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Why You Like It
- The Science and Culture of Musical Taste
- Narrated by: Nolan Gasser
- Length: 38 hrs and 56 mins
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Publisher's summary
From the chief architect of the Pandora Radio’s Music Genome Project comes a definitive and groundbreaking examination of how your mind, body, and upbringing influence the music you love.
Everyone loves music. But what is it that makes music so universally beloved and gives it such a powerful effect on us?
In this sweeping and authoritative audiobook, Dr. Nolan Gasser - a composer, pianist, and musicologist, and the chief architect of the Music Genome Project, which powers Pandora Radio - breaks down what musical taste is, where it comes from, and what our favorite songs say about us.
Dr. Gasser delves into the science, psychology, and sociology that explains why humans love music so much; how our brains process music; and why you may love Queen but your best friend loves Kiss. He sheds light on why babies can clap along to rhythmic patterns and reveals the reason behind why different cultures across the globe identify the same kinds of music as happy, sad, or scary.
Using easy-to-follow notated musical scores, Dr. Gasser teaches music fans how to become engaged listeners and provides them with the tools to enhance their musical preferences. He takes listeners under the hood of their favorite genres - pop, rock, jazz, hip hop, electronica, world music, and classical - and covers songs from Taylor Swift to Led Zeppelin to Kendrick Lamar to Bill Evans to Beethoven - and through their work, introduces the musical concepts behind why you hum along, tap your foot, and feel deeply.
Why You Like It will teach you how to follow the musical discourse happening within a song and thereby empower your musical taste, so you will never hear music the same way again.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
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Critic reviews
"Nolan Gasser is brilliant at explaining the beautiful machinery behind your favorite songs without taking away any of the magic." (Conan O'Brien)
"A sprawling, packed-to-the-brim study of the art and science of music, as monumental and as busy as a Bach fugue... Gasser's enterprise has a pleasingly mad-scientist feel to it, one that will attract music theory geeks as much as neuroscientists, anthropologists, psychologists, and Skynyrd fans." (Kirkus Reviews)
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Fascinating
- By Jane Sheedy on 01-11-17
By: Tracey Thorn
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The New Analog
- Listening and Reconnecting in a Digital World
- By: Damon Krukowski
- Narrated by: Damon Krukowski
- Length: 3 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Having made his name in the late 1980s as a member of the indie band Galaxie 500, Damon Krukowski has watched cultural life lurch from analog to digital. And as an artist who has weathered the transition, he has challenging, urgent questions for both creators and consumers about what we have thrown away in the process.
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Very Interesting!
- By Daniel Cascaddan on 07-02-17
By: Damon Krukowski
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The Rest Is Noise
- Listening to the 20th Century
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 23 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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The Rest Is Noise takes the listener inside the labyrinth of modern music, from turn-of-the-century Vienna to downtown New York in the '60s and '70s. We meet the maverick personalities and follow the rise of mass culture on this sweeping tour of 20th-century history through its music.
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Learned so much!
- By Paula on 02-18-08
By: Alex Ross
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Light & Shade
- Conversations with Jimmy Page
- By: Brad Tolinski
- Narrated by: Robert Fass, John Lee
- Length: 7 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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More than 30 years after disbanding in 1980, Led Zeppelin continues to be celebrated for its artistic achievements, broad musical influence, and commercial success. The band's notorious exploits have been chronicled in bestselling books; yet none of the individual members of the band has penned a memoir nor cooperated to any degree with the press or a biographer.
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Production History, FY!
- By Amy Peacock on 02-21-17
By: Brad Tolinski
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Dig If You Will the Picture
- Funk, Sex, God and Genius in the Music of Prince
- By: Ben Greenman
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Ben Greenman, New York Times best-selling author, contributing writer to The New Yorker, and owner of thousands of recordings of Prince and Prince-related songs, knows intimately that there has never been a rock star as vibrant, mercurial, willfully contrary, experimental, or prolific as Prince. Uniting a diverse audience while remaining singularly himself, Prince was a tireless artist, a musical virtuoso and chameleon, and a pop-culture prophet.
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Reads like a indepth career review & analysis
- By herb on 05-18-17
By: Ben Greenman
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The Master and His Emissary
- The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World
- By: Iain McGilchrist
- Narrated by: Dennis Kleinman
- Length: 27 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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This pioneering account sets out to understand the structure of the human brain - the place where mind meets matter. Until recently, the left hemisphere of our brain has been seen as the "rational" side, the superior partner to the right. But is this distinction true? Drawing on a vast body of experimental research, Iain McGilchrist argues while our left brain makes for a wonderful servant, it is a very poor master.
