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BS: Do you hate silence?
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Subject: Do you hate silence? From: Ed Pellow Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:27 PM Unless I'm trying to sleep (and sometimes even then), I really hate silence. It's especially true when I'm on my own, but even when I'm with someone; as soon as wake up, and until I leave for work, I'll play music or listen to the radio. The first thing that I do when I come home is to put the radio on. That, or music (I don't have a TV) will be sounding until I go to bed. I can occasionally enjoy silence but more often than not, it makes me feel quite uncomfortable. Curious to know if other people feel this way. I've heard theories that it's due to my age (I'm early 30's) and that older people grew up with more silence. I've also been told that it's a 'male' thing. Interested in any thoughts Ed |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: jayohjo Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:31 PM I'm just the same - I have to have music on, just in the background, all the time. And sorry to confuse your theories, but I'm 18 & female! *BG* Interestingly though, my mum can't cope with it - she says she can't concentrate on anything else being said to her or anything else going on (she's early 50s). Anyone else? jayohjo XX |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: JenEllen Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:36 PM I happen to live in a place where it's never silent, lucky for me I enjoy the noise. As for man-made noise, I don't have a tv either, but I listen to music fairly constantly. When the music gets turned off, then there are the birds and crickets that are heard, and that's great music as well.. Funny too, I was just talking about this to another 'Catter. I've come across a music hater. A seemingly nice and decent fellow, that turns music off like your mother following behind you turning off the lights. I'm ready to wring his neck. Car trips are horrible, I turn the radio on, a few miles later, 'snap' it's off. Regardless of the type of music, it has to go. He says it's because he can't sting, can't dance, and can't carry a tune in a bucket with both hands. Music holds no interest *gasp* Hopefully there is a cure for this? ~Elle |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: dwditty Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:44 PM I listen to music all the time, too. I particularly like the silence between the notes. If you're not sure what I mean, listen to somebody like Joseph Spence. dw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: GUEST,Barfy Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:48 PM I love moments of silence. Especially when it is generated by The Shambles and Praise |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Morticia Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:49 PM There are silences I enjoy.....the comfortable silence between you and an old friend when talking is unnecessary, the deep peace when I have ( rarely) got the house to myself late at night, that hush at the end of a really well-received song, some silence is wonderful. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Ed Pellow Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:52 PM Moments of silence, sure - and the silence of nature in beatiful surroundings is wonderful. Sat alone in an urban home - silence is downright scary! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: The Shambles Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:53 PM What ever is on or not, there is always music in my head and there always has been.
Am I alone in this and do you think that is the same as hearing voices in your head? I hope not...... So do I....... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Willie-O Date: 10 Jul 00 - 02:57 PM I wake up in the morning wandering around the house turning radios on. (To the same station) ...So the CBC can follow me on my chores. I like to catch breaking news, and feel like I'm in touch with the outside world. My better half tolerates this, but she grew up in a Quaker household where silence was golden, as in their worship services--although this doesn't mean they were quiet that often. I guess we've compromised over the years. She doesn't like fiddle music--live or recorded--or rock first thing in the morning or when she gets home from work; guitars and banjos are OK. Outside, though, I prefer the sounds of nature to a headset. The wind and the birds are never boring. Course that is not exactly silence. My dad has early-mid Alzheimers and just hates having the radio on in his house, if its people talking. He can't follow the conversations and just finds the static deeply annoying. Classical music is OK with him though. W-O |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 10 Jul 00 - 03:04 PM Total silence doesn't exist on Earth, except in isolation chambers. Much of the time the noise we make is to drown out other noise that we don't like. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: SINSULL Date: 10 Jul 00 - 03:06 PM I love silence. Hate the sound of a radio in the morning or in a car. I prefer to sing myself. I go crazy on the job when the FAX machine beeps for five minutes at a time. But I seem to tune out random noise - car alarms, street noise, air planes. Whenever I am out of the city without this cacaphony, the silence actually hurts.
