My Spotify Wrapped 2021

In contrast to Twitch’s Recap, Spotify actually shows it for all users in the app. This makes it quite easy to access the playlists and information and personally, it’s one of the things that I look forward to at the end of the year. It’s always quite nice to see what your listening behaviour was in the past year and in a way, it makes me nostalgic to think back at my electronic “phase” or my metal phase or the German rock phase that I had this year. Today, I wanted to share what my Spotify Wrapped looked like and well, streaming really influenced that quite a bit, to say the least!

(The header image is from Risk of Rain 2 btw whose soundtrack by Chris Christodoulou is amazing!)

This year, I spent 21,129 minutes listening to music which is more than 71% of most Germans. One of my best friends topped that by quite a margin with more than three times the amount but at the same time, I didn’t listen to quite as much music in 2021 compared to previous years.

The main reason for that was that I didn’t have to leave the house as much – or I tried to limit it as much as possible due to the circumstances.

Typically, I listen to music while I’m outside or on my way. Similarly, I used to listen a lot more to music while I’m writing or while I’ve been studying. This year, I had a change in those behaviours and ended up listening to videos or even playlists on YouTube instead of Spotify. I frankly listened less to music but I still did go for a considerable amount. 21k minutes is nothing to sneeze at, innit?

This year, I did stream quite a bit. In the first half (with the online classes and stuff going on), I had to commute less and was able to stream five times a week.

Similarly, in the summer semester, I was able to still stream at least three times a week. Hence, my typical playlists included music by streamer-friendly artists or artists whose permission I got.

Hence, City Girl, Desmond Cheese, Bonaparte, Pentakill, The Midnight, and Gunship made an appearance in my wrapped. Bonaparte isn’t in the no.1 spot this year, though, as I listened to other Indie Bands. City Girl made its way into my studying and cooking playlists. The Midnight and Gunship were listened to while I was taking the bus. Desmond Cheese were in my ears while I was doing chores or showering. This year, my streaming playlists definitely were what I listened to the most, though, considering that my top artists are: 

1. City Girl
2. Gunship
3. Desmond Cheese
4. Bonaparte
5. Pentakill

My top songs were:

1. Ji-Eun’s Sunset (by City Girl)
2. Afternoon Sun (by Desmond Cheese)
3. Dark All Day (by Gunship)
4. When You Grow Up, Your Heart Dies (by Gunship)
5. Woken Furies (by Gunship)

Despite that Chill/Indie and Synthwave presence in my top songs, my top genre was Modern Rock. I listened to 594 different artists with my top artist being City Girl (top 0.1% of their listeners with me listening to them for 2,577 minutes in total – and 91 times to Ji-Eun’s Sunset!). Spotify also added this “Vibe Check” that reveals that my “Audio Aura” is “tender and bold” (purple and orange?). Whatever that means!

I listened to 68 different genres with my top genres being:

1. Modern Alternative Rock
2. Synthwave 
3. Video Game Music
4. German Rock
5. Indie Rock

As far as Modern Alternative Rock goes, I’ve been listening to a lot of Dead Poet Society, Des Rocs, Badflower, and cleopatrick. Their newer releases show that they evolved but they still stick to their roots and create amazing music that I much adore. I also listened to a lot of My Chemical Romance (as always) this year but I’m not sure where those fall into here. I figured it’d be worth mentioning but I’m bad with genres. lol.

In terms of Synthwave, Gunship and The Midnight obviously have been a great listen overall. More importantly though… I love M/O/O/N and other artists that appear in Hotline Miami’s soundtrack. I don’t know why but it’s just catchy and sticks with me. That obviously also counts towards “Video Game Soundtracks”.

This year, I spent a lot of time listening to Katana Zero’s and Hotline Miami’s soundtrack. I also listened to the Crypt of the Necrodancer soundtrack from time to time as well as Chris Christodoulou (Risk of Rain, Deadbolt, Risk of Rain 2), C418 (Minecraft), David Fenn (Moonlighter), and the NieR Replicant soundtrack (given that that released this year). All of these have so much great music in them, fitting for any sort of mood.

In terms of German Rock, I got back into listening Die Ärzte as well as some Hämatom and Callejon. I’d consider the latter two to be “Metal” but then again the borders of Metal and Rock are swimming, aren’t they? Callejon in particular has been a lovely listen as they cover a lot of German Rap songs that I like as Metal Songs which is amazing! Their last album even features a song where they work together with K.I.Z and Ice-T… two artists that I never would have paired together but it works surprisingly well.

