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It’s that point of 12 months once more. Right now, November 29, Spotify customers throughout are sharing their year-end “Wrapped” recaps, which attempt to sum up your previous 12 months of musical style by giving stats and rankings in your most-listened-to artists and songs, alongside a glossy graphic to share on all of your socials. I look ahead to it yearly. However as Spotify Wrapped has virtually grow to be an web vacation, I can’t assist however discover that it’s gamified how we hearken to music all year long.
I don’t take into consideration Spotify Wrapped all through a lot of the 12 months, however as November nears, a part of me desires to ensure it really displays my musical tastes that 12 months, slightly than getting hung up on that one time I listened to the Glee cowl of “Clean Felony” for 3 days straight. Realizing that Spotify Wrapped looms over my account and is holding a tally of each time I depart a tune on repeat does are inclined to subconsciously get me to modify songs simply out of the irrational concern that somebody may discover out I listened to the stolen model of a Taylor Swift tune whereas ready for the brand new model. Heaven forbid a stray repeated tune derail Wrapped’s “definitive” have a look at my musical 12 months.
Can uncooked numbers actually seize musical tastes?
Wrapped says my top-ranked artist in 2023 was Sleep Token. Not shocking, as I’ve been looping the prog rock band’s eclectic album “Take Me Again To Eden” all 12 months. It’s simply my favourite file of the 12 months, so it felt proper for them to rank up high, and for 3 of their early singles to be my most-streamed songs. Ethel Cain and Troye Sivan got here in second and third, which I used to be additionally proud of given Sivan’s new album “One thing To Give Every Different” was a late-year obsession. It solely launched in October, leaving solely a month for the Australian pop king to fly up my listing.
Aries, the final artist in my high 5, is the odd one out. I solely actually listened to his absolute banger “Snake Eyes” after discovering it on TikTok, however I listened to that one tune obsessively. I’m speaking about having it on repeat for days on finish. “Snake Eyes” is my #4 tune of the 12 months now—wild.
Finally, I’ve nobody accountable however myself for the place the chips fall, nevertheless it does make me actually conscious that my Wrapped doesn’t mirror how a lot I listened to some full albums that launch later within the 12 months, like SZA’s “S.O.S.”
Spotify Wrapped is for sharing, so we placed on our greatest face
The bizarre, meta min-maxing a few of us now interact in because of Spotify Wrapped and its ilk is an fascinating phenomenon as a result of even now, I see folks on platforms like TikTok joking about how they’re now “free” to hearken to no matter they need since Wrapped stops monitoring your 12 months’s exercise after it launches (although the precise finish date has seemingly fluctuated over time). The second Spotify Wrapped exhibits up on our telephones, we be at liberty to embrace the cringiest of responsible pleasures on repeat with out having to show ourselves in a 12 months.
However as all of us examine and distinction our respective lists and stats, I’ve additionally observed a development that makes me really feel like I’m merely constructed completely different than the typical Spotify consumer. Reader, I nearly all the time have headphones in. I’ve by no means wanted lifeless silence to write down, speak, and even edit a podcast. Apparently, this isn’t the norm for most individuals, as a result of most of y’all have some rookie numbers relating to “minutes listened.”
In 2023, I listened to music and podcasts for 144,866 minutes on Spotify alone. That’s not even counting the occasions I converted to Soundcloud or YouTube for a extra obscure remix or online game soundtrack. Each time I scroll previous a buddy’s Wrapped and their minutes listened is a mere 4 figures I bear in mind some folks apparently don’t have sick beats enjoying of their ears always.
A part of me want to problem everybody studying this to beat my “excessive rating” subsequent 12 months. I’m on the high of the 2023 leaderboards (so to talk) amongst my buddies, and it’s been that method yearly since Spotify Wrapped began in 2016. At this level, I’m beginning to concern I could be the bizarre one. However making an attempt to problem folks to hearken to music in a different way additionally feels in opposition to the spirit of what these year-end recaps are supposed to do. Spotify Wrapped can impart a tacit stress to alter your listening habits so the numbers characterize some imagined ardour we have now for an artist or tune; that sentiment has even been weaponized by stans believing sure content material creators don’t appear passionate sufficient for his or her liking. That’s no good, so I’ll simply be content material right here on the high of the scoreboard having listened to music for—let me examine my notes—100 full days in 2023.
The recaps are enjoyable, however we don’t must sport them
Like most social media developments, Spotify Wrapped is an extension of all of us placing on a efficiency and projecting a model of ourselves out to the world that’s cool and has their shit collectively. However these year-end roundups, together with online game equivalents that observe our online game habits like PlayStation’s Wrap-Up, give us a data-driven purpose to show the a part of us that could be much less cool, or within the case of my Overwatch 2 playtime, worrying to the typical passerby.
I really like seeing a Spotify Wrapped that exposes somebody’s area of interest pursuits and responsible pleasures. Even when that’s in and of itself performative and makes for good posts, it does present that a few of us sport the music we hearken to the identical method we’d intentionally play as sure characters in a combating sport, to make sure they present up on our stats web page. We wish folks to know our mains, not the character we tried out for a day in a match of boredom. So even if you happen to come away from Wrapped or the like feeling prefer it doesn’t actually characterize your 12 months or your preferences, do not forget that uncooked numbers can’t account for all of the ebbs and flows of our musical tastes.
And hey, the weirdest top-ranked tune or artist could make for particularly large posting. Like this one:
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