Music is something I actively listen to. I can't have it in the background when I am reading or even on the computer. It distracts me. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: AllisonA(Animaterra) Date: 10 Jul 00 - 03:06 PM Ed, I'm not sure that hating silence is a guy-thing or a 21st-century technological age thing. There's so little silence that when it occurs it can be disturbing! It has taken me years to learn to love silence. There are so many different kinds of silence; that quiet, just-before-sleep-silence with nothing but far-away cars and nearby crickets; the companionable silence between two close friends or loved ones on a walk, the relaxing silence after a busy day or hour when you just need to sit and breathe. I'm now trying to learn to listen to the silence-beyond-the-music, both the music you play and the music of nature. I guess it's the same as the silence-between-the-notes you mentioned, dw. Peace, Allison PS, I wrote this up before the last 5 posts and then got disconnected. Most of you said what I wanted to say and you said it much better! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: kendall Date: 10 Jul 00 - 03:16 PM Personally, I cant stand people who need their heads full of constant noise. As far as I'm concerned I would like to smash every radio in every store I visit. That incessant yammering, thumping and screeching is the bane of my life. I love silence. I cant tell you how many stores and restaurants I have walked out of because they have the gall to force their lousy taste in music on me. It's like smokers thinking they have a right to pollute the air I have to breathe with their god damn acrid stench. You wanna smell like a shit can? fine, get downwind!! You need to fill your empty head with noise? fine get the hell out of my earshot.!! I'm afraid I have some strong feelings about this. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: kendall Date: 10 Jul 00 - 03:26 PM Jenellen, believe me, the only cure for your problem is another mate. Your obvious incompatability will only get worse. I'm with him. To play a radio in a car when you have a passenger is downright rude. It's like having someone constantly trying to butt in on a conversation. If there is something special you both agree on that you want to hear, fine, go for it. Otherwise, turn the damn thing off. Noise pollution is as bad as cigarette smoke to me. I guess the adjoining rocking chairs at the NYC is out eh? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Whistle Stop Date: 10 Jul 00 - 03:40 PM Well, I might not have expressed it quite as adamantly as kendall did, but I also feel like I'm surrounded by too much noise. When I'm engaged in a relatively brainless activity -- driving the car, washing the dishes, etc. -- I like to listen to music. But I don't like the fact that there always seems to be a radio or television playing wherever you go; I find it very distracting and productive of a lot of excess stress. Less noise would be fine as far as I'm concerned. And no, Shambles, you're not the only one. I always have a song going around my brain, or a piece of a song. Sometimes it's just one musical phrase repeated over and over, while my fingers "play" the passage on whatever is close to hand -- the edge of my desk, the steering wheel, etc. I know this because my wife is always telling me to cut it out (especially when it's the middle of the night; I even do this in my sleep!). |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Naemanson Date: 10 Jul 00 - 03:57 PM I wish I could hear silence. I play radios and music all the time to distract me from the high pitched whistle in my ears. Sometimes it gets very loud, especially when there is no other noise to compete with it. I love to walk in the woods and listen to the sounds around me but that damned whistle gets in the way of small sounds. You guys are lucky to hear silence, even those of you who don't like it. Of course, if I could identify the note I'm hearing I could use it as a tuning fork! This just occurred to me. I'll have to experiment... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Bagpuss Date: 10 Jul 00 - 03:58 PM Silence. I love the real silence that isn't really silence - when you can hear nature. On the top of a mountain with nobody around and you hear a bird singing, or the winds rushing past you. The more there is silence, the more you can hear. Having said that, when I need to concentrate on something, I much prefer to be listening to music. Bagpuss |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: JenEllen Date: 10 Jul 00 - 04:04 PM No, Kendall, it would be different if it were having the radio on for 'noise'. There are plenty of things around here worth hearing more so than music; the birds, the frogs, the wind in the sagebrush, the cat purring, hell even just sitting and listening to the grass grow is nice sometimes. Because I don't like the influence of television, and refuse to have one in my home, the only news I get is listening to NPR. I don't listen to most radio stations because I refuse to be spoon-fed the type of music I 'should' be listening to, and hate hearing the same crap every hour on the hour, but I'll take along a tape on long drives for farm calls, or play music that 'Catters have sent me in surgery, I know if I can't finish a spay in the time it takes me to hum "The Lady is a Tramp" then something is wrong. I also don't go around shutting off appliances in other people's homes, and I appreciate the hell out of it when they don't do it in mine. Silence is golden, especially when you need time to heal, don't tell me how to rock my chair and I won't tell you how to rock yours. Saving your spot, ~Elle |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Sorcha Date: 10 Jul 00 - 04:07 PM Having only about 1/2 the hearing capabilities of the rest of you, I probably hear more silence than most of you do, and I like my quiet world. Tried hearing aids once, and they drove me batty! Lots of things were actually painful.
