Playlists: The 21st century love letter

These days, Spotify is as much of a social platform as it is a music streaming service. Spotify’s functional purpose as a social sharing platform — heightened by the ability to see friends’ activity — fosters performativity and changes why playlists in particular are listened to and who they’re made for. A user’s playlists — each with their own respective cover picture, description, and song compilation — offer insight into who that user is and how’d they’d like to be perceived. Naturally, people have been using this new social medium for romance. Playlists have become what mixtapes were in the 1990s, and making a playlist for another person is essentially like writing them a love letter and instantly delivering it to their door (or phone).

When making a playlist for your crush, you can cherry pick a compilation of not only your niche favorites but also of clear expressions of your feelings for them. What does it mean, for instance, to put “No Romance” by Tirzah and Cat Power’s “Sea of Love” on a playlist for your crush? The two songs convey the multidimensionality of self and the idiosyncrasies that make up who someone is. You might think this is reading too much into something that isn’t there. But what is music sharing if not another curated form of self expression? Almost every song in my own library I found through Spotify’s Discover Weekly, friends, shows I have seen, or other searching mechanisms. The songs you give someone matter because, much like loving someone, you never know which ones you won’t be able to listen to again. Song association is the soundtrack for the memory that is your relationship with them. Do you boldly give a new crush an unknown musical gem from your prized musical selection? Do you give them a song someone else once gave you? These questions filter through your mind, as the commitment to having a crush on someone is giving them gifts you may never get back.

Once the playlist is completed you can eagerly monitor the Spotify friend activity to see if and how much they listen to it. Then, they could in turn make a playlist for you. Once this happens there is a symbolic exchange, like two halves of a heart necklace the public display of their affection is apparent. If the playlist is not explicitly how they feel for you (i.e. littered with love songs) it could be a collection of songs they think you will enjoy. If they ensure it isn’t too long then they kept in mind a realistic time frame for your consumption. Either way, the act of someone making a playlist in return to yours is already a good sign of active engagement in your relationship. The playlist is a short timestamp within your expansive life; you have listened to music long before and will continue to listen long after your crush. But, sharing music is ultimately another form of human connection and endowing others with this gift is a pretty great reason to exist.

Article by Paloma Macias