Why do you love that song?
Exploring the way your brain embraces music, the story of an evolving life-long love affair.
artwork by Amishi Gupta.
“What kind of music do you like?”
“Who do you typically listen to?”
“What’s your current favorite song?”
I ask these questions to everyone I get to know. The key to someone’s heart is to listen to their passions, and music tends to be a topic everyone feels strongly for. Yet, a further question remains unasked.
Why do you like the music you like?
That sole question opens the door to many others. Why do our best friends enjoy completely different genres? How can we have varied tastes ourselves? What could be driving those preferences? For a long time, I lacked answers or, more specifically, I lacked a way to begin decoding these thoughts. Thankfully, one day last spring I was wandering through a bookstore in London and stumbled across Levitin’s This is Your Brain on Music displayed by the till. Having, of course, bought it (I can’t resist an intriguing book) and read it, I’d like to share the insights offered. For the purposes of this article, I will be simply focusing on two of his chapters: ”My Favourite Things” and “Anticipation”. As we move through my key takeaways, I’ll share how it relates to the music I have curated over the years. And as you read, I hope you can join me in this reflection and discover your own answers!
Your definition of “good” music forms over time, yet primarily in your childhood.
Our auditory system is fully functioning as a 20-week-old fetus in the womb. Everything we hear from then and onwards influences what criteria we devise to measure music against.
Levitin shares a study where 1-year-old infants gravitated towards speakers which played music they heard repeatedly only while in the womb. Their prenatal exposure influenced their preferences despite not listening to those songs again since birth. While I cannot offer my experiences from this segment of my life—my parents can’t remember what they listened to as my mother was pregnant with me—the idea that this is a plausible possibility is so thought-provoking. The study defies the commonly held belief that we suffer from childhood amnesia, struggling to remember our lives before the age of 5. Just how strongly does music strike us?
“It appears that for music even prenatal experience is encoded in memory, and can be accessed in the absence of language or explicit awareness of the memory.” – p.225
However, the story continues as we age. People generally tend to begin taking a real interest in music around the age of 10. Looking back to 2014, my ears were constantly met by One Direction and Selena Gomez. No doubt, this is where my love for pop music can be traced back to. CapitalFM deepened this, and its loud, repetitive tracks stayed with me as I discovered new realms of music—but more on that later.
Our teenage music tastes may feel distant, close, or both at once. I’ve always thought that my favorite artists from ages 14-16 would always remain close to my heart, though currently they’re a thing of the past. Turns out, it hits harder than I thought. Elder Alzheimer patients, despite their deteriorating memory, distinctly remember their favorite music from age 14. Looks like BTS and I are in it for the long run!
My early teens were defined by different boy bands, predominantly within K-Pop (the likes of BTS, Stray Kids and Ateez). Stray Kids’ discography is often described as “noise music” (try “God’s Menu”). At 15, I loved their immersive loudness. By 17, the same loudness was overbearing. Nostalgia was perhaps the only factor drawing me back.
Amidst this change, I began listening to more R&B, in English and in Korean. In writing this article, I struggled to recall exactly how I became a R&B listener. From Levitin’s perspective, this transition feels well-informed. I enjoy R&B for its strong and often playful bass coupled with softer melodious vocals. Perhaps I was tired of in-your-face tracks, and they shaped my love for more powerful low-pitched sounds. This still holds true. And perhaps more changes in musical preferences aren’t in store for me; Levitin suggests our likes and dislikes are mostly set in stone by age 20, making us less inclined to venture out. Though I see how plausible this is, I hope this isn’t the case and that we continue to explore new sounds as we age and change.
You draw boundaries every time you listen to music.
Complexity is a common theme throughout the human experience: we want things to be interesting and nuanced—otherwise, they feel flat—but also want them to be accessible so that we can follow along. The same logic applies for music. We enjoy complexity within songs, whatever may be creating it, yet we can only appreciate it to a certain extent. Your threshold will differ from mine: after all, both complexity and simplicity are subjective matters.
Levitin pairs these ideas and links them to familiarity, which he describes as musical schemas. Schemas may just be the be-all and end-all when it comes to trying new music. Formed overtime, schemas serve as the framework we use to evaluate what we hear, shaping our experience and opinions.