If I am listening to music, I have to LISTEN to it; it can't be background noise or I just don't hear it. I hate piped in music music of other people's choice as much as kendall. Most of my hearing problem is in discrimnation of sounds, i.e., seventy sounds just like seventeen. If there is more than one thing going on, like conversation and music, or several conversations, I am almost totally lost if I can't see the person talking. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Bert Date: 10 Jul 00 - 04:22 PM I agree with kendal on this one although not so passionately. Tree, however, has to have music playing all the time. I'ts not really a problem. The silence I really like, is that soft, heavy, almost warm silence of falling snow. and those of you who listen to the car radio all the time; turn it off now and then and listen to your engine. There's many an engine seized up 'cos the driver was listening to the radio and didn't hear it pinking when it got hot. Bert. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Willie-O Date: 10 Jul 00 - 04:30 PM Oh yeah. Seem to have hit some surprisingly adamant feelings here. As I recall and have experienced, there's a technical description of the sound you hear in any house that's wired to the hydro grid. It's "60-cycle hum". I guess that's what I subconsciously don't like, so I look for for human sounds to drown it out. The experience of being in a house or cabin that is off the grid is completely different. Very peaceful indeed. Well, I gotta get off the puter and go sell power tools to people that probably don't need em. REEEEEAEOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!! Sorry Kendall....though I'm in some agreement about car radios--if you can get a conversation going the radio becomes annoying and superfluous. But that's a differenct topic--the death of common courtesy! Willie-O |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: GUEST,Mrr Date: 10 Jul 00 - 04:33 PM Having lived with someone who always had at least the TV going, I find that I now (living alone again) am much more amenable to silence than I was. I didn't think it bothered me to have the TV on, it would bother me to walk into an empty room and find the TV on but that was more a waste thing. Now I find that I don't turn the TV on unless there is something I actually want to watch - also I turn it off after, instead of just finding the least annoying thing on and leaving it there. But I still find that within human dwellings, silence tends to create a kind of abhorred vacuum still, and I will start singing if there is no other "noise" around. This is not the case outdoors, where the lack of human noise tends to be accompanied by quiet noises I don't usually get to hear, like crickets, birds et al.... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Mbo Date: 10 Jul 00 - 04:35 PM I like music everywhere. In stores, in cars, at home, anywhere! And if it's not playing, then I'm either singing or playing my guitar, or my fingers are tapping out rhythms of songs in my head. Yes, I do require silence, for studying or writing, but when it comes to mundane tasks like driving or throwing pots or cutting the grass...crank it up, I say! And I don't let no one touch my volume knob. I love music all times of day to, when I get home from dropping my sis of at school, at 8am, I turn on the computer and pop in some Oasis or Dougie or ELO. I like when people have music on in their cars when I'm in it...it's interesting to see what kinds of music others like. In my Ceramics class, everyday my fellow students would bring in CDs to play while we worked. It was amazing how many things you find that you like, from people you've never heard of. It's a rewarding and enriching experience. But of course, most folkies hate anything that isn't 200 years old and played on an acoustic guitar...that doesn't make them music lovers in my book. Certainly Kendall's views are not consisitent with a music lover...one of those kinds of people like my sister who can take only 45 minutes at a time, then no more for a few days. Charles Ives' father said "You have to stretch your ears." I've always followed that advice. Some people are just too prejudiced to care about anything that isn't contained in their tiny microcosmic musical reality. But you can't convert every one. That's why I like sitting in my room and playing music by myself best...there's no smart-mouths to complain or tell me to shut up. --Mbo |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Catrin Date: 10 Jul 00 - 04:39 PM D'you know that there's a strong correlation between only listening to one particuylar kind of music and bigotry? I like what you say Mbo - we should be open to other kinds of music - I'm sure its healthy. I do love my folkie stuff though, most of all. I also need silence to study and concentrate and music, or stories for the mundane tasks. ocassionally, I just like silence |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Davey Date: 10 Jul 00 - 04:41 PM I had a memorable experience about 20 years ago. Staying at a rented cottage in Northern Ontario with family and friends, we were playing cards in the evening, and around midnight I decided to go outside. I strolled down to the dock where there was a muskoka chair, sat back, threw out a fishing line (only for something to do), then sat back and listened for the night sounds. All I could hear was my own breathing, so I held my breath. There was not a ripple of water, no breeze touched the leaves, no frogs peeping or croaking, no birds making any kind of noise, no traffic, no insects. It was eerie, but at the same time very calming, relaxing, soothing.. I sat there immobile for about a half hour. It's an experience that I have remembered clearly and fondly since then. On the other hand, I like music playing softly in the background while I'm doing things around the house, or tapes playing a little more loudly if I'm driving alone. I too, like others, don't like restaurants that are too noisy, or clubs where the music is so loud that you can't carry on a conversation with the person beside you without shouting. Davey (:>) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: kendall Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:04 PM Let's face it folks. We all have our own needs and wants. To me, anyone who can listen to ANY kind of music is not a music lover. They are a noise lover. There is a song in my head all the time, and it is usually much more pleasant than any raucus & roll crap.I love Beethoven, I also love Rick Fielding, Gordon Bok and even some bluegrass. It's called being eclectic Mbo. I'm sorry, but when I hear some idiot trying to wring the neck off an electric guitar with the volume at 10, I want to hurt him...bad. