The Unusual Thing I Like as an Older Woman

Music can carry us back to another time. Those memories can be sweet. Or bittersweet. Involuntary. Like wiggling a sore tooth with our tongue, we just can’t help ourselves.

I came of age in the ’70s, so when Steely Dan, Eric Clapton or Fleetwood Mac come on the radio, I turn the volume up LOUD.

But here’s the thing: sticking to our musical comfort zone deprives us of the opportunity to discover and appreciate what has come along since we stopped being avid consumers of new music. When did that happen? Having babies means no more rock concerts or staying out till all hours in clubs hearing new bands. It’s a muscle I just stopped using.

But after my children were grown, I decided I wanted to explore again what was out there. I have always absorbed music from my children. And now, I’m listening to a few things that my 7-year-old granddaughter has turned me on to, including Kate Bush. She isn’t exactly new, but she’s new to me. I now have “Running Up That Hill” on my playlist.

My daughter introduced me to The National and Of Monsters and Men, and now they’re on my playlist, too.

I listen to SiriusXM, a satellite service. The problem is, its stations are largely organized by decade. So you have to noodle around to find something new. When I do, my rule is to give a song 30 seconds. If it hasn’t hooked me, I move on. This is how I discovered Diplo’s Revolution, a station that plays electronic music. Not exactly the music of my generation, but when I need to get pumped up, this does the trick.

I also have a Spotify account, a digital audio streaming platform. I’ve built about a dozen playlists, organized by genre or activity. (Gym workouts, for example, or rhythm and blues.)

I’ve started going to concerts again. I tend to see musicians who I liked in my youth, but I pay more attention to the warm-up bands. And I’ve discovered that I like some of them, too, such as The Steel Wheels, who play progressive country-bluegrass.

Charly Hadden, 71, also subscribes to Spotify, but the trouble, she says, is that the new songs its algorithm recommends are often the same types of songs you’ve already indicated you like. She finds new music on her Reels on Meta. “If I can listen to it for two minutes, I like it.” She also watches America’s Got Talent.

Hadden, who now lives in Encinitas, California, grew up in Detroit, and says it was an interesting music hub when she was young in the ’60s and ’70s. Think Bob Seger and Mitch Ryder. In fact, her first boyfriend was in the band Three Dog Night.