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The Master and His Emissary
- By Michael on 11-07-20
By: Iain McGilchrist
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Solid State
- The Story of Abbey Road and the End of the Beatles
- By: Kenneth Womack, Alan Parsons - foreword
- Narrated by: William Hughes
- Length: 8 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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In February 1969, the Beatles began working on what became their final album together. Abbey Road introduced a number of new techniques and technologies to the Beatles' sound and included "Come Together", "Something", and "Here Comes the Sun", which all emerged as classics. Womack's colorful retelling of how this landmark album was written and recorded is a treat for fans of the Beatles. Solid State takes listeners back to 1969 and into EMI's Abbey Road Studios, which boasted an advanced solid state transistor mixing desk.
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It's all about the recording studios
- By Tina on 02-18-20
By: Kenneth Womack, and others
What listeners say about Why You Like It
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Anonymous User
- 10-07-21
Great introduction to music science
I bought this book when I started my musicology studies. Passed the good-to-know first part with the story behind the music genome project and the company I discovered plenty of useful information parts to understand music 'musically' and 'scientifically'. Also, interludes are quite useful in that they sum up lots of research and state of the art scientific opinions on these topics.
I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to dig into the ingredients of music or just simply discover what music is made of (musical theory side). All type of music concerned.
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- Anonymous User
- 05-23-19
For Music Afficionados
It is a really well written and thought out book about music, it approaches it in all directions and facets.
That said, it is a really dense book (you should notice when you see the 39 hrs lenght), and its not a book for people that only like a single genre and have a narrow mind when it comes to music.
This is a book for Music Afficionados, not the regular music lover.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Anand
- 04-28-24
Comprehensive answers on why we like certain music
As a classically trained adult piano student and an amateur performer, music has always been a huge part of my life. I dabble in both Indian and Western music, but there were always these nagging questions I had about why certain music resonated with me, questions that most music experts seemed to skirt around. Plus, a lot of them held strong opinions about what constituted "good music."
Enter Nolan Gasser's "Why You Like It," a breath of fresh air in the world of music exploration. Gasser doesn't fall into the trap of musical snobbery. Instead, he offers a comprehensive and fascinating look at the elements that make us tick when it comes to music, regardless of genre.
Now, I'll admit, there were moments where the audiobook got a bit dense with music theory. (Maybe that's what all those years of music theory classes were for!) But the beauty of the audiobook format is that you can slow things down or even skip sections if needed. The real magic lies in the way Gasser explains these concepts. He uses clear, jargon-free language that even a casual listener can understand.
But what truly elevates this audiobook is the inclusion of well-chosen music samples. Hearing the theory Gasser discusses come to life in real music was a revelation. It helped me connect the dots and understand why I'm naturally drawn to both pop and classical music. Now, when I listen to new music, I find myself dissecting the different elements at play, a skill I owe entirely to Gasser's insightful exploration.
Whether you're a seasoned musician or simply a curious music lover, "Why You Like It" is a must-listen. It's a joyride through the science and culture of musical taste, and it might just help you understand why you like the music you like – and discover a whole new world of music to love in the process.
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- CHRIS LEMASTER
- 05-16-19
Disappointed
Great topic and very thorough. Unfortunately, the writing is overwrought with excessive parentheticals and unnecessary language. I found this incredibly distracting. Over time, this style of writing made it very difficult to stay engaged. Instead, I kept wishing he would simply get to his point and move on.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Gabriel Ente
- 12-22-23
Not finishing this one.
This book is too analytical and full of what felt like useless information. There were a few interesting facts here and there in the beginning, but eventually the technical mush made me stop halfway. It is indeed scientific like the title says, and the author sounds like a mad scientist, but after listening to half of the book, I still didn't understand why I or anyone else likes what we listen to,
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- Amazon Customer
- 03-29-20
Disappointing
Mr. Gasser clearly lacks any understanding of physical nature of sound. On page 220 he writes ”… molecules literally collide with one another, going back and forth around their original position”. Seriously – neutral N2 and O2 molecules at room temperature and P=1 atm are fixed in space and oscillate around original position? The exact meaning of “original” we leave for the author to explain. Does the author really think that sounds is produce by individual molecules oscillating back and forth around “original” position at 400 Hz or so?
Author keeps insisting that sound does not travel in liquid p. 258 “…inner ear is filled with fluid, which is terrible conductor of sound…” p.220 “Sound is vibration propagating though a medium most consequentially the medium of air, as few of us listen to music underwater”. Good thing whales can not read this. I have one word for Mr. Gasser – Sonars.
The book lacks any mathematical explanation of waves properties, I am not sure if wave interference is even mentioned anywhere in the book, much less so properly explained.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Christine Curran
- 04-27-23
This is not what you think this is.
Why You Like It is not about the psychology of why you like different genres of music. Why You Like It is about music theory.
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