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Allan C. Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:08 PM I want to think of silence as the white space as used by the Japanese in their art. It is considered as important as the space taken up by the painted areas. I think I value silence in much the same way. In this metaphor, desirable sound would be the painted part of the picture. Anything else would be like crayon scribblings of a madman over top of both the white space and the intentionally painted parts. It makes a rather ugly picture in my mind's eye and certainly makes for unpleasant listening in the real world of sound. I am partially blessed with a reduced hearing capacity - at least in the upper range. Unless I have my aids screwed in, this helps to eliminate a few noises for me, but as McGrath points out, there is rarely ever true silence in the real world. It is often considered to be part and parcel to the various permutations of the Attention Deficit Syndrome that some sort of sonic stimulation is everpresent. I have noticed this about myself. I have to actually FORCE myself to have quiet moments. I have never actually been diagnosed one way or the other, but I have one child who has been. Some experts point out that the syndrome often follows family lines. Who knows? Either way, some music in the background makes me happy. But I never, ever take a radio or whatever with me when I go into the woods. There is music enough out there. Allan C.whohopesyou'llforgivehisramblings |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: annamill Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:13 PM There was a book I read some time ago called 'The Art of Loving'. It is one of my favorites. The author (I've forgotton) mentions in one section, a section about loving yourself, how few people can stand to be just with themselves. They must have something to distract them from their thoughts. He suggested, to get to know yourself, to sit quietly, with no outside distractions, for about 1/2 hour per day to get to know yourself. He mentions, that even in a quiet place, your mind will take you away with outside thoughts and distract you from just being with you and you had to be careful of this happening. I tried it for awhile, but I bored me ;-) I need some sort of sound going on too. Especially music! Love, annap |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Mbo Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:13 PM Truth is I'd rather listen to the guitar guy than anything you could ever offer musically, and I'm sure that most people would rather hear you than me. "Good one", "nice one" is getting really old in Mudcat. I know people hate the stuff I play. I know they'd love for me to sing Fields of Athenry and Lorena every single night and then leave. Good, you can all have it. I'm outta here. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: AllisonA(Animaterra) Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:15 PM Shambles, in our family we call songs that get into your head and won't leave: "ear worms!" Usually they are friendly little worms, especially when I'm learning a song, but sometimes the little devils cause a terrible racket with old commercial jingles, tv show theme songs from the early '70's, and pop songs ditto. That's another reason I'm teaching myself to listen consciously and thoughtfully to the silence. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Clinton Hammond2 Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:21 PM Davey... Ya make me weep for missing my Northern Ontario Home!!!! I've been there, where yer talking about more than a few times... it's great eh!! On the subject of silence... there's a wonderful time of silence I look forward to now... After a gig and a Night Drive home, to "Turn the headlights off, close my eyes and let go fo the wheel"... maybe one last smoke sitting in the car and let the "echoes of the amplifiers" die away... Ahhhhhhhhh.......... {~` |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Micca Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:23 PM In my Youth I took part in some sensory deprivation experiments,you know, eyes and ears covered float in a tank in the dark at blood temp. and the first thing that happens is you hear your body sounds,blood in your inner ear etc. then your brain starts supplying sound , or imagined sound, and your sense of time gores completely.I was in there for 6 hours and I thought it was days... so I have something to measure silence against... I can have music as background, but My SO finds it hard to study with music going, she says she keeps trying to listen..and it ruins her concentrattion.. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: GUEST,Burke Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:23 PM I'm a bit in the middle on this. I do wake to news radio, turn it on when I enter the house & have something on pretty much constantly. I listen to the radio or a tape when alone in the car. Tapes to sing with are a great way to stay awake. I can't handle television because I can't let it be background, it demands my attention even when I don't want to give it. I do turn the music off when I have company unless there is something specific I want them to listen to. I turn the radio off in the car when we're talking. On long trips the conversation can run out so I'll put something on then. I think it is in large part a difference in ages, but the age break is somewhere around 45-50, maybe even a little older. Children of the 50's & 60's grew up with both television the transistor radios & just small radios that could be listened to in privacy that completely changed the home sound scene. I think when you grow up with the sound of radio, recordings, or TV, constantly around you, you can treat it as background & feel uncomfortable if it's not there. If you grew up before that time, you are used to giving it fuller attention & therefore find it more disruptive if you're not interested. This is especially marked in studying situations where one needs the sound to concentrate & one needs the quiet. I also don't find all sounds equal. I'd make a distinction between naturally occurring & manufactured sounds. Yes, we do tend to fill up the silence, but filling it with conversation or music making seem a better way of filling it. I also think it's a good thing to turn off the personal music device & listen to nature is also, but maybe that's just my age :-)
