Listen to Music With Me // A Musical Blog

I listen to a lot of music in my daily life. Why don't you listen along with me for a week?

One of my closest friends Vaish suggested writing a musical blog recently because "you listen a lot and make the effort to find good music." The idea immediately appealed to me because, as I said in my Mid-Year Notes, I love writing personal-ish posts through a specific aspect.

Considering I tend to write about whatever I'm passionate about, it's actually a little surprising that I haven't written about music so far. Once my friend suggested it, I had to write one.

So, for a week, I set hourly reminders to note down what I'm doing and what music I'm listening to. I made notes on what to write more about and the different aspects to include. I hope you like this musical week-long blog as much as I enjoyed making it! I'll include links to the songs and playlists I mention so do listen to them while reading 🙂

monday

I'm working from home today. I could have gone to the office but I just didn't feel like it so I decided to stay home. It's actually been a good while since I worked from home so I'm looking forward to working in a relaxed manner and having background music on the speaker all day.

Since I'm currently doing The Artist's Way, the first thing I do (after freshening up) is write morning pages. This morning, I played my slow playlist on shuffle while writing morning pages. It felt like a slow morning since I wasn't rushing to write before heading out so this playlist suited the mood.

The first song to play is ALWAYS by Yoon Mi-rae, from the Descendants of the Sun soundtrack. Although I didn't like the drama much and usually forget it exists, I really like the drama's soundtrack. It has such good songs. In fact, I listened to ALWAYS so much that I sing/hum it whenever I feel like I want a slow song but I can't play a song. This is usually the first one that I "sing" in my mind. The beginning is so easy to remember.

I usually put my playlists on shuffle, I'm not picky about what plays first or next. However, since my playlists are wide-range mixes, now drilled down to moods, I skip songs sometimes. I'm usually fairly open to any song that plays but some times, some of the tunes are jarring for my current mood so I skip them. It doesn't make sense to split them into mood-specific playlists because mood is a finicky thing and it takes a second to skip a song.

Back when we had to download songs onto our devices to listen to them, I meticulously downloaded mp3 files for my songs. Over years, the number of songs in my phone crossed 1000. Even when Spotify became a thing and I got a subscription, I didn't let go of my downloaded songs and would make the effort to find a good music player app to use for my downloaded library.

When I switched to an iPhone, I had to leave my downloaded playlist behind because I couldn't make it work with any downloaded music player. I already had a Spotify premium subscription with my friends by then, so I painstakingly moved my most-loved songs to Spotify playlists.

"sumedha's slow playlist" consists of ALL the "slow" songs I've loved since 8th grade, when I got a phone and started downloading music. At this point, I don't even want to split the playlist into mood-specific ones because I love stumbling upon old songs through shuffle and rediscovering my love for them or remembering memories associated with them.

Today, a while after finishing morning pages and starting work, Kaadhal en Kaviye come on in the background and the song is so beautiful that I stop working for a minute just to experience it. Spotify doesn't have the original song by Sid Sriram so I found a similar one and it grew on me. The original has raw emotions while this cover is so soft and beautiful. I love both of them.

Listening to it also reminds me of how I was introduced to it—a colleague/friend played it in my previous office years ago. My team (who became friends) would sit at a specific high table and this colleague would play songs on speaker. We'd work while listening to music and bantering. I loved those days.

When I'm at home, I usually play music on the speaker, sort of like background music. I used listening to music so much, always with headphones or earbuds, that my mom got really annoyed and told me to just buy a speaker. I eventually splurged on a Homepod Mini in orange and I really love the sound. The music envelops the room while somehow not being loud beyond the room which I worried about. Since I got it, I almost always have music playing on it.

It's nice to work from home because I can play music out loud instead of wearing headphones all the time (among other perks of course). I pause music whenever I have meetings, of course, and resume when they're done.

I'm usually totally focused on my work and the music is just background. However, rarely, when some songs play which perfectly match my mood or are so melodious, I can't help but take a minute or more to vibe to them and/or sing along. If I'm working on light work or am in a musical mood, it happens more often otherwise my work concentration is fairly hard to break. It happened with Kaadhal en Kaviye and Someone to Stay by Vancouver Sleep Clinic this morning.

At 1:30pm, I took a mid-day dance break. I just finished a piece of work and something happened a while ago due to which I crossed a milestone at work and was super happy. Dance breaks are another perk of working at home 😂 The slow music isn't the dance music I'm looking for so I switched to my regular playlist, also called "sumedha's playlist".

