Speaker 1: There Are No Girls on the Internet. As a production
Speaker 1: of My Heart Radio and Unbust Creative, I'm Bridget Tod
Speaker 1: and this is there Are No Girls on the Internet.
Speaker 1: It's that time again. That's right, Happy Spotify rap season
Speaker 1: to all who celebrate. For users of the music streaming
Speaker 1: platform Spotify, this is the time of year when we
Speaker 1: get are wrapped, a visual breakdown of how much and
Speaker 1: what kinds of music we spent the year listening to
Speaker 1: Spotify first debut It's Year in Music in but two
Speaker 1: years later they added statistics about which artists and how
Speaker 1: much time Spotify users spent listening. In twenty nineteen artists.
Speaker 1: Jule Hamm, who was then an Internet Spotify designed the
Speaker 1: pleasing social media friendly layout to communicate this data visually,
Speaker 1: which leads us to the Spotify Wrap that takes over
Speaker 1: our social media feeds this time of year, and it
Speaker 1: really takes over. According to CNN, in the first hour
Speaker 1: of Spotify Wrap release, the Twitter search showed the hashtag
Speaker 1: Spotify wrapped had been used over fourteen thousand times. So
Speaker 1: why do we love Spotify wraps so much? And what
Speaker 1: does it tell us about our online selves? Now we
Speaker 1: know that Spotify relies on algorithms and artificial intelligence to
Speaker 1: surface music that we might like. It's actually one of
Speaker 1: the main draws of Spotify over other music streaming platforms.
Speaker 1: Who doesn't like the idea of a robot curating personalized
Speaker 1: playlists for us while we sleep. But if we're consuming
Speaker 1: music because Spotify's algorithm has picked it for us based
Speaker 1: on our habits and what that algorithm has been able
Speaker 1: to glean about our habits and identity, that means our
Speaker 1: Spotify wrapped isn't so much a reflection of who we
Speaker 1: truly are in our heart of hearts as it is
Speaker 1: a reflection of who we are as defined by Spotify's AI.
Speaker 1: They don't just show me my own tastes, preferences, and identity,
Speaker 1: they also shape them. So in Spotify gives me my
Speaker 1: wrap for the year, they're not just showing me that
Speaker 1: these are the preferences of a thirtysomething black que or
Speaker 1: already woman. It's also kind of creating what that identity means.
Speaker 1: When we post our Spotify wrapped on social media, we're
Speaker 1: trying to tell the world something about who we are,
Speaker 1: and we're looking to see if our tastes are more impressive,
Speaker 1: more cringeing more hip or more refined than our friends.
Speaker 1: And in this way, Spotify has done a great job
Speaker 1: of turning surveillance, the kind of thing that many of
Speaker 1: us would be uncomfortable with in any other context, into
Speaker 1: a fun digital personal branding opportunity. To be clear, I
Speaker 1: am very much not above this, And in this special
Speaker 1: holiday episode of There Are No Girls on the Internet,
Speaker 1: I'm sitting down with my producer Mike to take my
Speaker 1: very first look at my own Spotify Wrapped for the
Speaker 1: year and dig into what it says about my identity
Speaker 1: in this very weird digital age we all find ourselves in.
Speaker 1: I just hope it's not too embarrassing to do in
Speaker 1: this podcast. So I've really got to start this conversation
Speaker 1: by lifting up Jewel Ham, the multimedia visual artist who
Speaker 1: created what we know as Spotify Wrapped today. Spotify Wrapped
Speaker 1: did exist before Jewel, but the kind of Spotify rap
Speaker 1: that we see taking over her social media feeds if
Speaker 1: you're feeding anything like mine, Jewel really did champion when
Speaker 1: she was an intern at Spotify in twenty nineteen, and
Speaker 1: I feel like she really didn't get her do that
Speaker 1: is tail us old as time when it comes to technology.
