You've touched a nerve for me with this article. I loathe and detest musical noise in public places. When we first began to hear piped music in supermarkets and elevators for example, we called it musak. I hated it from the very beginning, but learned just to suffer it. The increase and spread of this imposed noise into all the places and spaces you mention causes me increased irritation and agitation..... and some wonderment. I wonder, what on earth is this all about, and why does it have to be everywhere? You list some reasons, but honestly, for me, I can't wait to get my shopping done and get out of these places. The worst example for me in recent times, has been at my tennis club in the small town where I live. When I go to watch some team games or competitions occasionally, I note that we now have equipment to provide background music, presumably to make people even happier than just watching tennis will make them. Bah humbug!
Thanks for the comment. At least I am not alone and that is gratifying.
Awful about the tennis club. As I said in the piece, it was the inter-over music that put me off live cricket at Eden Park (which I loved and which, after a hard week in trial court was cathartic) No more, which is sad, although watching cricket on a warm Saturday morning at the Domain or Victoria Park is therapeutic, relaxing and enjoyable.
I think it is the boom box at the beach that is worst for me and no way am I going to ask the perpetrators to turn it down.
I hope you liked some of the music selections that are linked in the article. The Simon and Garfunkel is especially good.
Back now to a paper on AI and Software Development (not for Substack)
People have forgotten to value silences. They either fill them with ‘music’ (you forgot Air New Zealand with its dreadful choice while we board, assaulting our ears), or mindless chatter.
I am known by my friends and family and particularly my husband as someone who treasures silence and can’t abide small talk, background music, or the company of anyone who talks to fill in the gaps.
These days too many broadcast journalists underestimate the power of a silence to elicit information.
Air New Zealand - that’s an article in itself. I had to fly with them too frequently while on the job but in the last 40 years only once internationally. Bad service, over priced and unpleasant to fly which is itself an unpleasant experience. Such a pain that we have to spend hours in a plane to get anywhere interesting. And the Air NZ safety messages - Enuff said.
Yes I’ve just flown Auckland - Houston. So woke they call 1st class ‘preferred business’ and allow all to board at once like Ryan Air. So what if you paid more? Eat the rich. Why can’t they just say fasten seat belts, don’t stand up when the seat belt sign is on or you will end up in the overhead locker without your head, apply your oxygen mask before your children’s ones, etc? Instead we have the equivalent of Playskool with Jemima and Big Ted. Sigh.
The patronising and paternalistic woke Air NZ approach is awful. We flew Emirates to London last year and their safety message starts by saying they use no fancy tricks or celebrities to get the message across. We are flying Qantas to LAX later this year and returning from NY. Emirates is our preferred carrier along with Qantas. At our age turning right on boarding is not an option.
Re mall and supermarket music - personally I'm OK with it if it's very soft-rock and not part of the canon of serious music. I have been annoyed at times when proper artists such as REM and Tom Petty have been played. The soundtrack selector may have good taste in music but playing anything other than muzak in a mundane supermarket setting somehow seems wrong and insulting to the artist.
Understood and thanks for the comment. Inna-Gadda-da-Vida would not work in a mall although it would be interesting to see the response.
I have discussed why this auditory imposition seems to be a necessity. Is life so mundane that we have to have someones else's soundtrack imposed to distract us from the ennui of life? Maybe for some but frankly not for me. When I wake up in the morning everything after that is a bonus - but not someone's imposed soundtrack
I too was in Sydney aged 21 in 1969. Your choice of music resonates with me. We've just returned from Japan - our second visit - and although there's much to love there's also the most intrusive noise over loudspeakers everywhere. You expect it at train stations, but department stores, where retail assistants keep up a monotonous chanting, ending up in a drawn out 'maaaa' is just awful. Curmudgeon that I am, I took my hearing aids out.
The association of Crosby Stills and Nash's "Wooden Ships" is very much with Sydney. It was a day when tall sailing ships, square riggers, were coming into the harbour as the song was playing. And that vision stays with me even until today.
I have never been to Japan but I doubt that I would find the background sound very soothing.
Thanks for sharing and glad you like the music references.
Like most other comments to this post, your opening memories of music delighted me, thanks David. But I also loathe hip-hop, reggae, (I despise "rap") and other such rubbish. Otherwise, being "hard of hearing", "music" in supermarkets and other places only mildly irritate, unless they're the usual modern caterwauling that some chanters (aka "singers") yowl. I politely ask the folks in pubs and restaurants to turn the volume down if it's intrusive, but otherwise don't mind. We always have a background of music at home: some of the very best "pop" was created in the 1980s when our children were still living at home... we still enjoy it.
