Guide: How To Create The Ultimate Playlist

MusicCulture

Jul 31

☆ BY Rufaro Chiswo ☆

Playlists and playlisting are an inescapable part of music at the moment. Combined with streaming services, playlists are part of a curative and algorithmic shift in music that more and more caters to our tastes. In a Vox piece about how streaming has altered the fabric of the music industry, Charlie Harding asserts that playlists “have serious cultural power” and this is both on a large and more microcosmic scale. The pervasiveness of playlists is so intertwined with practically every aspect of our lives: they are used to soundtrack tranquil Sunday mornings, intense workouts, and equally intense breakups. But the predecessor of the playlist illustrates how this is not a recent cultural fascination. Both mixtapes and playlists fall part of a longstanding humanistic need to compile music, the desire to have a personal interaction with music, and essentially arrange how (and when) it affects you. They are tools that we use to communicate, connect, and diarise. Suffice it to say, the playlist is powerful. These are some ways you can maximize the potential of this incomparable cultural phenomenon.

Let’s get cerebral

When themes are brought up in any artistic context, boring book reports are usually the first thing that comes to mind, but with your playlists, it’s whatever links your song choices. From topics as evergreen as love and heartbreak to details as particular as similar bpm, the aura songs evoke, or genre-specific traits, a common thread in a playlist creates a pleasant listening experience and encourages a thoughtful compilation period. Take the playlist’s predecessor and its depiction in some iconic films. In The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012), Patrick (Ezra Miller) makes a mixtape for Charlie (Logan Lerman) where he curates a selection of songs that he considers “winter kind of songs”. Then there is Elizabethtown (2005), where Claire’s (Kirsten Dunst) mixtape for Drew (Orlando Bloom) consisted of songs to accompany him on his trip across America with his dad’s ashes. Paying attention to certain aspects of songs and how they can coexist in your playlist can transform it from a haphazardly strung-together compilation into something more intentional and meaningful.

Dear audio diary...

A playlist is the best way to track your personal growth and how your taste has developed. Treat it as a type of personal diary where you place songs that adhere to your chosen theme (or lack thereof) while also reflecting a time in your life, mind, surroundings, and more. This will not only ensure that you’ll have a selection of extremely moving playlists, but you’ll find that these compilations will heighten the banal. Don’t be afraid to get really raw, detailed, and personal.

Don’t repeat!

In the cult classic remake, High Fidelity’s Rob (Zoe Kravitz) states, “you can’t double up on songs by the same artists unless that’s of course your theme”. Though not a cardinal rule, avoiding doubling up allows you to expand your preferences and prevents you from playing it safe with your song choices. Every time you want to double up on an artist, challenge yourself. Find an artist whose stylistic choices, production, or lyrics compliment your initial choice, or better yet, are completely divergent. Make playlisting a process that gets you out of your comfort zone and gives you room to explore the range of your taste.

Forget everything I said.

While there are certain rules that can make a playlist enjoyable and cohesive, it truly is all up to you. A playlist is a collection of pieces by artists who we use as vessels to reveal something about ourselves, and how we choose to express this is completely relative. Hopefully, this has given you a few tools that can level up how you curate playlists (especially for those who are new to them), but if there is anything to take from this list; the ultimate playlist is whatever you make of it.

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“There's no part of me where I'm denying it or I'm ashamed or I don't want to represent that, but I think just some things should go unspoken and just let the art speak. You don't have to say someone is this, someone is that. Just listen to my music & come up with your own conclusion. That is so freeing to know that I'm not having to adhere to any type of category, genre. I'm just me. I'm a person sharing my experiences & living my life. I don't ever want to be boxed in that way. “ - Deb Never in our 15th Issue 🌟 Photos by @myyaaii Styling by @savwhite Interview by @itssophielol

Dylan Fraser’s catalog explores ruminative pop that is unafraid to experiment with distortion in all of its iterations, & unequivocally embraces vulnerability 🎵 Following the success of 2020’s ‘The Storm’, Fraser has quickly caught the attention of the industry & with his upcoming project, he is ready to cement his position in the new pop canon. 💫Fraser’s new track, “Nightmare”, is out now on all streaming platforms + his new EP, ‘The World Isn’t Big When You Know How It Works’, will be released on August 20th through Atlantic Records. Check out our interview with Fraser to learn more about the new music & what’s next for him ⚡️

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