How Many Times Do You Have To Listen To Understand A Piece Of Music?


Speaking solely about popular music, broadly speaking, it takes 2 to 3 listens to figure out if I like something.  Roughly meaning do I want to hear it again.  To get to the point where I think I understand the piece can take dozens of listens.  A big factor in how digestible a piece is whether it's a genre, artist or song I'm already familiar with.  At least for me truly new music is harder to get into.

Just curious as to how others experience new music.

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Ive listened to Led Zeppelin for 50+ years and I’m not sure I every understood it. (-:

But I liked / like it.

I got Revolution #9 by The Beatles very first time which I believe is a world record and no foreign substances were involved. 

Once, to know whether it’s something I want to listen to any further. Maybe two to three more times to figure out if I like it enough to buy it.

 

Once to know if I like it.  To get to know it depends largely on how simple of complex the song is.  There are Joni Mitchell songs that took me many listenings, 10 or more, to finally understand what was going on.