Thanks Peter. I was on the road this morning and because I don’t like RNZ Nine to Noon the playlist was called up. Two of the tracks reminded me of road trips - Hollywood Nights which is among the best driving tunes created as we navigated LA traffic to Interstate 10 and 15 to Las Vegas; Blake Shelton Boys Down Here as we went through North Carolina to Wilmington; The Beatles - Drive My Car - days at the Auckland University coffee bar where Rubber Soul was rinse and repeat and finally Tom Petty’s Free Fallin as we drove from San Francisco through the Salinas Valley (Steinbeck Country) and along the coast to Monterey. And finally a number of Roxy Music numbers - now there was an 80’s band. Rolling Stone said that Brian Ferry was the only singer who could make a love song sound like the decline of the West
Some good ones there David. Driving along around the USA "West" we recall long distances. My sister lived in La Cañada Flintridge for many years and still keeps her old home there (moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan - 10-15 years ago). We used her home as a base during our many visits from Africa and the UK. We drove down from San Francisco; meandered through Death Valley to Mammoth Mountain; down to San Diego; across to Las Vegas and to Grand Canyon... back through the Anza Borrego Desert, etc. You need good music when you drive those distances along generally "easy riding" highways! But I also drove many miles (with music!) around Southern Africa and throughout the UK on business... over far less easy roads, except across the Karoo (Cape Province). Even some of the recent "pop" songs can give pleasure.
Great piece, thanks David for the memories. Like Barry Lennox my pet hate is the loud music in cafes that is more to the taste of the staff, but I have found that they are usually amenable to turning the volume down when asked gently. I was bought up in a family of classical pianists and I wasn't allowed to listen to the Lever Hit Parade weekly show, so I was the only kid who couldn't take part in the playground conversations the next day. Then I was given a transistor for my birthday just in time to be part of beatlemania, and I well remember my mother's horror when I pinned up photos of the beatles in my bedroom in the sixties. They had long hair, ergo it must be dirty. My musical horizons were greatly expanded at Otago University and after, when my first husband was in both a rock band and a very cool jazz group, and in the past when I was inclined to think that that marriage was a terrible mistake I'm grateful for his role in the expansion of my tastes.
Interesting discussion and nice to reflect on one's own preferred playlists. One observation I would make is that the 80s was the best decade for rock/pop music ever. 60s & 70s had some nice stuff, but it peaked in the 80s. Luckily for me those were my teen years. Happy to hear opposing arguments, but good luck with those. Also of interest is that Gen Z seem to have adopted 80's rock as their own. My daughters inform me that 'all their generation' love Queen, Bowie, Billy Joel etc
Another observation, with the risk of appearing culturally insensitive (which I quite often am), is that the two worst offending groups for excessively loud music in public (at the beach perhaps) are Polynesian and Indian gatherings. The first group love to gather in large numbers, which is sweet to see, but they do love their boom boxes. And then we get to that imported horror of Bollywood music. Just awful.
Anyhoo, while I await the howls of 'racism' I will suggest that another key factor in 'excessive & loud music' is a diminishing respect across society for the presence of others and their right to peaceful enjoyment. 'How will my actions affect other people?' seems to have been replaced with 'these are my rights'. But that is a topic in itself...
My very clear preference for music is Simon and Garfunkel, Judy Collins, Kate Bush, Cher, Peter Paul and Mary, the Beatles, Cat Stevens and similar; rather than being exposed to today’s “Music” being foisted upon us in virtually all offices, retail, malls restaurants, sports and social events, bars and cafes.
Related to this is the constant extraneous rubbish added to TV programs even to the extent of fake canned laughter. This comes up periodically in letters to the “Listener” and their response is always the same. That people prefer the “ambience”. When I asked for evidence to support this opinion, I get radio silence (Whew!)
Now, Is there such a thing as a quiet café? The noise is dreadful, blasting “Music” that the staff prefer and bugger the paying customer, the clatter of cups, saucers, etc. The banging of the coffee head, and the generally hard reflecting acoustics make for an unpleasant expertise, even apart from the constant refrain that coffee will soon be $10 a cup!
I believe that “barista” is an old Italian word that translates to “One who makes as much noise as possible” !
Somewhat related, but I really do hope there’s a special place in Hell for the “Help Desk” planners. This is a constant “Due to exceptionally heavy demand all our operators are busy at the moment, you call is important to us, so please hold and we will be with you as soon as possible.” After many minutes of plinky-plonky “Music” you are then greeted by a person who has almost no command of colloquial NZ English.
I’m sure the above will tend to be dismissed as an old person’s problem. The thinking ones may realise that today’s “music” will be equally sneered at in 30 years time by your not-yet-born children.
