You obviously can’t do anything about liars. They manufacture a whole new musical persona every time they want to impress someone. Tell them you like The Beatles and they’ll quickly mug up all 13 tracks of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club album. But would they know about the underrated Magical Mystery Tour? Doubt it.
Some really put in the work. One 24-year-old writer confessed to listening to more than 12 hours of Blues to manipulate her Spotify Blend score with a crush. For the uninitiated, it’s an automatic playlist created by the app. It combines the song streaming data of two or more people, and tells you what percentage of their tastes match. She didn’t back down until it showed 98 per cent, only because 100 would seem too good to be true.
Another reason people hide their true preferences is the fear of being cancelled. Since these days artistes are being all sorts of unhinged in public, their stans keep a low profile. Mum’s the word for Udit Narayan’s followers. And Taylor Swift is a grey area.
Also read: Modern breakups are like divorces. Who gets the cat, friends, Amazon Prime account?
Spotify romance
It’s clear why playlist flirting rules. Songs in that shared list are hiding little confessions. One very popular way is to curate it in such a way that all the titles make up for a loaded sentence. Something like Tum Se Hi (Mohit Chauhan), Butterflies (Kacey Musgraves), Aajao (Ankur Tiwari), and Back to Me (Kanye West). If you’re lucky, one of these songs will make it to their Instagram story. That’s how you know the message has been well received.
A 29-year-old corporate girlie in Gurugram didn’t think twice before parking her extremely personal playlist in her Bumble matches inbox. She wanted to check if he judges her middle order of Baba Sehgal’s bangers—which she listens to ironically. But little did she know, the guy was one step ahead of her. His dopamine hits are supplied by Taher Shah. It’s a match made in heaven; nobody lets them near the aux.
This playlist business is employed to summon ghosts of the past—or just to keep tabs on them. For a good two years since her breakup, a Mumbai-based lawyer has used her ex’s online playlist as pre-workout fuel. Every time he adds a new happy song, she does 20 squats. Can’t even judge her. Therapy is expensive, but at least her backside is in shape.
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(Edited by Zoya Bhatti)