I only have 2 playlists—regular and slow. Some songs are hard to categorize because they feel slow but aren't really background music or have a few too many beats—I spend some time listening to the song and considering when I'd listen to it to determine where to put it.

"sumedha's playlist" is my regular playlist where every song goes unless it is specifically "slow". That's why this playlist has almost 500 songs, much bigger than the slow playlist.

Since the regular playlist contains a much wider range of songs, I skip songs more often. I still play it in shuffle and then either skip songs or check the queue to select a song I want from the upcoming few, skipping multiple songs. Depending on my mood and how picky I am, I either listen to the shuffled songs as is or skip. It's easier than scrolling through the chronological list of almost 500 songs.

For example, at this point, I want to dance. Not every song in the playlist works for my mood. In fact, most don't. But I play it on shuffle and the first song is If Walls Could Talk by 5 Seconds of Summer. It works for my current mood, so I let it play and dance to it.

Now is a good time to explain why they're so unoriginally named "sumedha's playlists" and don't have niche or aesthetic names based on my interests, so let me tell you the story.

In college, one of my roles in my friend group was to play music on Discord. We'd hang out on the voice channel at night, either to do our own things with company or play games or chat, and I'd usually play the music. My friends played multiplayer games most of the time and they couldn't curate music while they played. I used to blog while they played and cared about the music so I meticulously chose songs based on everyone's moods and manually played them one by one using the music bots on Discord.

Through trial and error, feedback from friends and noticing what songs they commented on, I got to know their tastes really well.* Eventually, I was curating the music so well that they often found good recommendations through it. A friend asked me to share my playlist because I have great songs so I started a Spotify playlist with the songs we all love and named it "sumedha's playlist."

When I moved to an iPhone and had to move to Spotify, I added all of my beloved songs to these playlists itself. It felt counter-intuitive to maintain other playlists for myself and maintain one for my friends as well. It pushed me to actually curate my playlist as well instead of downloading/adding everything that sounded kinda good. (I'll speak more about how I curate my playlists later.)

Over time, having my ever-growing curated playlists helped because I've been asked for my music quite a few times. I show them my playlists or share it with them. One of my ex-colleagues actually uses "sumedha's playlist" as his car music! We were heading for a team outing and I was so surprised that a specific song was playing in his car. When I mentioned it, he said that yeah it's because your playlist is on 😂

*Although we have stopped hanging out on Discord for a good while now, I still know my friends' music tastes really well and send them songs that I think they'd love. One of my college friends recently texted, "Idk how. I don't necessarily instantly like the songs you suggest. But man they grow on you. Thanks 😇". When I recommended another song randomly, he said, "how you know my type? It's my type but you've never listened to what I listen to" and I felt so validated haha. I learnt it through those years of DJing on Discord.

5 pm check-in: working with the slow playlist again! It's a really good companion for tasks that require focus but not too much focus because I can easily sing along with the songs or ignore them.

6 pm check-in: logged off work and the slow playlist is still running. It's so long that, even with skips, it feels never-ending. One time, I used this playlist to doze off to in a 9-hour bus journey and my companion was surprised by how I still have songs left at the end 😂

7:45 pm: I showered and got a cup of chai. Yes, it's super late for tea but that's how we roll in this house. I decided to catch up on blog posts and felt like switching the music to something else, but something similar. So I played the This is Hazlett playlist on Spotify in the background.

I'm not sure how I found Hazlett but I've really grown to like his music. I don't like all of his songs but I like enough of them that I use the auto-generated Spotify playlist. I do have a bunch of the songs split in my playlists but I like listening to his music together. They're quite similar that it can feel like one long song at times.

Since I don't like all of his music, I usually select the first one that I like and skip over the songs I don't like when they come on. Currently, the first one is Hesitate, so I play that. It's one of my all-time favourites by him (alongside Part Time Lovers) and is THE song that made me check out more of his music. I've been loving blue jean and Even If It's Lonely lately.

I could create a separate Hazlett playlist of my own but I don't think I listen to his music that often to warrant it. Besides, if I move to my playlist, how will I organically come across his new music and allow it to grow on me? I don't keep up with artists at all so their "This is ____" Spotify playlists are the only way I come across their new music. I actually didn't like blue jean the first time I heard it through the playlist but over time, it grew on me.