Inna gadda da vida baby! Oh how we laughed & loved it.
(Just fired off a grouchy email to Goldsmith...will probably join Internet separately. Thanks for the headsup...he's such a disappointment.)
Building site- trannies have long been a feature of our urban/suburban landscape...yech.
Beach boomboxes are plain awful. And I sympathise with the cricket nonsense. Rugby does it too. It's meant to be energising & cool but it's mostly just annoying.
The new Dylan flick was good. This 60s kid with an older brother & whose parents had a radiogram adored the folkie scene. I still have my parents' vinyl & the PeterP&M one in particular was much-played. Show soundtracks too & my first LP was the soundtrack to The Sound Of Music, followed by Joni Mitchell's Clouds. The older bro influenced me thereafter.
One-sided phone conversations in public are now ubiquitous.
Hilary - glad you enjoyed it. Iron Butterfly is not that well known.
I understand the tradies trannie (we understand that is the old version of the word referring to a portable radion and not the new understanding of the term) - we had a reno next door that went for 5 months. The trannies weren't that bad but the constant whine of powertools was awful.
One sided phone calls - quite. Back in the day if people were seen wandering around vocalizing to themselves the guys in white coats would be nearby. I don't need to hear what are often private and sometimes confidential matters being discussed.
Dylan - yes - wonderful. I recall a magical night in New York's Greenwich Village a bit before Newport when BD was playing a club. Quite magical.
Lucky you having a live Dylan memory from back then. Our kids are interested in the Dylan film & I've told them they can fight over my Dylan vinyl.
Oh yes, tranny I should've said perhaps but both spellings are now used for transvestites I suppose, & now the mania for transsexuals.
My husband just now pointed out it's an 'elf'n'safety' matter now...can't be having loud noise drowning out situational awareness on/in sites/factories.
The cognitive dissonance over folks speaking to themselves in public of former times is now practically scrubbed? If not the annoyance of the modern version..
You've touched a nerve for me with this article. I loathe and detest musical noise in public places. When we first began to hear piped music in supermarkets and elevators for example, we called it musak. I hated it from the very beginning, but learned just to suffer it. The increase and spread of this imposed noise into all the places and spaces you mention causes me increased irritation and agitation..... and some wonderment. I wonder, what on earth is this all about, and why does it have to be everywhere? You list some reasons, but honestly, for me, I can't wait to get my shopping done and get out of these places. The worst example for me in recent times, has been at my tennis club in the small town where I live. When I go to watch some team games or competitions occasionally, I note that we now have equipment to provide background music, presumably to make people even happier than just watching tennis will make them. Bah humbug!
Good morning Sheryl
Thanks for the comment. At least I am not alone and that is gratifying.
Awful about the tennis club. As I said in the piece, it was the inter-over music that put me off live cricket at Eden Park (which I loved and which, after a hard week in trial court was cathartic) No more, which is sad, although watching cricket on a warm Saturday morning at the Domain or Victoria Park is therapeutic, relaxing and enjoyable.
I think it is the boom box at the beach that is worst for me and no way am I going to ask the perpetrators to turn it down.
I hope you liked some of the music selections that are linked in the article. The Simon and Garfunkel is especially good.
Back now to a paper on AI and Software Development (not for Substack)
People have forgotten to value silences. They either fill them with ‘music’ (you forgot Air New Zealand with its dreadful choice while we board, assaulting our ears), or mindless chatter.
I am known by my friends and family and particularly my husband as someone who treasures silence and can’t abide small talk, background music, or the company of anyone who talks to fill in the gaps.
These days too many broadcast journalists underestimate the power of a silence to elicit information.
Air New Zealand - that’s an article in itself. I had to fly with them too frequently while on the job but in the last 40 years only once internationally. Bad service, over priced and unpleasant to fly which is itself an unpleasant experience. Such a pain that we have to spend hours in a plane to get anywhere interesting. And the Air NZ safety messages - Enuff said.
Yes I’ve just flown Auckland - Houston. So woke they call 1st class ‘preferred business’ and allow all to board at once like Ryan Air. So what if you paid more? Eat the rich. Why can’t they just say fasten seat belts, don’t stand up when the seat belt sign is on or you will end up in the overhead locker without your head, apply your oxygen mask before your children’s ones, etc? Instead we have the equivalent of Playskool with Jemima and Big Ted. Sigh.
The patronising and paternalistic woke Air NZ approach is awful. We flew Emirates to London last year and their safety message starts by saying they use no fancy tricks or celebrities to get the message across. We are flying Qantas to LAX later this year and returning from NY. Emirates is our preferred carrier along with Qantas. At our age turning right on boarding is not an option.