Speaker 1: Whenever there is something cool or interesting or unique or creative,
Speaker 1: especially if it's not a hard tech thing. Nine times
Speaker 1: out of ten there is a woman and a black
Speaker 1: woman behind it. So shout out to Jewel. Also Howard
Speaker 1: University grad. Uh, So we wouldn't even be having this
Speaker 1: conversation if not for her. It is interesting how the
Speaker 1: Wrapped is such a visual thing when we think about it,
Speaker 1: because it's it's audio, right, we're listening to and it's
Speaker 1: a list of the top songs that were tracks that
Speaker 1: we've listened to. But when I think about rap, I
Speaker 1: think about a list that looks aesthetically good, is tailor
Speaker 1: made for social media that I think that's really what
Speaker 1: made it a thing that people talk about. Oh absolutely,
Speaker 1: And I think like that's something that's so funny about
Speaker 1: Spotify Wrapped. I even feel a little bit weird making
Speaker 1: this episode because I feel like Spotify Wrapped posting it
Speaker 1: on social media is a little bit like that old
Speaker 1: George Carlin bit where my stuff is stuff and everybody
Speaker 1: else's stuff is ship. Like everybody thinks they're Spotify Wraps
Speaker 1: has something interesting or unique about them personally, and then
Speaker 1: nobody actually wants to look at anybody else's Spotify wrapped,
Speaker 1: you're just like, oh, good for you. You listen to
Speaker 1: Taman Paulo, well done. But when you post your own,
Speaker 1: you feel like you're really saying something about who you
Speaker 1: are as a person. And kudos the Spotify because that
Speaker 1: is some really good marketing that that they have been
Speaker 1: able to make it so that people feel so like
Speaker 1: it really says something about who they are when they
Speaker 1: post this on their social media feed. It's true And
Speaker 1: as like a data person, I really thinking about like
Speaker 1: what it said about me, Like my wrapped is crazy.
Speaker 1: This year, I was so surprised at what was there. Uh,
Speaker 1: but I think it was like, a it's not like
Speaker 1: it's a representative sample of what I've been listening to
Speaker 1: during the year. It's a sample of what I've been
Speaker 1: listening to on Spotify. So I was like, what do
Speaker 1: I use Spotify for? Use it to play albums and
Speaker 1: I use it to create stations. I used to hate
Speaker 1: the idea of just trusting an algorithm to choose media
Speaker 1: for me to listen to, but I guess at some
Speaker 1: point during the pandemic, I just completely said fuck it
Speaker 1: and went with it. And it's actually great, Like they
Speaker 1: do an amazing job of just creating a playlist of
Speaker 1: songs that I want to hear based on something that
Speaker 1: I put up there. Okay, so I have so much
Speaker 1: to say about this. First of all, it is so funny.
Speaker 1: So as we know, Spotify is definitely algorithmically driven, and
Speaker 1: so I was like, oh, uh, looks like you've spent
Speaker 1: a lot of time listening to sad As Bo Burnham
Speaker 1: songs this year, And it's like, that's what you fucking
Speaker 1: surface me algorithm. You know, you know, fit's what I
Speaker 1: listened to because you've been servicing it to be this
Speaker 1: whole year. So absolutely true. It is the it's like
Speaker 1: the kind of cheeky little like, oh, it looks like
Speaker 1: you spend a lot of time listening to BA. It's
Speaker 1: like they know, because they're elgo with them services surfaces
Speaker 1: it to you. So absolutely true. And I do think
Speaker 1: this year, you know, I'm going to dig into my
Speaker 1: own Spotify raft in a minute, which I hope is
Speaker 1: not embarrassing. But I do think in pre pandemic, I
Speaker 1: would definitely be excited to show my Spotify raft on
Speaker 1: social media. Even though I just said, like people post
Speaker 1: there so their Spotify raft on social media and does
Speaker 1: anybody really care? I definitely was not above that and
Speaker 1: definitely did it and like we'll do it this year
Speaker 1: as well. But I pre pandemic, I was much prouder
Speaker 1: of the music because I feel like it said something
Speaker 1: different about me. I feel like, and especially weird years,
Speaker 1: I don't know what they say about me. I feel
Speaker 1: like it's like, Wow, what a weird year I've had.
