ABSTRACT
The peak music experiences described by participants in dance, hip hop, indie and rock ‘n’ roll scenes articulate shared clusters of priorities. While these are consistent with existing literature regarding each of the genres in question, this approach provides new insight into how scene participants identify with and reproduce such collective values as an aspect of belonging. While the findings show the synchronisation of various elements including musical style, thematic content, physical activity, preferred settings and substance use, these preferences are not attributed directly to structural causes as in subcultural theories of homology, but to a shared aesthetic that idealises particular kinds of experience. Beyond the content or objects of taste, the scenes prioritise ways of experiencing music and, in turn, the self and its relationship to others. These ideals are expressed and reproduced through the peak music experiences described by participants. This neo-tribal ethic of the aesthetic offers new insight into affective scene belonging, and the operation of collective memory.
