What sort of music do you like?

'If you ask me, you can tell almost all you need to know about a person by asking them what sort of music they like.  And while that's the sort of question usually only asked by boys between the ages of 12 and 18, I was asked it a few weeks ago by someone I'd never met before.  And even though I could have easily beaten it back by saying something flippant, I was stumped. 

The American writer Chuck Klosterman said recently that, having for years experimented with a litany of abstract responses when asked this question, he has started to say, with some honesty as well as accuracy, "Music that sounds like the opening 14 seconds of Humble Pie's 'I Don't Need No Doctor', as performed live on their 1971 album Performance: Rockin' The Fillmore".

Now, never having heard this record, I couldn't comment, but apparently it has the desired effect, the reply having the added bonus of significantly changing the conversation, or ending it entirely'

- Dylan Jones, The Independent Magazine, 26 January 2008