I've noticed that the songs that grow on me are the ones I stick to for years, even if I initially dislike them. The songs that are immediately catchy are forgotten in a few days or weeks. I thought I really liked a few of Sabrina Carpenter's songs from the emails i didn't send album, and a few of them are in my regular playlist, but I don't listen to them often. I sometimes forget she exists until one of those songs come up in shuffle.

On the other hand, songs by Hazlett, CHPTRS, The Local Train, and more weren't immediate favourites but they grew on me over time and now I absolutely love them. I fairly frequently seek out their playlists, not happy with listening to one of their songs through shuffle here and there.

8:30 pm: I caught up on my Feedly feed! I was so into the blog posts that I didn't notice what songs are playing. I looked up after a long time to realize that a song I didn't like was playing so skipped it. This happens fairly often: I'll be focusing on something else and won't really notice what's playing.

However, I notice enough that, over time, I know the songs that I don't like by heart too. For example, even though I don't like quite a few songs by Hazlett, I know their tunes and words simply because I've forgotten to skip enough times and they've settled in my brain through background listening.

This is why I don't believe that multi-tasking doesn't hurt or that background music doesn't ruin focus. I used to preach it because I didn't see a decrease in my productivity but I now know better. Even if I'm productive, it doesn't mean I'm giving my work full concentration if there's music playing. I give it enough concentration that I forget that I'm listening to music but not enough to not hear the music. There's a part of my brain that's aware of the things other than my work.

It's not necessarily a bad thing. After all, I still work with music and have songs playing most of the time. There's value in noticing things and keeping them in mind, though. It's good to recognize that music isn't harmless all the time and that sometimes working in silence is important or even necessary.

9pm: finished some life admin work, off to have dinner now. Stopped the music.

10pm: night routine time! I try to sleep earlier as I schedule is earlier nowadays. I put on my CHPTRS playlist to listen to as I go through my night routine. This is my default playlist at night because it's the best for winding down. Yes, the playlist is called "My CHPTRS" Can you tell that I'm not good at naming? 😂

I used the This is CHPTRS playlist on Spotify for a really long time, well over a year. When I realized that I loved this artist's songs way too much and that I wasn't going to stop listening to them any time soon, I created a separate playlist. Although there are only a few songs that I dislike (only the instrumentals, actually, I love everything else), I was still spending far too much time skipping them. It made sense to create a separate playlist.

Although I toyed with creating a separate playlist for a good while, I didn't get to it until I realized that the Spotify playlist was missing several songs by the artist. I'm aware that they pick top 50 or so but I didn't realize that all of my beloved songs had multiple versions—each of them amazing. I had to create my own playlist to have all of them in one place. I went through all the albums and meticulously added every non-instrumental to my playlist, and added a simple playlist cover. A scant few CHPTRS songs are in my other playlists, I added them before realizing that I love almost every song.

The major problem with creating a separate playlist is that I miss their new releases, as I mentioned before. It doesn't automatically come up. I have to check whether they have new music out. Surprisingly, I forgot to check in the one year or so since I created the playlist. I checked now (as I'm writing this post, not on Monday) and realized that there are a few new songs out. I also realized that I missed SO MANY songs when I created the playlist because I only looked at albums 🙃 I went through their entire discography and added about 30 more songs now, making the playlist 122 songs long.

I'm 99% percent sure I'll love all of the songs I haven't heard. Even if I don't like them initially, I'm sure I'll grow to love them as I listen to them more. Hence, I have no hesitation in directly adding them to my playlist. If I actually dislike any song after a few weeks of listening, I may remove it. I haven't disliked any non-instrumental song by them yet though, so the changes are slim. I'm excited to listen to new CHPTRS music 🥹

P.S. I'm planning to write a whole post on CHPTRS, it's been on my mind ever since Clo suggested it, so keep an eye out for that! Hopefully I won't procrastinate and will write it soon.

tuesday

Woke up at 7:30 am with blue jean by Hazlett on my mind so I played that first, then Even If It's Lonely before letting the rest of the This is Hazlett playlist play in order, as I got ready for work. When I first heard Even If It's Lonely, I was put off by the dialogue at the end. It took a LONG time for the song to grow on me and now I really like it. I know the entire song by heart and I speak along to the dialogue at the end, including the "byee!" The dialogue doesn't match the song but it's cute.

Fun fact: I don't put this playlist on shuffle because most of the songs that I like are clustered together in order, so I choose the first one and let it play in order instead of skipping a lot during shuffle. I still skip a bit because sometimes other songs are in between but it's manageable.

