Battle of the Sexes: Is common music interest essential in a relationship?
Everyone has a particular characteristic that first catches his or her eye when noticing the opposite sex. For some it’s piercing blue, soul-searching eyes. For others it’s full lips or a great sense of humor. At times, a cute butt can do the trick when immediately noticing someone. But for me, all of these things are merely a plus to the one requirement that makes or breaks a good relationship: great musical taste. Not just okay, average or all right musical preference, but real solid excellence is required if we’re going to make it as a couple.
Maybe I seem a little judgmental—perhaps some of you would go as far to say I’m a bit of an indie snob. And while part of that may be true, I urge you to remember the last party you attended or bar stool you hopped on. While engaging with a certain prospective someone, think back to questions that swirled throughout the conversation. Most likely they asked what year you are, where you live, and the million dollar question: what kind of music are you into?
The thing about music is that it’s a form of communication, not just entertainment or something nice to listen to. Music is the language we speak to one another; it says what we can’t when there are no words. It provides a common ground for each individual to understand the other. We’re all emotionally invested in our music, even if we don’t play an instrument or can’t carry a tune to save our lives, and become incredibly defensive if someone trashes our favorite band. We define ourselves by what we listen to and classify others by what they put in their Facebook profiles as their favorite artist. Yes it’s judgmental and superficial. But it also cuts out the middle man by already putting people into neat little labels for us to see if we’re compatible with someone: sporadic jazz guy, angry metal head, emo-distressed swiped bangs boy, and generic George who just listens to anything on the radio.
I’m not saying that my next potential love interest has to know every group I’ve heard of and I especially don’t need him to upstage me by knowing more obscure band names than I do. We all just need to make sure we can understand the dialectics we’re speaking concerning our musical taste. And if two individuals’ languages are so different that there’s a barrier—they’ll need to be prepared to get some form of translator to find that common ground.
Sarah Delia is a junior English and art history major.
Relationships are fascinating—a connection between two individuals bonded together over similarities and differences, who work together to create an undeniable attraction. I made that definition up, but isn’t it true?
Relationships aren’t made in a day, it’s the hard work and cooperation that create and maintain the passion.
It’s not easy work and there are enough struggles in a relationship as it is, from where to eat dinner, to “Why didn’t you call me last night?”
So then is it not true that more similarities could only help out relationships? Wouldn’t having more shared interests lead to better karma, as well as more hugs and kisses?
In hopes of discovering the answer to this debate, I turned to 20 male students and asked them the mystical question: “Does similar musical taste affect relationships?”
Of the twenty men polled, 13 said, “absolutely it does;” five said, “it’s neutral, but in the long run it definitely helps;” two said, “no it has no affect.”
It wouldn’t matter if you were dating Miss America, or that hot teacher from high school, if she only listened to Alicia Keys or [insert your most hated music here], after listening to music that makes your ears bleed for some time, no amount of beauty could save her.
To solidify my position that shared musical taste only helps relationships, I’ve decided to bring in a real-life example.
I bring you my friend Nick Passero and his girlfriend Alyssa Schneider. They’re happy together, and they’ve just celebrated their one-year anniversary. Coincidentally they both have similar tastes in music.
Before they started dating they really didn’t know the others musical interests, but ever since they’ve discovered their similar interests it’s only been sheer magic.
“Similar music interest sparks another enjoyment in a relationship,” said Passero, “whether it’s cruising down the road and having a sing-a-long or relaxing and enjoying some beats,” he added.
“Having the same taste in music definitely strengthens a relationship,” said Schneider. “Because we have similar tastes we can have a lot more fun together, like going to concerts.”
Now don’t get me wrong here I’m not saying relationships are based around musical tastes, it obviously takes a lot of other factors for success. However, having similar tastes definitely helps.
Couples with differentiating musical tastes can survive. I haven’t seen it myself, but somewhere out there in this world I’m sure it’s happened.
Relationships remind me of an antique car. They’re tough to maintain but beautiful when they get going—and hey, that car ride is a lot better if you can enjoy the sing-a-long music together.
Sean Youngberg is a sophomore SMAD major.