Speaker 1: I can't even tell you if I listened to a
Speaker 1: lot of music, some of the stats on my Spotify wrap,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, did I really listen to that song?
Speaker 1: This much? Like that seems weird. I just think it's
Speaker 1: a weird year. And as we experience things in our
Speaker 1: real life like the pandemic and the insurrection and like
Speaker 1: other real life crises, it is so interesting to see
Speaker 1: how that is reflected through data points that we consumed
Speaker 1: on a digital interface. It's very interesting and I feel like, yeah,
Speaker 1: pre pandemic, I would have said my Spotify wrap says
Speaker 1: something about me. I don't know what it is, but
Speaker 1: something this year especially, I'm like, I don't even know
Speaker 1: if I can if I trust this because it seems
Speaker 1: so out of whack. With how I feel and who
Speaker 1: I am. It's been a weird year. Yeah, it's been
Speaker 1: a weird year. So should I get into my Spotify raft? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think you should. I think uh, you know, it's
Speaker 1: for at the end of the year to December. It's
Speaker 1: nice to take a break from a lot of the
Speaker 1: negative stuff we often talk about and let's just talk
Speaker 1: about some music. Let's talk about some music. So this
Speaker 1: is I'm gonna dig into this. I guess we should
Speaker 1: get into it. Yeah, if you recognize that that it's
Speaker 1: actually my first number one, Okay, I thought it was clever,
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna I'm gonna give you all my top three.
Speaker 1: My number one play a song of one is Doja
Speaker 1: Cats get into It, And honestly, I'm not mad at it.
Speaker 1: I love Doja Cat. She could be a little problematic,
Speaker 1: but you know, she's my she I'm I'm I like her. Uh,
Speaker 1: get into It is definitely um a song that I
Speaker 1: I listened to pretty frequently and it's not surprising to
Speaker 1: me that it's I'm a little surprised is my number one,
Speaker 1: but I'm not mad at it. I'll take it. I
Speaker 1: feel like Dojaquette has songs that just get in your head.
Speaker 1: That is absolutely true. I spent probably a year talking
Speaker 1: about how I wasn't how I wasn't a cat, I
Speaker 1: was a cow move if you know that do Jaquette song,
Speaker 1: So definitely do Jaquete earworms. Does she have a lot
Speaker 1: going on on TikTok o her being my number one?
Speaker 1: It's definitely the TikTok influence on my listening habits. A
Speaker 1: couple of other songs that are big on my Spotify Wrapped,
Speaker 1: Pink Panthers, another musician who was huge on TikTok who
Speaker 1: was in my Spotify wrapped but the Anxiety and Willow
Speaker 1: Smith that song meet Me at Our spot huge on TikTok.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry for just singing. I know that probably sounded bad,
Speaker 1: but uh yeah, I definitely see the TikTok influence on
Speaker 1: my uh Spotify wrap Definitely a lot of songs I
Speaker 1: heard I didn't know before I heard on TikTok and
Speaker 1: then found on Spotify and saved and listened to over
Speaker 1: and over and over again in one apparently so so
Speaker 1: now we've got the TikTok algorithm what you see which
Speaker 1: then drives listen to Spotify. Well yeah, I often feel
Speaker 1: like the algorithms are working in tandem. It is like
Speaker 1: the TikTok algorithms. Algorithms got me, the Spotify algorithms got me.
