Which artists do you just not get?

Jewel, Waylon Jennings, Miles Davis, The Grateful Dead, Most of Bruce Springsteen- especialy his boxed live set(s), Carmen, Justin Timberlake, The new Fleetwood Mac album, Aerosmith-Nine Lives & "Just push stop". Special mention: Pretty Woman the movie.

I get it all now!

I can't figure out a lot of hip-hop these days. Good lyrics, but as music to turn on, its beyond me. My musical evolution in that direction stopped a long time ago with the incomparable Grandmaster Flash.

In Jazz, Miles leaves me cold (maybe that's his point!, curiously. Not so Mingus, Monk and a host of other 'cerebral' jazz musicians. I dislike soft jazz.

People I wish were on the Titanic? Kenny G, Michael Bolton, and the Titanic woman herself, thankfully out of sight in Vegas. Actually, you can get any of half a dozen pop divas tickets with her, as far as I am concerned. Mariah Carey is saved from that fate by reason of her honorable early career.

I love most older rock 'n roll, all manner of pop music and one hit wonders, western classical until around 1930, most world music that does not attempt to be 'fusion' (John McLaughlin, please note). That's personal musical evolution, I guess. 35 years ago, Cream was the standard I measured everyone else's music by...used to think the Doors were on the 'soft' side of rock :-).

Happy days, when 'Who's Next', Led Zep or 'Exile on Main St.' were still surprises the future still held. Would that we could live in such times again.

Patricia Barber - I can't get enough. I'm listening to her "Split" on vinyl right now. I think I own everything of hers.

Anyway, one jazz artist I just don't get is Jiimmy Giuffre. His album Free Fall is suppose to be much sought after, but I can't find the music approchable. It's like looking at a Jackson Pollock painting. I just don't get it!

As a vocalist Diane Shure makes me wince! Most male rappers are so angry about everything, but it seems the female rappers approach their art more musically. I agree with Kinsekd about Dylan, though he's a better poet than musician and composer.

But as Barber is singing on side two of Split - "Too Late Now." All our ears are different, which is why there's such a diverse library of music out there.

Oh yes, one last thing. I occassionally go to Amazon.com to read the reviews on CDs of artists or musical styles that I am unfamiliar with. I'm finding that 75% of the time when I purchase music going this route I end up disappointed - wasted my money. Except for Diane Shure's CD with Maynard Ferguson I didn't list any of these duds, but it sometimes makes me wonder who is writing all these customer reviews. Is it the ten members of the ensemble and their parents, aunts, and uncles?

any/all country period......

Alot of the stuff mentioned above is generic pedestrian and musically pretty dang predictable. Kinda boring or lame maybe, but not hard to "get" at all. The Mahavishnu Orch. at it's peak STOMPS!!! the vast majority of music (especially rock) in terms of skill, energy and imagination. An inability to appreciate their work would make it impossible to do a decent job of absorbing most stuff that's more challenging than Lawrence Welk or Bob Seeger.
Alot of the most rewarding experiences you can get as a listener don't hit you right away. Recordings that once seemed random and disjointed can often later be recognized as beautifully organised compositions. Listening to them gets to be as easy as eating good food or taking a walk.
That hasn't happened yet for me w/ alot of Derek Bailey records.