Re mall and supermarket music - personally I'm OK with it if it's very soft-rock and not part of the canon of serious music. I have been annoyed at times when proper artists such as REM and Tom Petty have been played. The soundtrack selector may have good taste in music but playing anything other than muzak in a mundane supermarket setting somehow seems wrong and insulting to the artist.
Understood and thanks for the comment. Inna-Gadda-da-Vida would not work in a mall although it would be interesting to see the response.
I have discussed why this auditory imposition seems to be a necessity. Is life so mundane that we have to have someones else's soundtrack imposed to distract us from the ennui of life? Maybe for some but frankly not for me. When I wake up in the morning everything after that is a bonus - but not someone's imposed soundtrack
I too was in Sydney aged 21 in 1969. Your choice of music resonates with me. We've just returned from Japan - our second visit - and although there's much to love there's also the most intrusive noise over loudspeakers everywhere. You expect it at train stations, but department stores, where retail assistants keep up a monotonous chanting, ending up in a drawn out 'maaaa' is just awful. Curmudgeon that I am, I took my hearing aids out.
The association of Crosby Stills and Nash's "Wooden Ships" is very much with Sydney. It was a day when tall sailing ships, square riggers, were coming into the harbour as the song was playing. And that vision stays with me even until today.
I have never been to Japan but I doubt that I would find the background sound very soothing.
Thanks for sharing and glad you like the music references.
Like most other comments to this post, your opening memories of music delighted me, thanks David. But I also loathe hip-hop, reggae, (I despise "rap") and other such rubbish. Otherwise, being "hard of hearing", "music" in supermarkets and other places only mildly irritate, unless they're the usual modern caterwauling that some chanters (aka "singers") yowl. I politely ask the folks in pubs and restaurants to turn the volume down if it's intrusive, but otherwise don't mind. We always have a background of music at home: some of the very best "pop" was created in the 1980s when our children were still living at home... we still enjoy it.
Thanks Peter. I was on the road this morning and because I don’t like RNZ Nine to Noon the playlist was called up. Two of the tracks reminded me of road trips - Hollywood Nights which is among the best driving tunes created as we navigated LA traffic to Interstate 10 and 15 to Las Vegas; Blake Shelton Boys Down Here as we went through North Carolina to Wilmington; The Beatles - Drive My Car - days at the Auckland University coffee bar where Rubber Soul was rinse and repeat and finally Tom Petty’s Free Fallin as we drove from San Francisco through the Salinas Valley (Steinbeck Country) and along the coast to Monterey. And finally a number of Roxy Music numbers - now there was an 80’s band. Rolling Stone said that Brian Ferry was the only singer who could make a love song sound like the decline of the West
Some good ones there David. Driving along around the USA "West" we recall long distances. My sister lived in La Cañada Flintridge for many years and still keeps her old home there (moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan - 10-15 years ago). We used her home as a base during our many visits from Africa and the UK. We drove down from San Francisco; meandered through Death Valley to Mammoth Mountain; down to San Diego; across to Las Vegas and to Grand Canyon... back through the Anza Borrego Desert, etc. You need good music when you drive those distances along generally "easy riding" highways! But I also drove many miles (with music!) around Southern Africa and throughout the UK on business... over far less easy roads, except across the Karoo (Cape Province). Even some of the recent "pop" songs can give pleasure.
Great piece, thanks David for the memories. Like Barry Lennox my pet hate is the loud music in cafes that is more to the taste of the staff, but I have found that they are usually amenable to turning the volume down when asked gently. I was bought up in a family of classical pianists and I wasn't allowed to listen to the Lever Hit Parade weekly show, so I was the only kid who couldn't take part in the playground conversations the next day. Then I was given a transistor for my birthday just in time to be part of beatlemania, and I well remember my mother's horror when I pinned up photos of the beatles in my bedroom in the sixties. They had long hair, ergo it must be dirty. My musical horizons were greatly expanded at Otago University and after, when my first husband was in both a rock band and a very cool jazz group, and in the past when I was inclined to think that that marriage was a terrible mistake I'm grateful for his role in the expansion of my tastes.
Thanks Aroha. The Lever Hit Parade. That brings back memories including of my late mate Peter Sinclair on Radio i.
Funny how those memories flood back.
I shall be heading into town tomorrow and Weds so will listen out (as it were) especially around cafes.
