How much do you care about the artist behind the music?
 

A lot of music figures have achieved legendary status not only or not even necessarily for their talent but for their charisma, stage presence and larger than life persona. A lot of bands are known for their legendary frontmen like Queen with Freddie Mercury, for example.

Quite frankly, I'm not good with band members names for the most part. I probably can't name you the members of about 80% of the bands I listen to. I mostly know about the members of the bigger bands such as Metallica, Zeppelin, The Beatles, Queen, etc.

What matters the most to me is if the songs or the music people make is good. I don't care if one band has less charismatic members than other. What matters to me is that I like their songs better than the other band's.

I respect a lot of legendary music figures for their contributions and all, but that doesn't automatically make me like their music or acts they've been a part of. But society has a thing for deifying celebrities. I guess people often want their music to be done by someone they can feel some sort of personal connection to...

Thoughts?

Agree. I need to like the singer’s voice as well the lyrics and overall sound, though it doesn’t really matter to me if he or she doesn’t have a great singing voice. Tend to only know the names of members of my favourite bands, as I just don’t care much about the others.

Sadly, there are people who know a lot of the gossip behind music artists, but can't name any song (even if they remember when I tell them).

I've only ever cared in some form or another when I am a super-fan for a particular band and you get drawn in by that fandom. Wanting to know more about the music, how it's made, who made it, the stories about the songs.

This kind of stuff used to be really exciting in the 90's when there was an actual music movement, supported by stuff like VH1's Behind the Music, Storytellers, etc. It's like anything you are a fan of - you tend to go deeper than another thing you might casually digest and think was fine before moving on.

Even though I was never a major fan or anything, the accusations against Marilyn Manson, if proven to be true, make me feel a bit bad about liking The Beautiful People.

Thing is if you like music then you like all the work that was put into that music from the singers, bandmembers, writers, sound artists, recorders, producers, and studio staff who all made it possible. However, unless you like trivia or are a real fan-boy/girl type, you may not bother to look deep into the music, the names of the singers/band or any of the other staff behind it, what instruments are used, or even the lyrics or names of the songs/albums. That's how it is though, many who enjoy music don't go through the trouble of analyzing it; they may feel it takes away the enjoyment from the atmosphere the music creates.

Depends on the music and the artist. I love Meatloaf both for his music and his stage/acting presence (he's been in several movies, after all), and ditto for Will Smith, whom I was listening to even when he was just the Fresh Prince w DJ Jazzy Jeff. Yes, I'm that old. A few others, too, like the Beatles (the two still living, at least, but all of them once upon a time), or Tom Petty, Rod Stewart, and Paula Abdul. I've kept tabs on all of them at one time or another over the years.