Lean-forward listening

The surprising thing I learned from quitting Spotify

Last summer, I quit Spotify, and wrote about it with the rather unsubtle headline “Why I quit Spotify.” My reasons remain sound: The software had become clunky, the ads relentless, and the Sabrina Carpenter songs too inescapable. I wanted to find a better music streaming service. It gives me no pleasure to report that a few weeks ago, I rejoined. The algorithm got me. I don’t just mean that it got me, the way the TikTok algorithm glues you to the screen. Spotify’s algorithm got me the way an old friend gets me and my weird affection for yacht rock or ongoing obsession with French touch music from the mid-Aughts. ….[READ]