I love starting my day with music. There's a charm in coming out of sleep with music and getting ready to music. I had a habit of starting my day with songs since over a year but I'm especially loving it nowadays because my schedule is earlier. My previous job started at 11 am so I used to sleep in but now I go in at 9 am, hence I wake up when the sun is still mild and not harsh.

It's nice to open the curtains, open the balcony door to let in fresh air, and play good music in the morning. It starts my day on a good note. I once told my friend that starting the day with music is like starting the day with you in control, so that even if the day goes awry, at least some of it was good. But also starting the day playing music that gives you joy makes the day better.

I usually play music via the iPad in the mornings because I keep my phone and watch for charging. I don't like keeping devices connected to power overnight so I made a habit to plug them in as soon as I wake up in the morning. It's a good thing all of my devices are smoothly connected to my speaker, I can easily play from any of them. It also helps that Spotify syncs across devices and allows control over what's playing in other devices, makes controlling music while I'm moving a piece of cake.

After getting ready and writing morning pages (takes around 45 minutes since I don't have breakfast or coffee at home), I grab my headphones, stop the music on the speaker, and head out the door. Although I have Airpods Pro, I prefer using my Sony xm5 headphones in daily life nowadays. I only use the Airpods if I'm travelling or running, when headphones will be a hassle.

It takes me 10-20 minutes to travel to office in the mornings (depending on the traffic, the weather, and my co-passengers. The latter sometimes make my journey 30 minutes 🫠). I usually listen to music on the way but I was travelling with someone I know this morning so we chatted instead.

8:45 am: dropped my bag at my desk and went to grab breakfast. After picking up what I wanted, I found a seat and put on my headphones. I have breakfast alone most mornings because my team and the one (1) friend I have keep different schedules.

I tried having breakfast without music but I couldn't keep up with it. Mainly because the cafés at the office already have some music playing during meal times and I quite hate their playlist. Most of the time, sad music is playing and usually by artists I've never heard of. I picked up ONE song which is now in my slow playlist as well (WHO AM I by Anella), mostly because I had listened to it in the café so many times that I had the entire song memorized and had it running in my mind. But I hate most of the music. The few times when they've played popular pop music, I was actually delighted because it's a rare occurrence.

Felt like listening to upbeat music while having breakfast so I played my regular playlist on shuffle. Millionaires by The Script plays first.

I loved The Script in my middle and high school days. There was a point when I was obsessed with their songs because of the pain in them. (Just middle/high school things.) The Script was really popular around that time too, a lot of my friends and people online listened to them. Somehow, I forgot about them for the past decade or so.

Recently, I had the tune for For The First Time by The Script randomly in my mind so I played it and eventually played all of my old favourites. I became obsessed with them again and after days of playing them on repeat, I added them to my playlist.

Although it's been many years since I listened to their songs, I remember all of the lyrics. I was surprised, but also not. I get music really easily. If I listen to a song 3-4 times, I have most of it memorised, even if I don't listen actively. I may not remember the song names all the time but I know the lyrics and the tunes.

One day during high school days, I was hanging out with my best friends at the time and they exclaimed over how many songs were in my playlist and asked whether I even know them all. So we decided to do a test. They took my phone and played random songs and had me guess them. I actually didn't get all of the names but I could sing the verses for all of them, very quickly. I'm still like that.

I listened to songs from the regular playlist while having breakfast until a teammate joined me about 15 minutes later. We chatted through breakfast and grabbed a drink on our way to our desks. I got a lemon tea this morning, felt like drinking something hot but I didn't want any milky drinks just yet.

9:45 am: Started work with my cup of lemon tea. Put on my headphones again to get into the zone quicker, there was quite a bit of work to be done. I wasn't in the mood for my slow playlist so I put on My CHPTRS playlist.

I've worked to CHPTRS music so many times my brain is wired to get into focus when I play it on my headphones. It helps that the music sounds amazing on headphones—it feels like I'm enveloped in the music. It's easy to get lost in work, vibing to good music.

Open offices are the norm in the industry nowadays but I hate it quite a bit. I agree that it is great for collaboration but it is not great for individual deep work. In my previous job, I was disturbed a lot by people just because I was on the floor and I worked best when I was at home. (I don't mind helping but not for most of my work day, you know? I didn't get my work done unless I worked extra at home.)

