Is it WORTH it to listen to music ironically?

How often is "listening to music ironically" used to mean listening without giving a shit about keeping it real and just enjoying some music for a while?

Since when has irony gotten in the way of pure enjoyment?

Let me WORK it to listen to music ironically.

Is it ironic for me to listen to Nine Inch Nails because I used to love them in middle school but don't like 'em much now? Or is that just nostalgia?

In a sense, most listening to music could be classed as ironic, since for a good deal of the time there's an extreme disjunction between the ostensible subject of the song (limitless freedom/mindblowing sex or drugs/undying scorn) and the context in which we listen to it (in the office/on the bus/in the chip shop). To listen sincerely to pop music would have to involve either committing whole-heartedly-and-brainedly to the world of the song for its duration (this can be pretty ace and romantic and it's why indie kids obsessives valorise the lonely boxbedroom experience) or only listening to the song at appropriate times (eg Broooce can only be listened to while escaping from a life of mundane drudgery on a rock and roll highway to oblivion). But far more interesting, and what seems to me far more common, is an ironic inhabiting of the two worlds at once: does the romantic absolutism of the song take the piss out of your life? Or is the song humiliated by fact of its context in the everyday world? It's the singular strength of pop music that it's not tied to venue or technology like chamber music or cinema, it goes out and invades public and private space, bumps up against you in the shopping mall or the leisure centre, demanding a response. Finding yourself caught up in 'Lose yourself' while doing the hoovering... well maybe that's an interesting kind of irony.

''In a sense, most listening to music could be classed as ironic''

I like this post but I don't know if this applies to all music or more pop forms of music.

this thread overall makes for a better question, i think.

Jerry - that only applies if you pay attention to lyrics and context'n'shit, which is optional

yeah, would a frank zappa fan from poland understand his lyrics *winky face*

Listening to "Lose Yourself" while hoovering can still be just as Jerry described if ya don't listen to the lyrics- since the music itself (exciting, omnious, a tad sinister in its own way) is explicitly opposed to the rather mundane task that you're engaging in (unless you find hoovering exciting!)