Getting obsessed with music from a particular country

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Does anyone else have these sorts of obsessions? If so I’m wondering what countries and how people got them. I’ve had them for nearly ten years. The first obsession I kind of had was with Swedish music. It started because I noticed I enjoyed a few Swedish bands. I thought it was weird how much Swedish music I was listening to. It didn’t last too long. The first intense one was Iceland. It started because of Bjork of course, but I quickly discovered other music from Iceland as well. After that I moved onto other Nordic countries and even got into some traditional stuff. My current obsession is Israel. It's the first non-nordic country’s music I’ve been obsessed with. I’ve been obsessed with Israel before, but I was never familiar with their music. Right before this I did get obsessed with Tuvan/Mongolian throat singing, but I don’t consider that a country based obsession because I didn’t really care if an artist was from Russia, China or Mongolia. It’s also a real genre while Nordic or Israeli music isn’t.

At one point, I had a great interest in Japanese music - especially Japanese folk music - but I wouldn't go as far as to say it was an obsession. Make no mistake, I do still have that same interest, only it's seen a bit of a decline lately.

UK - (Home of my favorite Prog rock bands).

Though I wouldn't say I'm obsessed with the music of a particular country, I do own music in other languages. I would say I have a strong interest in certain bands. At one time, these bands may all be from the same or similar countries, then I'll move on to somewhere else.

As to how or why; who knows? I do a lot of YouTube hopping.

It's only one album, but I got obsessed with The Best of the Red Army Choir half a decade ago and still go back frequently. It's basically a bunch of Russian folk songs sung beautifully and powerfully. I love it!

I'm not sure if I'd go as far as to call it an 'obsession' in my case, but I have been known to develop strong but fleeting interests in particular countries/cultures and their music.

Incidentally OP, one of these was Mongolian music, which you mentioned. I still listen to Egschiglen sometimes - they use a lot of throat singing in their vocals.



Other random world music fascinations I've had over the years are Sufi devotional music, Middle Eastern oud music, Vietnamese traditional music and klezmer. Generally these interests peter out pretty quickly after I get past the initial excitement of discovering something new.

One type of music I do have an abiding interest in is the folk music of the Celtic nations and the British Isles - Scottish, Welsh and Breton especially, and to a lesser extent Irish, Cornish and those of the various regions of England. This is the part of the world I've lived and travelled in all my life, though, so perhaps it's to be expected that I'll find something appealing and familiar about it. Recently I've been listening to a lot of Silly Wizard/Andy Stewart, the Scottish folk revivalists

YEEEES. For me it's Finnish bands!

I somehow knew Sweden was going to be mentioned before I even clicked on this post. Lately over the last few years I've found myself listening to lesser known bands and singers from various countries. I like quite a few from Sweden and Germany and the UK. I've tried looking for new stuff to listen to in America, but I suppose the style of what I am in search of was never really popular here, or atleast not recently.

Ten years ago I was somewhat obsessed with Mexican pop and rock. Later I started to listen to music from other Spanish-speaking countries, too.

I have always liked either instrumental music or foreign language music. I had a thing for Nordic Roots music for a few years then I met Japan and have been going strong since, I think about ten years. The 'meaning' for me is how it feels to listen.

Advantage Lucy ~ カタクリの花

I started listening to Japanese music due to my interest in the Dance Dance Revolution soundtracks (so 2002-04) - the quality of english language music started to drop off a cliff around this time before exploding in a mangled heap some time in early 2011. I'm mainly into French and German music these days.

I used to be a big fan of japanese music, nowadays i'm more interested in korean pop and also celtic folk music!