Our schemas can attune us to certain pitches, timbres or structures, resulting in thresholds for the various musical elements. For Levitin, the key component of our schemas is the structure of music; music too structurally unfamiliar will likely result in a skip. We’re accustomed to a particular kind and particular frequency of chord changes, and deviations can feel illegal.
As with everything though, a sweet spot exists in between—here lie your favorite songs. Let’s dig deeper. Levitin outlines how our inclination towards certain music and our perceived complexity of it have a relationship mapped by an upside-down U. Starting with songs you consider very simple and therefore don’t enjoy, we move along, and the sounds become more complex and you’re more fascinated. But there’s a limit. From here, the complexity is frustrating and you’re less likely to like what you’re hearing. Sound right?
Everyone’s U-shaped threshold varies, which explains why despite listening to the same song for the first time, I might be inspired while you may be waiting for it to end. A memorable example of this is ENHYPEN’s “Brought The Heat Back”, I found the multiple layers unnecessary and the consistently overpowering bass left me overstimulated. Yet a good friend of mine loved its explosive and playful rhythm and is reenergized with every listen. Conversely, a song that pushed my boundaries but landed within, is “Symfonia” by Ariel. Since my first listen about a year ago, I found the sounds airy and distinct to my usual taste and couldn’t even place it in a playlist of mine. Interestingly, I eventually found comfort in “Symfonia” too—its breeziness and light-heartedness offered a new moment to listen in.
Pushes to our boundaries can be equally frustrating as it can be exhilarating, meaning we take a risk every time we listen to something new. How liberating is that?
“Good” music plays with your expectations, but just the right amount.
This relationship between complexity and enjoyment hints at the importance of anticipation. Anticipation is built as you listen to a track. “Good” music plays with your expectations in real time, manipulating them to keep you engaged. As a track unfolds, the artist is setting certain expectations, and you’re using your musical knowledge to predict what comes next.
This manipulation of expectations can take many forms; most commonly, artists play with their melody, working within and outside of their chosen scale. Embracing artistic freedom, creators build a rapport with their listeners, gaining their trust only to break it, even if temporarily, in hopes that the listeners are thankful for the surprise.
We’re playing a guessing game, but it’s a game where we don’t want to be 100% correct. We can all be pleasantly (or unpleasantly) surprised by an unexpected musical choice. It could be the voice changing a note as the final chorus concludes. It could be the sudden use of a low pass filter. It could simply be the song concluding earlier than you thought.
I’ve enjoyed each of those surprises. I was unhealthily obsessed with “beside you” by keshi for many months after its release. Right before the final chorus he ascends several notes, catching me completely off-guard on my first listen. Yet it sounds better each time I relisten. Bryson Tiller’s voice towards the final chorus goes underwater in “Sorrows”. It is just as powerful as it was the first time I heard it. Despite expecting it now, I look forward to it—frankly, it’s my favorite part of the song. “intro(end of the world)” by Ariana Grande is much shorter than I imagined or hoped for it to be, leaving me longing to hear more and lovingly replaying the track.
You can apply this same logic to how you may define a “good” DJ. They must be able to retain some traits of their chosen songs, mix them in a way that captures your attention, and throw in some well-planned curveballs here and there.
The creators of your favorite tracks most likely mastered the skill of correctly violating your expectations. Their music adheres to your schema while keeping you on your toes. So, how well-trained are our ears?
Final Thoughts
While Your Brain on Music answered many of my questions, it also opened the door to many more. Is familiarity and then boredom the only reason we move on from previously loved tracks? Does our threshold for complexity also move – not just increase but also decrease? Thinking back to ‘noise music’, did I really get bored of those sounds, or did my tolerance for those sounds somehow decrease? Levitin doesn’t offer answers to these in this book, so my journey to understand music psychology has just begun.
Despite this, reflecting on the music I’ve enjoyed throughout the years was a fulfilling trip down memory lane. I hope you may have also found some answers and, perhaps, some more questions! Our relationship to music is different from everyone else’s, making it so special and thought-provoking, and that’s truly the beauty of it!
edited by River Wang.
artwork by Amishi Gupta.