Deploying Taste
Documentaries, computers, music, and pencils.
Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson is a multi-faceted and multi-talented human being.
He was the co-director of a documentary called, “Ladies & Gentlemen... 50 Years of SNL Music,“ which showcases the best musical performances from Saturday Night Live over the last 50 years. At the time of this writing, I haven’t seen the documentary, but I have listened to Questlove talking about what he went through to make it.
In an interview on Score (a podcast), Questlove says that over the course of two years, he watched all 1000+ episodes of SNL. He watched over 1500 hours of a show, to help create a 2 hour and 8 minute documentary.
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Before designing the Daylight DC-1 (the world’s first human-friendly computer), Anjan Katta (the founder) did his homework. In an interview on Dialectic (another podcast), he says this:
“Like HTC, like, you know, 10 comes out, or M8, read every review, Engadget, Gizmodo, Verge, read all the comments. You know, when YouTube reviews started to become a thing, just sit there and scroll for whatever, however long it takes to read the comments.”
He would read every review of every handheld gadget that came out. Including all the comments on YouTube reviews. Imagine how many hours that took.
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Both of these examples make me think of a question I heard once, that echoes in my head often:
“Can you deploy your taste? That is the thing that is the hardest.”
- Tamara Winter, Interview on Dialectic.
When we go very deep on a thing, or we experience a lot of a thing, we’re building our taste in that thing. This works with things we literally taste, and also with things we hear, touch, see, or smell.
The reason Tamara’s question echoes in my head so often is because of the word deploy. She’s challenging us to act on the things we consume or experience.
This question is particularly potent if you consume or experience a lot of a given thing.
The longer I’ve sat with this question, the more intrigued I’ve become about how people deploy their taste.
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Our friends Greg and Whitney are huge fans of The Tragically Hip. Greg practically knows every song on every album, and can even recall the year that particular album came out. Until recently, I could barely name one song by the band.
A few weeks ago, Greg and Whitney took my wife and I to see a musical that featured songs from The Tragically Hip, and on the drive we asked Greg to tell us about the band.
We essentially asked him to distill over 30 years of consumption, 30 years of building his taste, into an hour-long drive. What he told us ended up being a gift because of how we were able to then experience the musical that we were going to see.
Greg deployed his taste in the form of a story, which ended up being a gift.
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My friend Will is super into pencils.
We were part of a gift exchange a few Christmases ago, and his contribution was a set of his favourite pencils: The 9850 HB Wood-Case Pencil by Mitsu-Bishi Pencil Co.
I ended up being the lucky recipient of his gift.
As you might imagine, his gift wasn’t just a set of pencils, he obviously had a story about why those particular pencils. Being the thoughtful human that he is, Will typed this story (in a very unique style of font and paper) and attached it to the set of pencils. Here’s a line from it:
“The 9850 HB pencil is a symbol of Mitsubishi Pencil’s commitment to creating reliable, professional-quality tools that elevate the everyday writing experience.”
Will deployed his taste in the form of a literal gift.
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How will you deploy your taste?
Wow, this is amazing and makes one think so much about one’s own life experiences and what we choose to share. And who is listening.