Speaker 1: It's like like an intersecting algorithm. I'm just a slave
Speaker 1: to whatever they surface to me, and I'm just like, yes,
Speaker 1: give me more. Yes, that'll be a new area of
Speaker 1: intersectionality of like how the algorithms interesting. Honestly, I'm speaking
Speaker 1: of bow Burnham. He's got this line in Inside where
Speaker 1: he's like, Daddy made some content just for you, so
Speaker 1: open wide. That's kind of how I feel, just like, yes,
Speaker 1: give it to me, give it to me, all right.
Speaker 1: So let's get into my number two on my Spotify raft,
Speaker 1: which is a little bit of an outlier. Um. It
Speaker 1: is the song Jet by Wings. If you are a
Speaker 1: listener who is in your twenties or early thirties, you're
Speaker 1: probably like, I don't know what this is. I think
Speaker 1: people know Wings. I don't. I don't think people know Wings.
Speaker 1: So for people who don't know Wings, Wings is a
Speaker 1: It was an offshoot ban of the Beatles started by
Speaker 1: Paul Paul McCartney. Sir Paul McCartney, Sir Paul McCartney in
Speaker 1: the eighties. The song came out in so definitely not
Speaker 1: a current hit. I have a soft spot for it.
Speaker 1: I feel like people get down on Wings. I really
Speaker 1: have a soft spot for Wings. And fun fact, this
Speaker 1: was not the only Wing song to make an appearance
Speaker 1: on a Spotify raft, which I don't even really know
Speaker 1: what to make of. I think you really like Wings,
Speaker 1: I guess so. And also, when I as a kid,
Speaker 1: my dad would sing this song to me because he
Speaker 1: said that Jet was a nickname for Bridget. It is not.
Speaker 1: The song is not about a girl named Bridget, but
Speaker 1: I believed that when I was young, I could see
Speaker 1: it would be appealing to think that it was that
Speaker 1: apologist singing to a girl named Bridget. Yeah, it really was.
Speaker 1: And so it's just it's a song that has us.
Speaker 1: It's it's I'm almost embarrassed that it's as high as
Speaker 1: it is. But you know what, can I say? I
Speaker 1: like Wings? I like you know what? And I got
Speaker 1: two Wings songs on the on the Spotify wrapped and
Speaker 1: I'm not ashamed. Yeah, nothing to be ashamed. It's a pandemic.
Speaker 1: It's a pandemic. Listen to as much Wings as you
Speaker 1: need to get you through this pandemic. Listen know whatever
Speaker 1: you want, like, don't be ashamed of your Spotify wrap
Speaker 1: Listen to whatever you want in this pandemic, whatever you
Speaker 1: need to get you through. My number three song on
Speaker 1: Spotify wraps again is another TikTok classic, Nobody by meets
Speaker 1: mitsky Uh. That was a little bit of a TikTok meme.
Speaker 1: And again I'm I'm kind of grateful for TikTok as
Speaker 1: I've gotten into it as a platform. Look, I feel
Speaker 1: like I hear new music all the time that I
Speaker 1: wouldn't have heard, you know, being someone who is we'll
Speaker 1: say a bit older than the typical TikTok demographic, getting
Speaker 1: insight into different kinds of music has been really interesting.
Speaker 1: So yeah, of my top three, two of them are
Speaker 1: definitely TikTok, TikTok algorithm chosen for me. You have to
Speaker 1: give me some tips on how to use TikTok because
Speaker 1: mine is entirely animals, which like, I like animals, I
Speaker 1: like funny animal content, but I'd like something else in there.
Speaker 1: But it doesn't serve me any music. How do how
Speaker 1: do you get to serve your music? I don't know.
Speaker 1: I guess I just the algorithm. Gods have have chosen
Speaker 1: me to get those A cat all the time on
Speaker 1: TikTok so. A couple of other things. Things to note
Speaker 1: from my Spotify rapped one is that I was definitely
Speaker 1: all my black girl feeling myself ship. Uh, very overrepresented
Speaker 1: person on my town. My Spotify rapp was Megan the Stallion,
Speaker 1: specifically Megan the Stallion's thought shit And I remember, I
Speaker 1: don't know if this is weird to say when there
Speaker 1: are no girls on the internet. One the Shorty Award
Speaker 1: for our mini series and Disinformation, that was really when
Speaker 1: Megan the Stallion's Thoughts ship creeped into my Spotify plays more.
