Every year around the first of December is when Spotify Wrapped, a detailed overview of the music you listened to in the past year, comes out. They also add little things each year, such as a listening personality or your musical “mood.” Apple Music and other platforms have something similar, but this is truly a day for Spotify listeners.
Out of all the days in the year, the day the Spotify Wrapped comes out is when I’m on social media the most. Many post their most listened-to artists and songs, and I feel like you’re getting a taste of someone’s personality. Even if I don’t know someone very well before, I feel like I know them better after seeing their music taste.
I’m always hyper-aware of my Spotify listening because of the Spotify Wrapped, but it usually doesn’t control my listening behaviors (emphasis on usually, more on that later). I’m going to look at how my own music has treated me this year, along with some expectations and surprises I had.
Minutes Listened To
Every year, my Spotify usage increases exponentially. When I first got it about four or five years ago, I was on the free version and didn’t listen much because of all the ads. I didn’t get the premium version until the summer of 2021, and that’s when I saw my usage go from around 20,000 to 73,000 listening minutes. Now that I’ve had Spotify premium for a full year, I accumulated nearly 97,000 minutes of listening time. It’s about where I expected it to be, since I listen to music in the car, on walks, when studying, or writing (which is most of my time nowadays). I expect my listening to stay about the same as this year or decrease a little in future years.
Most Listened-To Song
Something I do when listening to music is when I find a song I like, I listen to it on repeat for hours, days, or weeks. It’s tough for me to get sick of a song, which ends in my most listened-to songs having hundreds and hundreds of streams.
This year my most listened-to song was “Bathroom Light” by Mt. Joy, and I had listened to it 468 times in the year. My other top five songs were all songs I had listened to a lot in the summer, with the exception of “Fear of the Water,” which is now a bedtime staple. “Fear of the Water” was also the only repeating song from my list last year, in the same place, too.
Looking into my Top 100 Songs, I noticed that it was a lot of songs from albums. An entire album from Amber Run, Genevieve Stokes, and SYML was on there, which just further proves how much I listen to the same songs over and over.
Listening Personality and Mood
The listening personality and music mood throughout the day were two new features on the Spotify Wrapped this year, which were cool but also unnecessary. The listening personality was in a similar format to the Meyers-Briggs personality quiz, the one with the four letters. I’m not quite sure how Spotify determined these personalities, but I didn’t agree with mine as an “Early Adopter.” If anything, I felt like I didn’t get on music until after it was popular, but maybe that’s just me.
Along with the listening personality, there was another feature that showcased your music “moods” throughout the day. My assumption was that they took the genres you were listening to and analyzed what time you were listening to what, and my result was hilarious. My day had a very distinct start and end to it, and I thought it was funny that I started my day happily and ended with somber and melancholy music.
The Taylor Swift Era
Seeing where Taylor Swift would be among my most listened-to artists was probably the most compelling thing to see this year. I had always listened to Taylor Swift, but this past summer she was about the only thing I listened to during my six-hour shifts while working. From there, she came out with a new album and had a song for practically every mood and situation, so I knew that she would be on my list. The question was where she would be.
To be honest, I really didn’t want Taylor Swift as number one, since she is the most popular artist in the world currently. I knew my music boiled down to more than that. Because of this fear, I started intentionally not listening to her in November, but I learned later that Spotify only collects information from January 1st to October 31st, which deemed my efforts ineffective.
As a result, Taylor Swift reigned on top and was my top artist of the year. Following her were Glass Animals, Mt Joy, SYML, and Harry Styles. Harry Styles was also pretty unexpected for me since I hadn’t listened to him since the summer, so I kind of forgot about him.
Overall Feelings
I thought that this was a pretty good year for my Spotify Wrapped, and it overall represented my taste well. Glass Animals and SYML had always been a part of my music listening repertoire, and I had just gotten into Mt Joy this year. While they weren’t on my Top 5, it was good to see that Genevieve Stokes and Ritt Momney were still up there, along with some oldies like Amber Run coming back.
Next year, I hope Taylor Swift is not number one on my list, and to discover some new artists and songs. I’d also like to see Spotify implement a feature where you can see the stream count of all your songs on Spotify Wrapped rather than just number one, but I’m not too picky about it.
If you’re interested in seeing my Top 100 Songs playlist, click here!