It’s the most wonderful time of the year…and no, I am not talking about Christmas. It is Spotify’s “Wrapped” season, or, in my case, Apple Music Replay.
Your “Wrapped” can reveal many things about you, like whether your most listened-to songs of the year are songs from your top albums of the year or if, as a user, you prefer singular songs rather than consuming the full album or body of work. “Wrapped” can even serve as a musical depiction of the events of your year. Maybe summertime involved listening to a lot of longing Lana Del Rey, lyrical Hozier, and Benson Boone ballads, and that meant you were falling in love, whether for the first time or the third. Perhaps these artists were listened to during the October-December period, which is commonly known as “cuffing season”. It’s possible your winter tunes consisted of Phoebe Bridgers, Mitski, and Conan Gray. Your “Wrapped” lets you reflect on all those situationships of the year.
On a more serious note, “Wrapped” can also provide a social commentary on the current pop culture and political climate. Maybe many people have The Killers in their top songs because nostalgia resurfaces or platforms like TikTok have been popularizing them for trends. Perhaps the yearly listeners of the folk genre have increased, and this can be linked to the popularization of artist Noah Kahan, opening the doors for pop artists to break out of their sound to experiment with more slowed, indie ballads, reinventing what sells in the mainstream. Perhaps genres such as K-Pop or artists that have multilingual songs, like Palestinian-Chilean artist Elyanna, have ranked higher in personal and collective Spotify-wrapped results because of the push to centre coveted voices or perspectives from a lived experience from somewhere other than a Western, English-speaking majority culture. Finally, if Rap and RnB experience a successful year, that can line up with people wanting to listen to empowering and storytelling narratives that exude confidence in the wake of injustice.
Sigmund’ing Spotify Wrapped
Research performed by Princeton Psychology Professor Diana I. Tamir, shows that receiving information personal to you activates parts of the brain associated with motivation and reward, which is why Buzzfeed quizzes are so popular. Essentially, “Wrapped” is like taking one of those quizzes, but without doing anything but listening to music as normal.
Carl Rogers, a humanistic psychologist, discusses the human need to self-actualize and understand oneself. “Wrapped” plays into this desire, showing users insights about their personality and how the music they listen to says something about them.
“Wrapped” also evokes nostalgia, giving users their top hits of the year and telling them what they replayed the most. This nostalgic reflection activates regions of the brain that are associated with a sense of self and pleasure. Nostalgia related to music also opens the doors to shared bonds, especially as most people involved in fandom culture will discuss and debate how much they listen to “their favourite artist” compared to other fandoms, which creates a tension that gets people talking.
“Wrapped” and other brand campaigns use subscribers’ data in a way that goes far beyond providing curated playlists, and for the majority of people, maintaining privacy and anonymity from online spaces is a huge concern in a society that is built on storing and commodifying personal data. However, “Wrapped” is the first time I’ve observed users being so happy about having their data surveyed, analyzed, and commodified—all it takes is some visuals and data letting users know what percentage they rank in their favourite artist’s listeners worldwide to accept this, despite visually being told the plethora of data collected every single year.
In fact, Hightouch found that Spotify stores everything from what artists or songs users listen to, and utilizes the data to assess behavioural patterns.
Brand Loyalty
There are many other music services, and many others that offer their versions of “Wrapped”, but, as evidenced by the public posting their top five on Instagram and discussing their top most listened-to albums on Twitter, Spotify comes out on top. Essentially, people give Spotify free advertisement through all the content coverage it gets. The content coverage will convince people to register for a Spotify account, paid or unpaid, just to relate to others, which is proven each December when Spotify significantly ranks higher than other music platforms in downloads in the App Store
Spotify’s presentation of people’s data in “Wrapped” also contributes to the success of its social media-focused campaign. Each section is divided into a shareable Instagram-story-sized graphic. The idea behind it? Share it.
There’s a lot to be said about the music that an individual consumes and their personality, and “Wrapped” gives users an insight into it. It links with the individual’s desire for vanity and validation and takes storytelling to a new end. Utilizing the mediums that it offers on its platform like singles, albums, and podcasts and presenting users with a unique narrative with aesthetically pleasing visuals is the key to luring in the average listener and quality memes from the chronically online…