‘The role of the intellectual is no longer to change society but rather comment eloquently on it.’ -I forgot who said this.
The role of the pseudo-intellectual is to use the headings of complex ideas and theories alongside profanity and hyperbolic similes to describe over-reported-on happenings as an attempt to stand-out.
Both are insufferable.
But it’s December or Dezemba if you’re an alcoholic. It’s a month of reflection and a time for brands like Spotify to let us know what we liked, when we liked it and even being so kind as to tell us what that means on a personal level. Every brand is doing a recap show nowadays, a reward for the data they’ve been collecting from us since almost the inception of the internet. Even LinkedIn is doing it, which is probably the greatest signifier of a Capitalist hellscape we’ve had since small purchase financing.
Wrapped is especially fascinating to me though. It works off more than a Parasocial connection to artists, it centres listening tastes as achievement and even so far as virtue.
Punk music means you are rebellious.
Metal music makes you hardcore.
RnB guarantees that you are just the chilliest of guys.
And Pop classifies you as a cultural leader and trend setter.
Of course, what is left out are the sentence modifiers “Listening to…” and “…on Spotify”. The implicit requirement that to be defined by your music taste in any way you need not only have record of it but record of it on Spotify. Conditioning that has centred Spotify as the defacto music streaming app both in our lexicon and in user metrics.
What is explicit, is cherry picked data made into a phony awards ceremony. And what gets me is that people seem to gobble it up happily.
This year’s was especially stylish, with the gamification of ones listening habits made overt in the interactive sections of the report.
The clever but as usual vapid implementation of AI poked its head in the addition of the listening files at the end. A chronicling of specific ‘listening events’—again placing listening to music as an achievement rather than pass-time— was novel for all of five minutes.
The reactions on the internet were split between ironic critique of said ceremony, and deathly serious exposés on the evils of the company behind the performance. Both achieving the same thing.
Which was nothing beyond reinforcing the attitudes of a neutered revolutionary class.
And before conscious consoomers castrate me:
Know that, for the most part, voting with your wallet just means funding the machine through alternative channels. Even when you don’t, it’s miniscule increments of change versus exponential fortifications of evil.
At the end of 2024 the killjoys and terminally serious cried injustice over Spotify’s mistreatment and exploitation of artists. At the start of 2026 users can proceed knowing their subscriptions have bolstered both the development and implementation of SUICIDE DRONES and other AI augmented systems of war. Whiplash from ‘what the’ to ‘fuck’ so severe that even the most militantly non-polarizing were slow to upload their stats this year—though they still uploaded them of course.
In case you live under a rock or focus on the things in life you have power over, good ol’ Daniel Ek, the now ex CEO of Spotify, invested over 700 million Euros into Helsing.
A German founded defence company with the catch phrase ‘Protecting our democracies’.
Using the justification of having one’s democracy be under threat to profit off war… Where oh where have we seen that before?
Speaking of war and its instruments, I can’t help but think of a line from Lowkey’s Terrorist. A track I liked to listen to on Spotify:
“Tell me, what's the bigger threat to human society B.A.E Systems or home-made I.E.D's?”
That was in 2011.
Now we have DEI considerations being espoused by an AI powered SUICIDE DRONE manufacturing company.
Which is, you know, kinda fucking hilarious.
Critiquing or celebrating, making moral judgments in favour or against is tantamount to wearing Caterpillar sneakers and walking in circles on blood slicked ground. In the first case: decrying the awful state of your inside hip and knee joint from undertaking such a noble task, while the other just pretends all of this is normal procedure.
Both are insufferable.
And worse
Ineffective.
When threats to democracy are no longer Arabs or Russians and a ‘clever’, ‘revolutionary’, and ‘groundbreaking’ Strike Drone™ deems you a threat to Technocratic hegemony: maintain the moral high ground by streaming an appropriately ironic track on Tidal or YouTube Music to accompany the sound of your flesh being obliterated.
I’d recommend famed astronaut and part-time lip-syncher Katy Perry’s Firework.
The cold truth of the matter is that it’s not Spotify’s business model specifically that’s problematic, it’s music streaming in general. But identifying a modern amenity as exploitative is like pointing out that grass is green or that RocoMamas is repulsive. Spotify as a case study simply illustrates just how absurd a reality of making allowances for exploitation in exchange for convenience can get.
While it is funny to listen to protest music on an app that is creating the conditions that require protest; at some point you need to touch the grass that is green and reflect.
What you like and why you like it is something that should always be investigated. Letting brands or companies decide how you identify, even ironically, is caustic to the soul. The decisions you make as a consumer is not a revolutionary act to change the world. But rather one of deep compassion for yourself to ensure that the world does not change you.
Happy New Year and thanks for reading my bullshit.