I started using my earbuds/headphones as a way to block off the noise and signal that I'm busy so that it will deter at least the disturbances that aren't urgent. (I also started saying that I'm busy unless it's urgent as soon as people walked up to me. I hated that my desk was in the middle of the floor.)

Now, I'm mostly an individual contributor here and I'm new so it's not like I can help a lot anyway. Hence, I don't have a lot of conversations disturbing my work. Still, I use music to drown out the noise around me. I can't get deep work done without it. I don't mind overhearing discussions between my teammates but discussions among nearby teams are aggravating. Conversations distract me so easily. Noise cancelling headphones/earbuds is a necessity at work.

I disliked open offices already and reading Cal Newport's in-depth analysis on it in Deep Work made me dislike it even more. After reading the book, I'm able to articulate why I'm clingy with my headphones at the office—it's really hard to do good work without them. I'm not the only one too—a few of my teammates almost always wear headphones while working too. The distraction due to the music is still much lesser than all the random distractions that happen on the floor.

10:45 am check-in: Got some work done and went downstairs to get a cup of coffee. I usually wear my headphones while I move around the office if I'm not with anyone. Although I leave my desk and pause work, I don't change the playlist. I don't like sudden transitions and I'll still be thinking about work anyway, despite being on a break. It takes a while for my mind to come out of the focus zone too.

I got my coffee just in time for a meeting at 11 am so I put my headphones down headed off for that. I specifically choose to grab coffee before a meeting if there's one so that I don't break my focus time multiple times.

12:20 pm: I've been back at my desk for a while but I didn't put on my headphones because I was doing light-weight things and looking at what I have to do next. Once I decided what to work on next, I put on headphones again and continued the CHPTRS playlist.

1 pm: I stopped listening to music to discuss something with a teammate and forgot to put it back on. This can happen too. I'm quite good at maintaining a deep work zone and can forget to play music too, if nothing reminds about it. Thankfully the floor is silent at this time so I don't feel the need for it.

2:50 pm: I want to wear headphones now because of all the conversations around me between other teams about things irrelevant to me, it is so distracting. But there's no point in going into focus mode when I'll have to go to a meeting in 10 minutes. Trying to bear it 😓

5 pm check-in: back at my desk but not with music as I won't be here for long. Did I even work today? 🙃

5:30 pm: On my way home. Listening to The Last Time by Taylor Swift and Gary Lightbody. I love this song. Their voices go together so well and I feel like belting out the song myself every time I listen to it. Some people loved the re-recorded Taylor's Version but I hated it. The original is the best. Once that song was done, I switched to my slow playlist on shuffle.

6 pm: I'm home! Switched the output device to my speaker and continued the playlist. There's this really cool feature in Homepod where if you tap your iPhone on it, the music will switch to the other device. I don't use it though, I find it much easier to switch through the options on my phone.

7 pm: I ended up rereading Bride by Ali Hazelwood till now. I really do love that book. It can be cringey but the main character's sass is super fun and I love the found family aspect of it. The book is like a fantasy hug.

I have some work to get done though, so I'll work for a little bit. I try to get enough done in the office so that I don't open the laptop at home but on rare days it doesn't work out so I work extra at home. Decided to work in silence though, so that I can give it my full focus and not work for long.

8 pm: Ended up working for about 45 minutes and then showered. I have clothes to fold and keep inside, there's a mountain of laundry to get through haha. I try to fold in small batches but end up procrastinating. To be honest, folding clothes is a relaxing activity for me so I sometimes intentionally let it pile up 😂

I always listen to music while folding clothes. Sometimes it's with headphones if I'm moving around a lot but usually I play on the speaker. Since my hands are busy while I fold clothes (or during other activities where my hands are occupied), I use voice commands to control the music on the speaker. It's so handy.

I use voice commands to change the volume or control the songs. I sometimes use voice commands to say which song to play as well. Unfortunately it doesn't work well to put on playlists so I have to do that from my phone. I showed my mom how to use it and due to the command, she calls the speaker "Siri". She says "stop Siri, play this song on Siri" 😂 It's helpful that the homepod easily picks up my voice even if I speak fairly low and works if I speak from outside the room too.

If I'm a bit too far away from the speaker, I don't want to speak, or don't have my phone with me, I use my watch to control the music too. It's handy that all of my devices are connected seamlessly. I can even use Siri on my watch to change the music if my hands are busy and I'm somewhere else.

