People have playlists and multiple ones at that 0.o What are the usecases of playlists? I guess maybe I could see working out, but wouldn’t the same songs in the same order over and over lose their punch?
Edit: could you please explain instead of just downvoting? I’m genuinely unsure here.
Yes. Also, you can shuffle playlists. Anyway, I have about ~40 current playlists, not counting sub-sets, out of which I use 5-10 day-to-day. They’re basically genre/mood tags but I don’t want to clutter up my entire library with fake genres so playlists it is.
I used to run a single playlist, essentially just my entire library, but the issue with that is I would be skipping songs constantly and it would jump from upbeat to sad to energetic to slow… it got old. Now, if I’m feeling in a rave mood I put on that playlist. Pop? Got it. Angry, sad, EDM, synthwave, swing, phonk, metal, hip-hop… the list goes on but I’ve got playlists for 'em and I don’t want to listen to each of them every day or at the same time. If I am feeling multiple I just queue up multiple on shuffle. It’s allowed me to be a lot more adventurous in my music taste by separating out the rare listens for only when I need them. Keeps me from getting bored of them.
That makes sense. Thanks!
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You can randomize playlists play order
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Playlists are great for storing songs you found and you’ll never rememeber otherwise. For example, I have a playlist called “awesome obscure” where I put all songs from artists I generally don’t know. Say a friend sent a song, a song came on a spotify weekly list whatever. I also have a playlist called “nostalgia” where I store all my old time favorites. If I remember a song from the past, I put it there so I don’t have to think so hard if I want a hit of my personal nostalgia.
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Listening to (good) songs multiple times actually makes me appreciate songs more.
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Having the playlist not set to randomize can actually also be a great way to set expectations/an experience on what comes next. I’m a shuffle guy myself, but I could see handpicking moods to chain together. Say (for example) you start with some slow songs to wake up, but the playlist gradually increase in tempo and vibes to wake you up. It could be a routine thing.
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Playlists don’t have to be a few songs long, they can have hundreds, or thousands of songs. They don’t lose their punch if it takes 30 hours to get through them.
So basically it’s a personalized list of songs YOU want to keep together for any meriad of reasons.
Thank you for explaining!
No problem!
Some other usecases:
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My band has a shared playlist of all the song covers we play. That way we can acces the songs easily and listen to them to practice.
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A different band I’m in has an “inspiration” playlist where we put songs that inspire us in the genre we create music in. Anyone can add songs they have found in the wild.
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I’ve made “songs you might like” playlists for friends. A collection of songs that particular person might like.
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Genre/mood playlists. Yes, spotify/other services have this feature, but they will include many songs you might not know/like. If you want a rock playlist with only your own rock music, make the playlist yourself!
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Got me. Random for me!
Insinuates?
… incorporates?
Inserts?
Yeah, that’s better.
I think it’s a perfectly fine use of ‘insinuates’.
Photosynthesis by Frank Turner; It reminds me that getting older doesn’t mean I have to give up on what I’ve enjoyed or wanted in life.
None. All my playlists are fully unique, mostly because I am too lazy to actually make playlists.
There is a partial exception to it with one song: Louis Armstrong - When the saints go marching in
That is because I have 2 versions of it. One I ripped from YouTube in the past and like it more, and one I ripped from CD. The latter I keep in separate directory for album completion, just like culture mix of Big in Japan by Alphaville. I don’t like it, but I have rest of the album (also ripped from CD by myself).I do have playlists, I almost never listen to full albums (nearly all songs I download individually), but I do that by categorizing new songs into the most fitting directory, and that’s it.
I’m limited to one?
That’s pretty much “Fade to Black”, by Metallica.
The only playlists it doesn’t end up on are genre limited lists, and it there’s a cover in the genre, that isn’t even certain. There’s a couple of incredible bluegrass covers of it that are on my bluegrass playlists lol.
But, Metallica is more or less my favorite band. I could argue with myself about that and make good points against it being true, but it amounts to it being true anyway.
It’s off of a great album. It’s musically fulfilling, in that it covers a lot of ground without being chaotic. The subject matter is a big one, and it’s one I’ve faced in my life many a time. It has emotional resonance because of that, and because the song has helped me make it through many of those times. It’s kind of a tautology there.
It’s one of James Hetfield’s best vocals (imo).
The guitars are superb, the drums at the peak of Lars Ulrich’s abilities. The bass is present and well mixed (which is not a guarantee with Metallica lol).
There are other songs that find their way into damn near any playlist I make, but none of them can match FtB.
Cha cha cha
Just listen to it and you’ll know why I love it enough to have it on my playlist. You don’t even need to speak Finnish to enjoy it.
“Around the World” by Daft Punk. The strangest thing is though, I don’t use traditional playlists, but layered random smart play lists. I generate a list of 300 songs, by combining my 2, 3, 4 and 5 star playlists to give me a random selection of songs, but with my preferred ratio of 2:3:4:5 star rated music.
So the over representation of this song is just how statistics work and means nothing. If it wasn’t that song, it would be some other song that has been played more than the others.
It was fascinating reading through your playlists, colored by your description of them.
Reptilia by The Strokes and probably because I listen to it a lot.
I never actually counted but thanks to your question I know now. Currently I am enjoying music on 45 playlists and there is zero songs overlapping, with a small exception of “temporary” playlist — where songs are awaiting being sorted and this one is generally a “beautiful mess”.
There might be like 5 songs that occupy different playlists but they are in different versions, covers, unplugged/concert versions or redefining remixes.
I think it’s Lay it on me by Vance Joy. It has a part about him being sad, then there is love, and then an instrumental chorus to which I dance to (given a chance). I guess I find it pretty uplifting.
What happens when the heart just stops by the frames. Went through a breakup not too long ago, just feeling The vibes now.
One of the songs that is used in many(not all) of my playlists is Mutemath - You Are Mine.
The song has vibes, can be played as background noise, but also as a listening song. It is melancholic, but not so sad that it can’t be played on a sunny day(although it is more suited for rainy days and autumn weather for sure)
Since I mostly listen by dropping a whole genre into an ephemeral playlist, there is zero overlap. I rarely even hear a piece more than a few times a year, and sometimes the whole playlist takes more than a year to play from 0 to Z at an average of 1 hour play every day (eg I have pretty much the complete catalogue of Ektoplazm, including 575 goa trance and 377 downtempo albums).
Even if I have a few static playlists of random pieces, they’re also thematic (eg a bluegrass playlist as background music for dogfighting) and with zero overlap between them.
Come to think, of it, I only have two static, saved playlists—one for dogfighting and one with pieces that have subbass and ULF content down to and below 20 Hz. Playlists for me are wholly ephemeral, the default one that gets cleared and refilled as I go, acting more as a playback queue, and temporary ones that get deleted when I’m done with them.
I am enjoying all of your experiences. Every one of you has broadened my musical mind.
