Building the Perfect Playlist
“Perfect” is contextual. What’s perfect to me may not be perfect to the next person. The framework of perfect is shaped by where the considering person is from, their upbringing, their socio-economic status, their education, and so much more. The concept of “perfect” is especially considerable in music preference — music preference arguably even being the key indicator for understanding an individual’s context. For example, country music is widely identified as a Southern-centric genre, but preference in country music subsets vary amongst Southern states. Areas in California, the Southwest, and Midwest also consume different types of country music.
Observing context as a driver of music preference has brought me to consider my own influence in music listening. What cultures have I absorbed, places have I visited, experiences have I had that cause me to enjoy the music I enjoy?
One life-event that I have identified as a key building block for my music preference is my move from California to Colorado — realizing my grown appreciation for surf-rock only when I returned to California for the first time in two years. I believe that my landlocked state in Colorado passively shaped my appreciation for surf culture and the surf-rock genre— my long-term distance from the coastline triggering an ideal state of my own personal happiness, and my own landlocked state triggering the creation of a Spotify playlist to deliver my aspirational coastal mentality to greet my found Colorado lifestyle.
The Spotify playlist I’ve created, “Landlocked”, is the product of my perfect music scenario. But little did I know until moving the MVP playlist on Spotify from private to public that many Boulderites having relocated from California in the last five years feel the same way — landlocked. I continue to build this playlist with the goal of relieving the disenfranchised landlocked state, pushing a “perfect” scenario for as many relocated coasties as possible — in part as a surf-rock lover, and in part as a case study for context.
Check out “Landlocked” on Spotify below.
