We did the Castell Coch-Taff trail route today. The thing I like about this walk is that the first mile is mostly all uphill, but then it’s gentle downhill after that. In this it reminds me of something I read in a Graham Greene novel (I think) once, which went something like “the first 20 years of a writer’s life are experience, the rest is reporting”. It’s nonsense of course, plenty of very good writers discover a new voice as they get older. It’s maybe a very male perspective also, all about thatalhpa male in his prime stuff. Anita Brookner would’ve disagreed with it I’m sure. But there is something to the shaping of tastes in those intense years. Analysis of Spotify data revealed that people’s tastes are mostly determined by what they listened to as teens.
I think this probably varies across areas. Renewing tastes takes effort. I listen to more music now I buy vinyl again and take some time to read about new releases, but when my daughter was young whole genres of music came and went without me being aware. I still like horror movies of my youth and probably don’t expend the effort in learning about new directors or styles in detail the way I would have done. And clothing, is just a mix of some vaguely acceptable middle aged brands. It’ll be different for others, they can tell you about the latest clothing trends, but not any interesting artists over the last two years. When I first started recollecting vinyl I remember going in to record shops and thinking “what do I want?”. Starting with the Stone Roses or the Smiths is a reasonable response, but beyond that it needs energy to build sufficient momentum. Once you have that inertia it becomes relatively easy again – I have email notifications from Pitchfork, Secretly Canadian, HMV or Instagram vinyl accounts, or suggestions from Spillers records, or playlists created by Spotify based on recent purchases. But like this walk, you gotta put in that climb at the start to get the easy ride down.
Teilo just wants me to stop singing Electric Magnolia Co tracks to him so he can sniff every single log in peace.
