Musicians Are the Worst Music Judges

Never ask a musician if your song is good.
They literally don’t know.

Musicians are not capable of judging music the way normal people do.

We don’t listen like humans.
We listen like surgeons.

Surgeons vs humans

Normal people feel if a song is good.

They don’t know the scale.
They don’t hear the mix decisions.
They don’t care about the picking pattern.

They just know:

“This hits me.”
“This does nothing for me.”

Musicians? Completely different:

We’re tracking the harmony.
We’re mentally soloing the drum sound.
We’re counting subdivisions.
We’re reverse engineering the riff while we listen.

We’re not just listening.
We’re analysing.

That’s great for learning.
It’s terrible for judging whether a song works on a real audience.

The worst and best test audiences

Because of that, the worst test audiences are often:

your fellow musicians
your producer friends
your music-school classmates

Second-worst?
Your mom, your friends, your family.

They are biased:

They love you.
They don’t want to hurt you.
Or they want to impress you with technical comments.

Your best test audience?

Non-musical strangers… and toddlers.

Kids don’t lie.

A three-year-old doesn’t care about:

your gear
your modes
your compression chain
your ego

They either:

light up and move
or they don’t

There’s no fake nodding, no “yeah man, sounds cool” while they’re secretly bored.

Two brains: creator and child

Every great musician needs two brains:

The surgeon brain – to make the music
- choose the chords
- arrange the parts
- dial the tones
- get the performance tight
The child brain – to listen like a kid
- stop over-analysing
- feel the energy and emotion
- notice: do I want to move / sing / replay this?

Most players get stuck in surgeon mode 24/7.
They never switch to the child.

So they keep “fixing” songs that were already emotionally working,
or they keep polishing songs that never had a heartbeat in the first place.

How to listen more objectively

You will never be fully objective.
But you can get closer.

Try this with your next track:

Step away for a few days.
Let your brain forget the micro-details so you can hear the big picture again.
Play it in the background while doing something else.
Notice: does it pull your attention back… or does it fade into wallpaper?
Watch non-musicians react.
Not what they say, but what they do:
- Do they move?
- Do they hum something later?
- Do they ask, “What song was that?”
Ask a brutal question:
“If I heard this on someone else’s playlist, with no credit, would I save it?”

If you want another angle on this “musician brain vs human brain” problem, read my piece on Fast-Food Guitar vs Real Music. It’s the same story: the things musicians obsess over are often not the things listeners care about.

How honest can you really be?

So, how objectively can you listen?

Are you willing to admit when something is technically impressive but emotionally dead?
Can you admit when a simple, “basic” song just works better than your complex masterpiece?
Can you accept that the toddler in the room might be a better judge than your music buddies?

If you can develop both brains – the surgeon and the child –
you don’t just become a better musician.

You become one of the rare people in music
who actually knows when a song works.

Transcript

Never ask a musician if your song is good.
They literally don’t know.
Musicians are not capable of judging music.

We don’t listen like normal humans.
We listen like surgeons.
Normal people feel if a song is good.
Musicians analyse.

That’s why the best test audience
is not your fellow musicians,
not your mom,
not your friends,
not your family.
It’s non-musical strangers… and toddlers.

Kids don’t lie.
A 3-year-old doesn’t care about gear, modes or ego.
They either light up… or they don’t.

Every great musician needs two brains:
one to make the music,
one to listen like a kid.

How objectively can you listen to music?

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