This may seem like an odd time to review my Spotify Year in Music since we’re two-thirds of the way through this year and I’m going to be doing this again in December, but whatever I’m going to do it anyway. Now, this Year in Music has particular meaning to me for two reasons, one because I joined Spotify the last couple of days of 2014 so this is my first Year in Music and almost reflects how the medium changed my listening habits the more I used it. And two, the simple fact is I almost exclusively use streaming while listening to music so this almost doubles as a look at my year in music period. Ok, with that out of the way let’s do this.

Top Artists

Marina and the Diamonds – 418 Streams

Ok, so this is a no brainer, I discovered Marina and the Diamonds last April/May and since then she’s become one of my favorite artists ever. In fact, for good part of the year it seemed like all I was doing was playing her entire three album discography back-to-back non-stop.

CHVRCHES – 402 Streams

…Which is probably why she has a pretty decent lead over the runner-up who coincidently (or maybe not?) is another one of favorite bands, Chvrches; again a no brainer “The Bones of What You Believe” was one of the first albums I went looking when I first joined Spotify and it’s been a staple of my music listening ever seen. Not to mention they also released their sophomore album “Every Open Eye” in the fall of last year, which only helped them get this second spot and which I’ll talk about again later.

Halsey – 334 Streams

So, in the three spot we have alt-pop darling Halsey and hey I’m not complaining I loved her debut album that dropped in the summer and, in fact, of my 100 most streamed songs of last year a staggering nine were from either “Badlands” or “Room 93”. I do think it’s kind of cool how almost a year ago I had just discovered her music right before she dropped her debut album and now a year later she already has a number one hit on Billboard (with The Chainsmokers).

Bea Miller – 250 Streams

First, look at the drop in streams it took to make this list, but whatever, Bea Miller was one of the first artists I discovered via Spotify who I really liked so of course she’d end up here. Although I have noticed that I don’t seem listen to her as much I used to, now I am trying to fix this, but at the end of the day while her EP and debut album made for some great listening last year I’m skeptically if I’ll be very interested in any of her follow ups.

Zella Day – 223 Streams

I don’t have much to say here, like all the other four she had a major album release last year that I was a big fan of and, as we’ll see soon, “Hypnotic” was a song I couldn’t get enough.

Top 5 Albums

“The Bones of What You Believe” – Chvrches 200 Streams

No surprise, not much else I can say about this album.

“The Family Jewels” – Marina and the Diamonds 198 Streams

Ok, I know if you asked me this at the time I probably would have pegged this as my favorite Marina album in a heartbeat, but now I might actually go for “Froot” instead, but either way this got almost as many streams than both of her other albums put together.

“Kicker” – Zella Day 167 Streams

Yeah, great album, no further comments.

“Queen of the Clouds” – Tove Lo 158 Streams

Despite liking “Habits (Stay High)” when it hit radio in late 2014 I didn’t immediately look into Tove Lo’s debut album “Queen of the Clouds” until about April and obviously I liked it a lot.

“Badlands” – Halsey 152 Streams

For reasons I can’t explain because I don’t fully know myself I decided to listen to the standard version of this album before moving on to the deluxe edition that I exclusively listen to now with the result being that “Badlands” is down here in fifth place. C’est La Vie.

Top 5 Songs

“Paperweight” – Bella Thorne 53 Streams

Uh, I can explain…

“Oh No” – Marina and the Diamonds 44 Streams

For the longest time I jumped on this as my favorite Marina song (probably because it’s off “The Family Jewels” that I talked about earlier) and hey since I just listened to it today maybe it still is, but either way good song.

“Pray to God” – Calvin Harris; Haim 42 Streams

For the record, I’m here more for Haim than Calvin, but either way this is the song that put Haim on my radar and I couldn’t be happier for it.

“Hypnotic” – Zella Day 41 Streams

I wrote earlier this was one of my favorites of 2015 and I don’t have much else to say about it, but I do want to point out how close in streams all these songs are with this song only needing two more streams to get the three spot.

“If Only” – Dove Cameron 36 Streams

I think she’s got a great voice, and that’s all I’m going to say about this being as high as it is.

Top Genres: Pop, Synth Pop, Metropopolis, Indietronica, Dance Pop

If you’ve seen my posts in What Are You Listening to Right Now? Or just read the previous paragraphs this shouldn’t come as a surprise at all. Although I do find at least a little weird that Country didn’t show up here at all I mean I know I don’t listen to the genre anymore except for some choice acts, but still like I said it’s weird.

Ear-Worm: “Paperweight” – Bella Thorne (streamed 8 times in one day)

Ok, now time to explain, and well I’m just going to say that I really like this song yes I know it’s flawed (to say the least), but I don’t really care because it connects with me and that’s the only thing that should matter when it comes to music. That being said this on top of my non-existent list of songs that I wish would be covered just because I think that there’s a great song hidden somewhere in here waiting to be made.

Listening Habits:

Number of minutes listened to in 2015: 22,000 (or 358 hours or 15 days)

Number of artists streamed: 648

Number of tracks streamed: 1,943

Since this is just raw stats I’ll post them here and move on.

Outlier: “Music People” –IAMX

According to Spotify I “ventured into the unknown,” by listening to song, which I guess is a good thing?

Sounds of the Seasons: Most Streamed Artists by Season

Winter: Avril Lavigne (74 streams), Chvrches (73), Cassadee Pope (54)

So, this reflects my beginnings on Spotify, and is a pretty good example of what I used to listen to back then, not that I don’t still stream Lavigne and Pope, but it’s getting rarer these days to be honest.

Spring: Marina and the Diamonds (165), Tove Lo (142), Chvrches (104)

Note, the massive spike in the number of streams, which marks when I really got on board this streaming thing and more importantly is a great example of what I’ve always believed that Spotify is great at turning either occasional or non-listeners into much bigger consumers of music. Anyway, as I mentioned before it was around this time I discovered Marina and Tove Lo.

Summer: Marina and the Diamonds (178), Halsey (152), Zella Day (143)

I wasn’t kidding when I said that I was listening to Marina non-stop after I first discovered her; and also here is reflected the June and August drops of “Badlands” and “Kicker” from Halsey and Day respectively.

Fall: Halsey (182), Chvrches (130), Melanie Martinez (119)

I really liked Halsey’s album, and the drop of their stellar sophomore effort “Every Open Eye” in September precipitated the return of Chvrches in these rankings (although I do find it interesting that nothing off that album made any waves here either in the form of a top album or top song). Also, in August I made, what might still be, the best discovery off of Spotify’s much buzzed about “Discover Weekly” playlist namely Melanie Martinez. And it was the appearance of her song “Pity Party” on aforementioned playlist that made me an instant fan the second I heard it.

And that was my Year in Music and I can’t wait to see how much my listening changed in December when my next Year in Music comes out.