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Joe Offer Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:31 PM I think it takes a lot of discipline to appreciate treasures like solitude and silence. I wandered around south Florida for a couple of weeks last month, just me and the mosquitos and the alligators and the roadkill armadillos. I had taken a wallet full of CD's with me, but then my rental car broke down and the replacement car played only cassettes. I was stuck in silence when I was out of range of decent radio stations - but it was good for me. The trip was much better without the CD's. I keep meaning to set aside a time for silence every day, but it's something I find easy to neglect. Solitude and silence can do a lot to make us much more thoughtful and crative than we usually are. -Joe Offer- |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Kim C Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:53 PM Depends on my mood. Usually I like to have music on, but not always. Sometimes I turn the car radio completely off when I'm alone. When I'm trying to sleep, though, I usually like the soft hum of a fan. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Allan C. Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:54 PM Mbo, since you have chosen this thread to announce your departure I will address it here. I sincerely hope that you soon arrive at a calm place in your life where you can make a conscious decision to sing your own songs. I think many of the people who have gravitated to this place have made just that decision. In their case, at least one of the kinds of music they prefer to sing, play, or listen to falls under the umbrella named "Folk". I'll wager that quite a few of us have very strong interests in other sorts of umbrellas. For instance, my other predilection is for 1956-1969 Oldies. When left to my own devices, I play quite a few Oldies if I think anyone would like to hear them - ask Annap & Moonchild. I don't pretend to like a lot of what is considered the music of today but I have found some of it which I think is really very good. You have been responsible for pointing out some of it, my friend. Do what your heart tells you to do with regard to the Mudcat. But just know that there are those here at the Mudcat who are richer for having heard your music and for having read your words. Allan |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Jed at Work Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:55 PM I love silence, too. I enjoy the hours of quiet I get (minutes at a time usually) inthe car - or at home, working in the yard. I usually have some music running through my head, and when I'm hear music I have tolisten, even if it's bad! I am an active listener, at the sub-concious level. Maybe that's why I enjoy the moments of quiet - gives me a break! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Sourdough Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:57 PM After four hundred years or so, I think there is a general consensus forming among psychologists that we are returning to a view of essential personality that has much in common with the old ideas of The Four Humours. As MArk Twain is supposed to have said, "History does not repeat itself, it rhymes.) There are studies that show that there are groupings of reactions to stimulations such as (and these are hypothetical, I don't want, unless absolutely necessary) to go back into my old scripts to locate specifics), people who prefer more or less constant audio stimulation are less sensitive to temperature change. Of course, life experiences can help to shape this but we all seem to have a hard-wired set of preferences that can be changed only with some effort. Coming from a professional background of journalism, I've seen that there are clearly some people who are very unhappy in a "bull pen" situation while others, myself included, love that stimulation, the buzz of people on the phone, of conversations around. I once had a private office with a secretary outside. I felt lonely, cut off, perhaps even abandoned. To an extent that often surprises others, I remain able to pick up on more than one thing simultaneously, filtering to hear only what is of some value. Out of the buzz of several converstions, I will hear a noun or a verb that is of interest to me and will be able to tune in. I worked with an executive producer of some of the most highly regarded television documentaries. He was a former Chicago Tribune reporter and always had the television set going in his office. It was playing game shows, childrens cartoons and situation comedy reruns. All this while he was grappling with some of the major issues of our times and how to communicate them. As near as I could tell, all he was interested in was having the noise and flickering movement for company. (He did have a private office with a secretary outside the door.) At that time, I didn't know anything about temperment but now I am convinced of its important role. We are not born with blank slates for minds. Sourdough |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: GUEST Date: 10 Jul 00 - 05:59 PM The best silence I ever "heard" was in a dry, dead cave many years ago. The person with me couldn't take it and went back out, but I sat there for maybe an hour, with the flashlight off and enjoyed seeing nothing, and hearing nothing but my own heartbeat.