Speaker 1: She has this line where she says, bitch on the
Speaker 1: ship per the Recording Academy, and when we won the
Speaker 1: Shorty Award, that really was like a line that I
Speaker 1: identified with this, like, oh we uh also are the
Speaker 1: ship per Recording Academy or a Shorty Academy. Yeah, I'll
Speaker 1: take it. And it really makes sense because my according
Speaker 1: to Spotify Rapped, the mood for my music that I
Speaker 1: listened to one was confident and bold and so I
Speaker 1: got I think I got a Megan the Stallion to
Speaker 1: thank for them. Let's take a quick break cut back.
Speaker 1: Another artist that I was not surprised to see but
Speaker 1: makes a lot of sense was d m X. I
Speaker 1: was a huge DMX man when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: Loves d m X, and DMX died and I will
Speaker 1: never forget it. I was the day where I had
Speaker 1: back to back to back to back meetings and calls
Speaker 1: and zooms, like professional meetings, and I got the push
Speaker 1: notification on my phone that DMX had passed away, and
Speaker 1: all through these meetings where I had to have my
Speaker 1: like fake zoom voice on, you know that fake enthusiastic
Speaker 1: voice that you do when you're on zooms and you
Speaker 1: kind of want to die, but you keep got three more.
Speaker 1: I had to keep that voice on, wanting so badly
Speaker 1: to do nothing but blast DMX. And I remember when
Speaker 1: the final call happened at like six thirty and I
Speaker 1: was like, okay, thanks guys, and then I turned off
Speaker 1: my computer and I blasted X Gonna give It to You,
Speaker 1: which is my favorite DMX song. And so it's not
Speaker 1: surprising to be the DMX is so heavily in my
Speaker 1: Spotify rap because I remember when he died and it really.
Speaker 1: It hit me hard and I I listened to a
Speaker 1: lot of DMX. I guess yeah. I feel like everybody
Speaker 1: in America was listening to d m X after that.
Speaker 1: Was X Gonna give It to you in a movie?
Speaker 1: I feel like I know exactly what you're thinking of.
Speaker 1: It's in an episode of Rick and Morty. That's why
Speaker 1: you're thinking of It wasn't in a movie. It was,
Speaker 1: definitely it probably was, but I know I know what
Speaker 1: you're remembering it from. Okay. Another song on my Spotify
Speaker 1: wrapped list that I was not surprised to see at
Speaker 1: all is Daft Punks Georgio. That is a song that
Speaker 1: I deeply, deeply, deeply funk with whenever I have a
Speaker 1: podcast interview where I want to edit it to bring
Speaker 1: a certain kind of tenderness or a certain kind of beauty,
Speaker 1: or a certain kind of meaning. I listened to that
Speaker 1: song because it's a song of a uh really famous
Speaker 1: producer basically telling his life story of how he got
Speaker 1: into music, how he got into producing, and it's so
Speaker 1: lovingly edited that it's such a good reminder of the
Speaker 1: power of listening to someone tell their own story in
Speaker 1: their own words. My whole life. I've always had a
Speaker 1: thing for listening to someone tell their own story and
Speaker 1: their own words, and I feel like that was a
Speaker 1: much of a In terms of music, that was a
Speaker 1: much bigger thing, kind of back in the day in
Speaker 1: the nineties. You know, spoken word. I've always had a
Speaker 1: song if it's someone giving a speech or explaining something
Speaker 1: with a little bit of like sound design around it,
Speaker 1: love it. A couple of other examples of that would
Speaker 1: be UM, Mutual Slump by DJ Shadow, where it's DJ
Speaker 1: Shadows then girlfriend is talking about how much she loved
Speaker 1: remember Zannah do the roller skating? How much she loved Zanna?
