Listening to...

2pac at the moment on Spotify. I forgot how much I loved 2pac and biggie until I bought Best Of Notorious BIG recently. I remember the first time I heard 'Hypnotize' in year 6 at school. One of the guys in my class had brought it into school on tape and I'd never heard anything quite like it.

I was 10 and had more or less relied on my parents' taste to guide my music choices so far in life. Now, my dad was always into Grandmaster Flash and Sugarhill Gang, plus my French family all listened to MCSolaar religiously but this was something different. Something outside of my barriers coming into my mind and changing my whole approach to music.

The year before the 2 big tunes of the year as far as I was concerned had been 'Missing You' by Puff Daddy and Faith Evans and 'Breathe' by Prodigy. Fat of the Land was an album that had a similar effect to 'Hypnotize' on me. I'd always been into punk from a very young age but 70s classic punk and the line that Prodigy walked between industrialized dance music and punk took it to a new level.

That is what changed at that pre-teen age of discovery. There was a distinct break away from the parentally accepted forms of music and a conscious seeking out of music that challenged those safe boundaries. Anything that might shock or disturb my parents' sensibilities was decadent, forbidden, indulgent and I was irresistably drawn to. Heavy Metal and Ganster Rap offended my family's ears immeasurably and yet this is still some of the music I come back to again and again because it formed an integeral part of not just my musical but adolescent development.

Metallica's 'One' remains my favourite song of all time because it tapped into an anguish that I could neither realise nor express that was building up inside my body as I began the transition into adulthood. It meant nothing that I could in no way relate to the experience of the mutilated Vietnam soldier. The first time I heard the song I didn't even know the subject matter but the force of the music made me cry like a baby in my best friend's bedroom.

Music transforms and changes who we are as well as expressing everything that we can't find the words to say. Language has so many limits that music manages to overcome. At that integral coming of age moment when we develop and sculpt our own musical pallets for the first time we take on influences that will stay with us throughout our lives because they form the bedrock of everything we will ever love and care about listening to. Or at least, that's my view of the thing. Your opinion?