Alas, when one lives with pets there is no such thing as silence. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Bill D Date: 10 Jul 00 - 06:15 PM Good music deserves your attention, so I try to play it only when I can pay attention...bad music need not be played, so I have many periods of quiet......There IS a sort of music that is ONLY supposed to be background 'mood' music, but I can take that or leave it. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: catspaw49 Date: 10 Jul 00 - 06:54 PM jed said, I believe, "active listener" and that I can relate to. In the van alone, I play what I want and sing along/learn....whatever. But I can't take music just playing away as a background. Karen likes it....I hate it. So we swsap off as we travel together. As to what's on the radio, I can't take it and I never could. Just something in that "hey boys and girls" bullshit that kills me. Our teens have all been nuts for the radio and I have been known to "disable" their stuff when they aren't looking. I miraculously fix it later. On severasl occasions in the van I have lost it completely to the point of stopping, ripping the fuse out and throwing it into a field. Oddly enough, I can't go to sleep to either music (actve listener) or silence (start thinking about things) and have gone to sleep to the TV for years.....when I sleep that is. I can go to sleep listening to Carlen, Pryor, Miller, etc., but I know the routines by heart. Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: kendall Date: 10 Jul 00 - 07:32 PM Well, I didnt mean to bring on another PMS attack for Mbo, but, I feel very strong about this and I will not apologize for stating how I feel. I say again IMHO, anyone who MUST have some kind of noise is an airhead! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Mbo Date: 10 Jul 00 - 07:36 PM Then I with honor accept the title of "Mbo the Airhead." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Peter Kasin Date: 10 Jul 00 - 07:37 PM As I get older, I get a little less tolerant of constant music. Enjoying the silent moments makes getting back to the music that much better. When I was in college, a typical dorm room party was music blasting from a tape player at full throttle, with everyone standing around yelling at each other at the top of their lungs - which was the party conversaton. I see a correlation between getting older and wanting less music coming out of machines. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: kendall Date: 10 Jul 00 - 07:58 PM age has nothing to do with it in my case. I've always hated anything that made no sense. Mbo, why are you taking all this so personally? I dont remember singling anyone out? I'm having a real rough time right now, and, my tolerence level is dropping more each day. Wednesday I find out if I will ever sing again. A wise man once said "Never ruin an apology with an excuse." OK I've got a hair across and I make no opology!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: Ebbie Date: 10 Jul 00 - 08:57 PM As some have suggested, maybe being an older person has something to do with it but I cannot concentrate when there's too much noise- and that includes tv's, radios and canned music. I'm very tolerant of music that's being made in my presence, but I suspect that if I needed to think something out I would have to get away from that too. There are people in my family who automatically switch on the radio when they wake up and then don't even listen to it! Even talk shows! Why bother?? And people who jog along with the 'phones plugging their ears... I understand that in the 'old days'when sewage ran in the streets people would hold posies to their noses. In my opinion, that's what people are doing today, but against noise rather than smell. And we don't even realize it. Ebbie |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: kendall Date: 10 Jul 00 - 10:07 PM I guess I pissed Mbo off without meaning to. So, have I offended anyone else with my rantings? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: GUEST Date: 10 Jul 00 - 10:10 PM silence |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: IvanB Date: 10 Jul 00 - 10:29 PM kendall, I tend to agree with you on pretty much all your points. I think music sounds all the sweeter when it ends a healthy helping of silence (relative, of course). Even as a boy, I can remember going fishing with my cousin. He had to have some sort of sound blaring at him all the time, while I could be content to sit in the boat for hours, never moving, never having a nibble, just listening to nature's quiet. Needless to say, about two fishing trips together was enough for both of us to forswear ever trying it again. I DO like just about any type of music, tho'. I just have some strict definitions of what is music and what is noise - and my noise definition would probably include many things composed as 'serious' music. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Do you hate silence? From: PoohBear Date: 10 Jul 00 - 11:33 PM I find that total silence is unnerving. However, the silence that surrounds a lightening strike is more wonderful than a piece by Motzart or Eric Bogle. I find myself cringing away from places that force music on me - altho in my car I almost always have something on the CD player to sing with. To each his own - just like most things in life. PB |