Speaker 1: Do you love it? Um, Everybody's free to wear sunscreen
Speaker 1: the Boss Learnman thing where he's like, no matter okay, graduates,
Speaker 1: no matter what you do? Where sunscreen? Uh. Little fluffy
Speaker 1: Clouds by the Orb where it's just a beautiful um,
Speaker 1: a beautiful voice over of a woman describing what the
Speaker 1: clouds and the skies were like when she was young.
Speaker 1: You know, when people make podcasts, if you're doing an
Speaker 1: interview in the field, you often have to get levels,
Speaker 1: and so you might ask the subject a question, you know,
Speaker 1: what did you ever breakfast? So that you can check
Speaker 1: the levels. And I always from that song. I always
Speaker 1: asked what because of that song? I always asked what
Speaker 1: were the skies like when you were young? And the
Speaker 1: kind of answers that you get when you ask somebody
Speaker 1: what were this guy's like when you were young, It's
Speaker 1: really interesting. I was once interviewing a French migrant and
Speaker 1: he said, I never saw these guys. I don't know,
Speaker 1: and I remember thinking that was such a powerful answer.
Speaker 1: More after a quick break, let's get right back into it.
Speaker 1: I have always had a thing for someone explaining something
Speaker 1: that's meaningful to them with beautiful sound design. It will
Speaker 1: always be something that like just getting like feels right
Speaker 1: in my brain. Yeah, those songs were all like podcast.
Speaker 1: I feel like spoken word tracks of the nineties were
Speaker 1: the first podcast, like like right in, let me know
Speaker 1: what you think. This is my big theory. Boken word
Speaker 1: tracks of the nineties were the first podcast. Somebody proved
Speaker 1: me wrong? Can you give us a little taste of
Speaker 1: year Spotify raft mine? Oh no, I don't know immediately, No, No,
Speaker 1: it's what was on there. I feel like the early
Speaker 1: two thousand's are gonna call me and want their music back,
Speaker 1: So let's just skip it. So for better or for worse,
Speaker 1: that is what my Spotify says, I spent my year consuming,
Speaker 1: and to me it kind of shows that I was
Speaker 1: bouncing back and forth between the new, you know, the
Speaker 1: TikTok field songs taking over my earbuds, and the old,
Speaker 1: the reliable songs I grew up with that have stuck
Speaker 1: with me. I think it's a fair reflection of the
Speaker 1: year I've had a little all over the place, to
Speaker 1: be sure, and perpetually caught between looking to the familiar,
Speaker 1: to fine comfort, while also trying to look toward the future,
Speaker 1: whatever that holds. So this is where you come in.
Speaker 1: What was your Spotify wraps like this year and what
Speaker 1: do you feel like it says about you? Give our
Speaker 1: voicemail a call at five seven one three one oh
Speaker 1: eighteen fifty nine and leave us a voicemail and let
Speaker 1: us know and you might even hear yourself on a
Speaker 1: future episode of There Are No Girls on the Internet.
Speaker 1: That's five seven one three one oh eight fifty nine.
Speaker 1: Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or
Speaker 1: just want to say hi? You can reach us at
Speaker 1: Hello at tang Godi dot com. You can also find
Speaker 1: transcripts for today's episode at tangodi dot com. There Are
Speaker 1: No Girls on the Internet was created by me Bridget Todd.
Speaker 1: It's a production of iHeart Radio and Unboss creative Jonathan
Speaker 1: Strickland as our executive producer. Tara Harrison is our producer
Speaker 1: and sound engineer. Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm
Speaker 1: your host, Bridget Todd. If you want to help us grow,
Speaker 1: rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts
Speaker 1: from my heart Radio, check out the iHeart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. And then
Speaker 1: I have been home with and then I have been
Speaker 1: he with