays of Casey Kasem's American Top 40 from the 70s. It's brutal.

 

My wife only listens to Linda "Alice" Lavin at a very loud volume.

I think I win this thread.

 

My ex was obsessed with the band X. God I can't stand them.

 

I don't think I've ever been with someone whose tastes strongly differed from mine.

My most serious GF in the 90s liked some trendy stuff back then - like the brief "swing revival" - but we both loved Bowie, U2, and a bunch of others.

Other GFs have liked bands that didn't do much for me but I can't recall any where we really disagreed!

 

Yeah, I wouldn't say the spouses are always the ones with bad taste, from the evidence of this thread.

 

My ex was a Springsteen fanatic but also bought Barry Manilow's Greatest Hits. Some people have nooks and crannies in their brain where it is possible to love totally incongruent musicians.
None of my wives or GFs have liked Love, Spirit and many of the bands I love. But that's OK.

 

"The world's a mess it's in my kiss"

 

My wife is Ukrainian and listens mostly to Russian pop music.

She can't stand most of my music, (blues, 60's & 70's rock, R&B, some modern rock.)

We meet in the middle with trip-hop stuff, (like Portishead)--it's pop enough for her and weird enough for me.

Oh, and we both enjoy this album, played on a loop during our first few years of marriage:

 

Yeah, maybe I should have said that I think Joan Armatrading and Joni Mitchell are most likely great taste, just not my taste.

 

My EX and I got together in the early 90's. She was into a lot of current dance/pop music of the time....Ace of Base, Janet Jackson, etc...
I shifted her into a more rock direction but that came with its own crosses to bear. Popular rock radio songs that got played to death on MTV, got played even more at our place. Live and the DMB really irked me the most. I actually like some live stuff but something about her and her girlfriends screaming Lightning Crashes just makes me cringe.

Her and her sister than got big time into Tori Amos. I have seen Tori live an insane amount of times. I've seen her solo with piano, with just a guitar player, full band, her book tour, etc... Those were tough days. I swear I was the only guy in my section, surrounded by young women screaming "I love you Tori" every 5 seconds.

Don't tell her, but I actually play Tori's To Venus and Back album every now and then. It has more of a rock sound and full band. Good songs too.

Full disclosure: I may even sing along with The Sign once in awhile too.

 

In 2001, I dated a woman for about 6 months who was a massive Bruce fanatic.

I love Bruce but I was a casual fan compared to her. It's not much of an exaggeration to state that nearly every conversation we had - no matter what the topic - would eventually migrate to Bruce!

She was - and is - obsessed. Kinda ironic that we dated the only year from 1999-2009 during which Bruce didn't tour!

 

I haven´t met anybody who had a questionable taste in music. If you like it, you like it.

Then again, I think most people would find my taste in music, eclectic as it is, extremely questionable. Feel free. No skin off my nose.

 

An ex-girlfriend was from Asbury Park. I've never been able to get into Springsteen mostly because of his personal style, and the fact that he dresses like the people who used to beat me up in high school.

My wife of 37 years and I met because of a shared love of the music of Kate Bush.

 

Honestly not sure what style of dress you mean!

 

My ex-wife was not a big rock fan. On two occasions (1993 & 2002), she blew off attending Paul McCartney shows with me. Fortunately, it was easy to find friends more than willing to go. She also blew off a CSN show at the last minute (their unplugged tour).

I did, however, attend a Bette Midler concert and a Manhattan Transfer concert with her. Full disclosure, I thoroughly enjoyed the Manhattan Transfer show.

During our marriage, I resigned myself to having a spouse who did not enjoy rock music, especially live rock music, as much as I do. I have been happily remarried for 11 years to a woman who loves a variety of music and attending live shows when we can.

She can’t believe that I attended a Bette Midler show.

 

All the thugs at Southwest High School dressed like this.