Saratoga Wrapped
SLAH takes a closer look at the Spa City's music-listening preferences on this hallowed week of Spotify streaming.
This week, Spotify broke the internet. If your Instagram Stories weren’t overrun by orange, yellow, green, purple and pink graphics on Wednesday, let me explain. Every year, the music-streaming service unveils Spotify Wrapped, a marketing campaign that recaps each user’s listening preferences from the last year in eye-catching, stat-driven graphics that can be—and are—shared to social media. After all, if you didn’t share your Spotify Wrapped on Instagram, do you even listen to music? Or are you just one of those people who uses Apple Music and feels utterly left out every Spotify Wrapped season? (Apple Music did release its version of Wrapped, this year, but the app remains the uncool little brother to king-of-streaming-services Spotify.) Wrapped has become such a phenomenon that it’s even being referred to as a bona fide social media holiday. “Happy Spotify Wrapped Day to all who celebrate,” one Instagram local user posted along with her musical year in review.
So why are people so eager to share their listening preferences come November 30? “I posted my Wrapped because I just love music,” says Ballston Lake resident Chris Spoonogle, who’s unanimously anointed DJ by his friends at every social gathering. “It’s always a surprise to me to see who I’ve listened to throughout the year. Music has a tie to emotion for me, so seeing the songs I listen to can almost tell me how my year went. I also like sharing it because I find myself having a large amount of listening hours compared to most users.”
It’s true: Chris’ Wrapped reveals that he listened to a whopping 80,689 minutes of Spotify music this year (that’s eight full week’s worth). His top artists were The Lumineers, Portugal. The Man, Glass Animals, Vance Joy and COIN; and his top genre was modern rock. While Chris chose to share only one screenshot of his Wrapped recap on Instagram (after all, music taste can be quite personal), other local music-lovers bared all, for better or worse. Wedding photographer Hannah Kuznia, for one, posted that her top song was a discrete track by goth/indie artist carolesdaughter. “Exposing myself here I guess,” she wrote on the screenshot. Self-proclaimed Dave Matthews Band super-fan Laura Tower Pfeifer, on the other hand, proudly posted that she listened to 3,592 minutes of Dave and was in the top .5% of listeners among the band’s larger fanbase.
Obviously, DMB had an outsized presence in Spa City Spotify Wrappeds (Saratoga is Dave country, after all). But SPAC’s influence on Saratogians’ listening preferences doesn’t stop at the almighty Dave—Morgan Wallen, The Lumineers and Zac Brown Band also had quite a presence among local Wrapped screenshots. “I’m a diehard DMB fan, so I knew what to expect,” says Wilton resident Tim Fontaine, who’s top three artists were Dave, The Lumineers and Caamp, the band that opened for The Lumineers at SPAC this summer. “For The Lumineers and Caamp, I knew that I liked them, but after seeing their artistry live at such a cool venue, I became a much bigger fan and started playing a lot more of their music.”
Then there were the shoo-ins—the world-famous artists who topped Spotify’s charts globally as well as locally. Puerto Rican singer-songwriter Bad Bunny was named the world’s most streamed artist for the third year in a row, while Drake was the top artist in the US. Taylor Swift, who’s been much in the news following the release of her album Midnights and 2023 tour announcement, was second on both lists, and Harry Styles’ track “As It Was” was the most-streamed song in the world.
But while national acts get much of the glory come Wrapped day, smaller-time artists on Spotify also get a look at how their music is doing on the service. “Spotify puts a short video together highlighting our musical achievements with their platform,” says Seth Warden of local band Warden and Company. “It highlights our top songs for the year, which were ‘Aria 08’ off the 2014 album Instrumental Lullabies with 46,000 streams, and ‘Somewhere’ off the 2022 Warden and Co. release with 44,000 streams. Getting the Spotify Wrapped validates that we are making music that people are enjoying listening to.”
And as with any viral social media craze, parodies of the Spotify Wrapped trend were almost as common as actual Spotify Wrapped posts. “You spent 529,600 minutes being crushed under the weight of capitalism,” one locally shared post read. “You were the most played in 2022,” read another. Two Buttons Deep even weighed in with “Stewart’s Wrapped,” a list of the top five Stewart’s ice cream flavors as voted on by their followers earlier this year.
Now it’s our turn. Here is our 2022 Saratoga Race Course Wrapped:
—Natalie
Quote of the Week:
“Those are my skinny dipping eyes.”
—Overheard at Tin & Lint
Holiday Happenings
On Thursday, Saratoga kicked off the holiday season with the annual Victorian Streetwalk, which saw Broadway get shut down to cars for the first time since before the pandemic. The evening featured a tree-lighting ceremony, performance by American Idol alum Madison VanDenburg and an appearance from Santa Claus himself. Missed out on all the merriment? Special Streetwalk events are going on all weekend long—see the full calendar here—or head down to Troy on Sunday for the 40th annual Victorian Stroll.
Sweater Weather
This just in—not only is Wednesday’s Single in Saratoga event an ugly sweater party, but there will also be an ugly sweater contest presented by the Micropolitan Matchmakers!
The Polls Are Open!
Voting is now open for the 2023 Besties, our sister mag’s annual poll of Capital Region people, places, food and drink. Vote for at least 20 categories here (Saratoga people and businesses are in play!) and be entered to win a $50 Capital Region restaurant gift card each week until voting ends!
This Week in Saratoga Living After Hours
On Monday, we published a fill-in-the-blank news quiz about holiday happenings in Saratoga and beyond.
And on Tuesday, SLAH did some of your stocking stuffer shopping for you.