K.I.Z probably has been one of the bands that I listened to the most near the end of the year. Their latest album, Rap über Hass, features so many great songs that also reference older ones by them. I’m not sure if they might count towards “German Rock”. I wouldn’t say so but I wouldn’t be surprised if Spotify was like that? I certainly listened to them a lot more than to “proper” German Rock artists.

At last, Indie Rock has always been one of my favourite genres. I used to practically breathe Arctic Monkeys and Bakers Eddy but I’ve been listening to them less this year. What really drove this year, though, were Brick+Mortar, a band that I’ve just been listening to for such a long time now and I love their newer songs. WILLOW and Travis Barker have listened to a bunch… and well, I practically listen to all sorts of music and I would have thought that Todrick Hall would have made a bigger appearance in the playlist, I got, but that’s not the case.

At last, I’ve listened to the “Sleep-deprived podcast” “a lot” where a few people talk about planes… but they don’t really talk about planes. I’m not actually that much of a podcast person and while I’d like to get into it, I frankly haven’t been in the mindset to listen to stuff and drift away into my workflow.

When I listen to podcasts, I want to listen to what they say… but it feels as if you’re not doing anything while you’re listening, so that kind of annoys me… so I want to do something but I either zone out into my work and end up not listening to the podcast… or I focus too much on the podcast but can’t get the work done in the process.

Hence, podcasts and I still have a rocky relationship and the only time I got to listen to the Sleep-deprived podcast was when I stood in line for the second vaccine shot and waited there for more than an hour. Instead of listening to music, I then listened to said podcast for 45 minutes or the first three episodes but I never got back into it, even if I found them and their tired ramblings hilarious!

Now, 2021 has been an interesting year. What could be described as “more of the same” felt, a bit more hopeful compared to 2020 with vaccines rolling out and restrictions being lifted. Yes, it was still very much “2020 Part 2: Electric Boogaloo” but I got to leave the house more often and feel less guilty about it. Factually, 2021 has been nice and that’s reflected in my music, I think, with me listening to less tracks overall but more chill music to vibe with while I do things – as if things were normal. Does that make sense? Not sure. What I’m trying to say is that my Spotify Wrapped is super chill and 2021 was chill as well.

2022 will hopefully be more exciting. Yes, it may not look like it right now, but maybe the pandemic will end in 2022’s Q2-Q4? Let’s be hopeful. Q1’s gonna suck for sure though. Now, as for goals for 2022:

• I want to listen to more podcasts. Jacksfilms actually started publishing one with his wife, Erin, so I want to check that out. apart from that, there are some interesting ones out there that I’d like to try out, including the Nerd’s Guy Through The Galaxy as well as Frosty Canucks and other podcasts by blogger friends that I want to try out.
• I want to at least double the amount of music I listen to. I love listening to music and I love discovering new artists. I’d love to take advantage of my student’s plan and listen the shit out of that subscription! 21k minutes? Fuck that number. Let’s aim for 42k! At least! Maybe even 69k?! That sounds great!
• I want to listen to more new artists and go back a few years to listen to older stuff that I may have missed out on a lot. Lately, I’ve been listening to Styx and KISS a bunch because I suddenly felt like it. Weirdly, Shakira’s She Wolf also appeared in my Spotify Wrapped as I can’t get over the fact that she did “Awoo” before it was “uwu” and “moe” and stuff. I might go through the years and write blog posts on “new” artists that I’ve “discovered”, even if they’re clearly not “new” but… old… if that makes sense? I mean, 1979 was an amazing year for music, for instance, but I’m not sure if I’ve listened to a lot of music before that year.
• I want to write about music. I’m not the biggest music crack in terms of actual knowledge of how things sound and why they sound the way they do and stuff… but I know a lot of great artists and I’d love to write about some of my new discoveries and share new playlists and that sort of stuff. This idea was inspired by Belghast’s Mixtape Mondays btw. I don’t know why but I love creating playlists and I figured it’d be a good idea to get back into it – and I might as well write about it.

What did your Spotify Wrapped look like? Were there any changes to it over the last year or two? Feel free to create a blog post of your own in response or to leave a comment with your top songs and artists (I mainly wanna find new good music). :) 

Cheers!

This post was originally written by Dan Dicere from Indiecator.

If you see this article anywhere else other than Indiecator.org… then this article has been stolen. Please let me know of this via E-Mail. Other than that, feel free to stop by my Twitch streams!