I was a classic and alt rock kid as a teen who became a full on indie rock (the process started with The Moon and Antarctica junior year of HS) and hip-hop junkie in college who has a deep appreciation of (non-EDM) electronica throughout the years. The only genres that have been historically off limits are country (i.e. anything too twangy) and pop.
Point being, my close friend from HS and the 2 years I spent in CO post-College (before moving back to LA) recently moved to San Luis Obispo as a travel nurse. She's a jam band girl at heart and basically a sister and who knows me better than maybe even my own brother....
When I put Dua Lipa on in front of her she had two reactions A) "I fucking hate this" B) I'm re-accessing everything I thought I knew about your taste in music.
Which led me to a) tracing the evolution of my music over the past decade- how Grimes led to Sky Ferreria led to FKA Twigs led to Jai Paul led to Tei Shi led to Let's Eat Grandma... (and that's without mentioning Brockhampton who some would call pop) and b) pointing out that I've realized what I'm actually averse to is anything that sounds like it was designed in a top-40 lab (regardless of genre).
To which she said-- "but this sounds like top 40 pop" and I replied "maybe so. But if so, that just cements it's brilliance to me".
OMG, I really, really, really would like to meet you one day now!!! I feel like you are my vinyl best friend I am yet to meet! I relate so much to you!
I used to only like Hip-Hop & R&B. I was a massive hip-hop head but then my music taste started opening up, my friends started to be like "This is so not you Nathan" and started thinking I was trying too hard! When I started liking and playing indie music, they all laughed and some of them were a bit sad because they were kinda like "I want the old Nathan back". When I started showed them artists like Clarence Clarity, King Krule, SOPHIE, Kero Kero Bonito, Grimes, Kirin J Callihan etc, they were like 'What the'. Kaytranda, Kali Uchis, Anderson Paak, Xenia Rubinos, Sampha, Disclosure etc was cool. But the more left-field my music taste got and the more experimental it became in terms of opening up, my friends started to freak out!!! Like when I started playing indie artists like Stella Donnelly, Armand Hammer, Perfume Genius, Julia Holter, Father John Misty etc, my friends were like "STOP TRYING TO BE INDIE! STOP THINKING YOU'RE HIPSTER BECAUSE YOU'RE NOT". Took them a while for it to sink into their heads that I did genuinely like Indie, electronic, experimental, bit of rock etc.
Whenever I play Ciara, Trey Songz, Lloyd, Omarion, Teedra Moses, Ne-Yo, Alicia Keys, R. Kelly, Usher, Bobby Valentino, Faith Evans, Justin Timberlake etc, my best friend is always like "This is the Nathan I know and love"
Same thing with my friends who love hip-hop! As soon as I started listen to that more abstract/left-field hip-hop, like Shabazz Palaces, Milo, Earl Sweatshirt, Open Mike Eagle, JPEGMAFIA, Clipping etc, they were all like "what the fuck is this shit man". They only accepted, Vince Staples, Playboi Carti, Travis Scott, Kendrick Lamar, Young Thug, Joey Bada$$, YG, Noname, Freddie Gibbs etc haha