Interesting discussion and nice to reflect on one's own preferred playlists. One observation I would make is that the 80s was the best decade for rock/pop music ever. 60s & 70s had some nice stuff, but it peaked in the 80s. Luckily for me those were my teen years. Happy to hear opposing arguments, but good luck with those. Also of interest is that Gen Z seem to have adopted 80's rock as their own. My daughters inform me that 'all their generation' love Queen, Bowie, Billy Joel etc
Another observation, with the risk of appearing culturally insensitive (which I quite often am), is that the two worst offending groups for excessively loud music in public (at the beach perhaps) are Polynesian and Indian gatherings. The first group love to gather in large numbers, which is sweet to see, but they do love their boom boxes. And then we get to that imported horror of Bollywood music. Just awful.
Anyhoo, while I await the howls of 'racism' I will suggest that another key factor in 'excessive & loud music' is a diminishing respect across society for the presence of others and their right to peaceful enjoyment. 'How will my actions affect other people?' seems to have been replaced with 'these are my rights'. But that is a topic in itself...
Your observation regarding boom boxes at the beach is correct although I regret to say that Maori have a tendency to inflict reggae, hip hop or rap.
Rap with a capital C…
😄
Many thanks for a very timely piece.
My very clear preference for music is Simon and Garfunkel, Judy Collins, Kate Bush, Cher, Peter Paul and Mary, the Beatles, Cat Stevens and similar; rather than being exposed to today’s “Music” being foisted upon us in virtually all offices, retail, malls restaurants, sports and social events, bars and cafes.
Related to this is the constant extraneous rubbish added to TV programs even to the extent of fake canned laughter. This comes up periodically in letters to the “Listener” and their response is always the same. That people prefer the “ambience”. When I asked for evidence to support this opinion, I get radio silence (Whew!)
Now, Is there such a thing as a quiet café? The noise is dreadful, blasting “Music” that the staff prefer and bugger the paying customer, the clatter of cups, saucers, etc. The banging of the coffee head, and the generally hard reflecting acoustics make for an unpleasant expertise, even apart from the constant refrain that coffee will soon be $10 a cup!
I believe that “barista” is an old Italian word that translates to “One who makes as much noise as possible” !
Somewhat related, but I really do hope there’s a special place in Hell for the “Help Desk” planners. This is a constant “Due to exceptionally heavy demand all our operators are busy at the moment, you call is important to us, so please hold and we will be with you as soon as possible.” After many minutes of plinky-plonky “Music” you are then greeted by a person who has almost no command of colloquial NZ English.
I’m sure the above will tend to be dismissed as an old person’s problem. The thinking ones may realise that today’s “music” will be equally sneered at in 30 years time by your not-yet-born children.
Inna gadda da vida baby! Oh how we laughed & loved it.
(Just fired off a grouchy email to Goldsmith...will probably join Internet separately. Thanks for the headsup...he's such a disappointment.)
Building site- trannies have long been a feature of our urban/suburban landscape...yech.
Beach boomboxes are plain awful. And I sympathise with the cricket nonsense. Rugby does it too. It's meant to be energising & cool but it's mostly just annoying.
The new Dylan flick was good. This 60s kid with an older brother & whose parents had a radiogram adored the folkie scene. I still have my parents' vinyl & the PeterP&M one in particular was much-played. Show soundtracks too & my first LP was the soundtrack to The Sound Of Music, followed by Joni Mitchell's Clouds. The older bro influenced me thereafter.
One-sided phone conversations in public are now ubiquitous.
Hilary - glad you enjoyed it. Iron Butterfly is not that well known.
I understand the tradies trannie (we understand that is the old version of the word referring to a portable radion and not the new understanding of the term) - we had a reno next door that went for 5 months. The trannies weren't that bad but the constant whine of powertools was awful.
One sided phone calls - quite. Back in the day if people were seen wandering around vocalizing to themselves the guys in white coats would be nearby. I don't need to hear what are often private and sometimes confidential matters being discussed.
Dylan - yes - wonderful. I recall a magical night in New York's Greenwich Village a bit before Newport when BD was playing a club. Quite magical.
Lucky you having a live Dylan memory from back then. Our kids are interested in the Dylan film & I've told them they can fight over my Dylan vinyl.
Oh yes, tranny I should've said perhaps but both spellings are now used for transvestites I suppose, & now the mania for transsexuals.
My husband just now pointed out it's an 'elf'n'safety' matter now...can't be having loud noise drowning out situational awareness on/in sites/factories.
The cognitive dissonance over folks speaking to themselves in public of former times is now practically scrubbed? If not the annoyance of the modern version..
That said I have my playlist going in the background as I wade through the bureaucratic turgidity of the Media Reform proposals released last week.
Grist for the Substack Mill I might add.
Watch this space.