I remember hearing about an experiment in a psychology class I took in college. It was about an Austrian professor  Theodor Erismann, who devised an experiment where he turned a man’s eyesight exactly upside-down. After a short time, roughly ten days,  had completely adapted to this new upside down world and was able to perform an task as easily as he had before. 

I’ve met people who claim to only like and listen to one style of music and that this is how they have been for their entire adult life. I love so much music that I initially hated at first, it’s hard for me to fathom people like this really exist.  But I’m grateful for whatever it is that allows me to have patience with myself enough to let  things grow on me.  

Most of the time if I am exposed to an artist or a genre that I’m not feeling  I like to play this game with myself where I find one aspect, whether it’s the sound of an instrument or a line in the lyrics of a song, about the music that I find compelling. 

I feel like this technique might be useful for other things outside of appreciating music.  Perhaps if we could find one aspect of what otherwise may look like someone’s upside down world, maybe we could get along. 

Below is a playlist of songs that have resonated with me in the past month. I hope they bring more joy to your life. Thanks for listening, MMM

Included are songs by: Liam Kazar, IDLES, Jeffrey Lewis, The Primitives, Courtney Barnett, FACS, Dark Holler, The Crucifucks, Miles Davis, The War On Drugs, Su Ra & His Arkestra, U2, Polvo, Donald Byrd

(Subscribe to get a new playlist every 1st Monday of the month. Click on my user link or search: Major Matt’s 1st Monday on Spotify to cruise past playlists and discover more music.)