How The Music We Listen To Shapes the Men Of Our Dreams

Think back to the frontmen you idolized as a teenager, the crooners who lulled you to sleep as a little girl. Chances are, if you're anything like me, they were great romantics. Did you grow up wanting to fall in love with Jim Morrison? I don't think any girl can say there wasn't at least one frontman she hoped to find a real life replica of, and we're not talking just for looks.

As far back as I can remember, I was listening to The Who, with Roger Daltrey belting out Townshend's and Entwhistle's heartbreaks. Perhaps the biggest sap of all time is Bono himself, a key piece in my childhood, and womanhood. He always seemed to have such a big heart - not just for Africa and the starving babies, but for the women in his life. I thought that, surely, all men are capable of loving so much.

You can run from love
And if it's really love it will find you
Catch you by the heel
But you can't be numb for love
The only pain is to feel nothing at all
How can I hurt when I'm holding you?
-A Man And A Woman (2004)

One of my close friends used to be able to sleep as a child only if her grandad played Chris Isaak. As an adult, she still listens to him, and in fact turned me on to the man's soulful words. You can feel his guitar weeping, but what brings on the tears in your own eyes is his sadness, his pleading, how in love he always is with a girl who won't love him back in the same way. What kills you inside is how you know he'll fall in love again, despite how bad it hurts. He'll let another one torture him, because the payoff is worth the pain.

Give me a sign and let me know we're through
If you don't love me like I love you
But if you cry at night the way I do I'll know that somebody's lying
-Somebody's Crying (1995)

The ones who say "baby" always got to me the most. Jon Bon Jovi created entire songs around this concept, and knowing the weakness it is in women. You'd think a woman was singing the song below, but it's not. It's a guy at the end of his chain, willing to do anything to keep his girl. I guess he's really turned that way - the softest songs are the ones about his wife. But is the world filled with Jon Bon Jovis? No, and most men would be ashamed to be caught dead listening to such drivel, let alone acting that way. I have a few select guy friends who have no shame in admitting it. I also know how they're as connected to those songs through the hard times as I have been.

If you don't love me - lie to me
'Cause baby you're the one thing I believe
Let it all fall down around us, if that's what's meant to be
Right now if you don't love me baby - lie to me
-Lie To Me (1995)

My teenage years were the most detrimental to my perception. I fell into Depeche Mode, Interpol, The Arcade Fire, HIM, the overall new insurgence of guys who weren't afraid to put their masculinity on the line and even sound like queers to write and sing about the deeper stirrings of their hearts. Those were also the years I started to learn that real men aren't like my British psuedo-idols, they aren't that passionate, that soft, that open. They generally really do care more about sex, status, and good times than anything emotional. Surely there are exceptions, but they are few and far between, and they're often hurt and turned bitter by the uncaring girls along the way who give womankind a bad name.

I submit my incentive is romance
I watched the pole dance of the stars
We rejoice because the hurting is so painless
From the distance of passing cars
But I am married to your charms & grace
I just go crazy like the good old days
You make me want to pick up a guitar
And celebrate the myriad ways that I love you

Can you see what you've done to my heart
And soul?
This is a wasteland now
-Slow Hands (2005)

I often wonder how this shapes the men. Do they become the songs they listen to, grow up seeing them as words to live by? Does the subject matter inundating our society now affect that? When my older brother was a teenager, times had changed. Romance, even just the mere acceptance of men singing about it, had died. George Michael, Simon Le Bon and many of the other greats of the '80s had come out of the closet and changed the perception of what was "straight." Nirvana and the deep grunge phase of self-loathing and pity were in. For the first time, songs about abusing women, slapping them around, dirty rap about sex on the dance floor and life as a pimp, were going mainstream. What happened to the days when America wouldn't show Elvis below the waist, in fear his shaking hips would stir up the yearning loins of teenage girls?

I'm not saying you should base a guy's personality and inclination towards treatment of women on the music he listens to. I've known perfectly good guys who listened to Slipknot, and rather wretched ones who had a fetish for Five For Fighting. I'm probably not even hitting the nail on the head with this one. It's just a theory, that if what a woman expects, or sees men as being, can be affected by her exposure to lyrical material… surely a guy's behavior can be too? Or is this another chicken-before-the-egg type deal, where we just don't know - do they listen to what the do, because they're already turned a certain way and that's what they connect to? I'm sure the people who want to blame Marilyn Manson for strings of suicides and school shootings are still trying to figure that one out. Any of the lads want to give me their 2 cents? Try opening up and talking about it. I know you can do it.