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Music

Reading, Listening and Vocabulary

I remember the first album I bought when I was a kid. It was The Joshua Tree by U2. We had a turntable at home, so I used to love putting the needle on the record and listening to the album. My father hated my music taste so he always shouted at me, " we have headphones you know!", so I usually plugged myself in for a few hours after my household chores. In my house, I grew up with various musical influences, my father loved country music; my mother loved classical, my older brother was into rock, my older sister was into pop, and I was  into alternative music. When I was in secondary school, my music taste reflected my fashion and my attitude. I hung around in a group, about four or five of us, all dressed in black, with nail varnish, lipstick, piercings and hair standing up on our heads. We were all into Goth music, the Cure, The Jesus and Mary Chain and we always got into fights with the rockers (the guys who wore blue denim and black leather jackets, who loved rock music).

In university, I grew out of that Goth scene, and became more interested in singer-songwriter musicians, listening to Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen and Nick Cave, people I still listen to today. I also became more aware of Irish musicians, who in some reflected how I felt at particular moments throughout my life. Depending on my mood, I would pump up a song loud enough that I couldn't hear myself singing. One of my favorite songs for this was "Revelate" by The Frames (the lead singer is the main actor in the move "Once"). I also enjoyed dance music and hip hop, but this was mostly when I went clubbing, I would rarely listen to this at home. I was never really into chart music, or what the latest hit was, and MTV was never really on in my house.

Nowadays, I usually troll through Myspace or Itunes, or a few other websites to find music samples, before I buy the CD or download. My ipod can hold a lot of music and it displays the album art and organizes the songs into playlists, artists, songs, albums, composers, genres, compilations, podcasts and so on.

With the technology of today, it seems to be much easier and faster to access the artists you want to hear, it is quite different to when I was a child recording songs off the radio with a cassette player. When I travel now or go for a jog (sometimes), I will put on my ipod, put in my headphones and set my music to shuffle.

However, something which I miss most about living in a new country, is live music. Seeing and hearing your favorite band, group or singer on stage is amazing. I even miss walking down the street and listening to a busker strumming away on his guitar. The vibe you get from the crowd gathered around you, all with open ears, listening to every chord , beat , note or lyric is something I used to love about going to live music, whether it was on the street, in a small intimate venue, a concert hall or at a large open air concert. I will always have a love for music, even though I am terrible on the guitar and can't hold a note to save my life.

Phrases

The most commonly used Music Phrasal Verbs

Questions (Please click on the link below to find some sample questions)

Music