Playlist Prodigy
ELLIE KURLANDER // FLAT HAT MAGAZINE
If you look at my bio on the staff pages of Flat Hat Magazine, The Flat Hat, The Armed Services Arts Partnership, or the DC Summer Institute Online Citizenship Fellows page, you can see my outward love of Spotify is not restricted by audience. The only bio I don’t mention the music streaming service in is that of the Botetourt Squat, where instead I write a monthly music column called “Press Replay with Becca K.” Needless to say, I am an avid music-listener and am loyal to the app that has been with me through (almost) it all. In the debate of the top two streaming services Spotify vs Apple Music, putting aside the exclusivity of the latter being only available to people with a specific brand of phone, the former comes out on top because of its social aspect. Creating and sharing playlists with friends, seeing what my peers are listening to, and finding others on the app with similar musical interests makes Spotify a unique platform that inadvertently builds communities.
Each member of my family has their role in party planning: my mom does the delegation, makes the invite list, and plays hostess during the event itself; my sister makes the charcuterie board and plays bartender; my dad grills. As the youngest, I help everyone with their respective tasks, but I play one critical part every time we host anything: I’m in charge of the music. Even while I’m at school, I will get the occasional phone call asking for a playlist for some party my parents are hosting. Playlist-making is one of my favourite pastimes, it’s a stress-reliever and creative outlet. My Spotify account has 188 playlists associated with it right now, which I keep organised in folders. I have playlists for holidays, different types of parties, and road trips. I have some dedicated to a specific sound or theme or mood, playlists for songs about cats and dogs or songs that mention a month, and so many more overly specific collections of songs. Part of this is for my own amusement, but I find the public aspect of Spotify quite entertaining. My friends can see my public playlists and see what I’m listening to on the web app, and I love being able to say, “I have a playlist for that” in the middle of random conversations.
On one fateful night during early quarantine, I found myself itching to hear a very specific type of music that I didn’t have a playlist for. Surprising, I know. I searched the keyword “kickdrum” and after a few clicks, found a playlist that met all my needs. The collection of songs was so perfect, I thought to myself, was this person in my head? Curiosity made me click his profile, where I found more playlists filled with my favourite artists, and some I hadn’t heard of yet. This guy’s taste in music was immaculate because it was similar to mine, and his sense of humour was apparent just by looking at his profile. Spotify lets you customise playlist images and his included pictures of him, sometimes with friends, sometimes in random costumes, and once eating a banana. His music was so great I couldn’t help but try to find him on a platform where I could speak directly to him. After explaining that I’m not a total creep in his Instagram DMs, we quickly became friends and would send music recommendations back and forth. At some point, we even invited each other to Among Us Zoom sessions and played a few games with each other’s college friends. My friends have affectionately dubbed him “Spotiguy.” The music-streaming app brought this great guy into my life (and equipped me with this fun story), but it wouldn’t have ever happened if Spotiguy didn’t have a social media presence on other platforms.
Spotify could be an even more phenomenal platform with just one additional feature, one they got rid of in 2017: a messaging function. If we could directly message friends on the app, the music-sharing world would be made better for it. Gone would be the days of hitting “share,” “copy link,” then pasting in a different app just for another person to click the link to boot up Spotify. We could streamline this process by being able to share music within the app. Even without, my favorite green media streaming app (sorry, Hulu), is the best in the business. I may just be a wannabe quirky girl with her quirky playlists, but I don’t believe judgement should be passed for harmless activities that spark joy. I’m able to deepen my relationships with the people around me simply by seeing their music and complimenting certain playlists or artists. I’ve made playlists for friends of songs I think they’d like and have heavily influenced many music tastes because of my enthusiasm. All I’m saying is follow me on Spotify, make fun playlists for yourself, and most importantly, send me song recommendations at raklinger@email.wm.edu.