9 pm: I became a bit emotional about half an hour ago and decided to write a newsletter. Playing soft piano music on YouTube as background music while I write. I didn't want to listen to music with words so that it won't take away my attention from the emotions and words in my mind, I wanted to get it down on the newsletter. Chose a playlist which sort of works with my mood too.

I discovered the time of youth YouTube channel recently and have been loving their music. It's not the lofi music I usually listen to but it's nice. They're musical and soothing. The vibes that the title promises are usually delivered too. I initially fell in love with the Isophilia playlist (embedded above) and then started listening to other playlists in the channel.

10 pm: Took a break to have dinner and soon finished the newsletter. I actually paused the music during dinner and forgot to resume it when I was back to writing, my mind was on the newsletter alone. It took a while longer than usual because of the emotions. I rewrote, rephrased, and rearranged a bunch to make the emotions and flow exactly like what's on my mind. It's not polished or revolutionary but I love it. I love how it is full of emotions. Check it out — Games at 9pm?

It's time for the night routine. Will play CHPTRS. I feel like listening to the Chapter Eight album first so I opened that and started with To Say Goodbye.

wednesday

I woke up with Bones Shake by Hazlett in my mind. I don't even like the song and skip it whenever I realize that it's playing. Maybe it's growing on me? Or maybe it now lives in my mind due to all the times I forgot to skip it? I played it first and then moved on to the Hazlett songs that I actually like.

This actually happens fairly often. I'll have a song that I don't listen to often, haven't listened to any time recently, or even a song that I hear only bits of at times but never fully listen to. Once, I woke up with a song on my mind which I don't know, I've danced to in Zumba because the instructor plays it but I don't know which song it is to look it up. I had only the tune but barely any words. I was annoyed that the small bit I knew was playing on loop in my mind and I couldn't look up the song so I had to listen to other music to replace it.

The mind is an interesting thing. I'm confused by the songs it picks quite often because I can't figure out where they came from or why they came up. I'm sure my experience is not unique but it still feels weird that it's my mind and I don't have control over the music I wake up. There's a song playing when I wake up (sometimes in my dreams too) and it doesn't leave until I listen to the song or forcibly drown it out with other songs.

I didn't listen to music in the cab since I was travelling with the person I know again (can I call us friends if we only ever talk in the 10-15 minute car ride whenever we're put together by an algorithm? 😂). I didn't listen to music at breakfast either since I was with my teammates. We discussed music though.

The conversation started with a comment about what was playing on the speakers and went to us discussing our music tastes and why we like the music we like. One of them asked why do we listen to English music when Hindi music is so good. And honestly, that's a valid question.

I listen to a lot of English music but most of them are for background music. Hindi and Tamil music are my weaknesses. It's really hard for me to relegate them to the background because the music is so beautiful. I may listen to CHPTRS and Hazlett a lot but that's because I can play them and easily ignore them. If I listen to any regional song, I will break my concentration to sing or vibe along.

I explained the same thing to him—that I listen mostly as background music and English music is the best for that. Popular pop songs are good if I want to enjoy beats without using my brain. Most English pop songs are so easily understandable and don't have layers of meaning. I can listen to half of Taylor Swift's and Sabrina Carpenter's songs without using any of my brain. I cannot do that with, let's say, The Local Train's songs.

The teammates that I was with were North Indians so they asked me what Hindi music I listen to and I said The Local Train first and they nodded, like yes that's good music. I absolutely love The Local Train's music. They're a Hindi and Urdu rock band and have quite the following despite having released only two albums and 13 songs in total.

I was on a trip with my friends last year when one of them played (all of) The Local Train's songs. It was my first time listening to their music and I liked only Dil Mere. A couple of weeks after the trip I obsessively listened to Dil Mere for a few days. Although the obsession reduced, I still listened to it often and added it to my slow playlist.

Cue to a quick weekend trip with the same people, about a month after the above one, we spent a lot of time driving between places and had the time to listen to a lot of songs. I was playing the music (I'm comfortable in the role at this point and would love to play music any time any where). I played Dil Mere at one point and mentioned that I've been in love with the song ever since they introduced me to it. So of course they requested other songs by The Local Train which are their favourites. And predictably, I loved them too. I didn't when I first heard them but this time, they just clicked.

Dil Mere is actually not their regular kind of music. It's a slow song. Their music is mainly rock, with a lot of drums and a bunch of (low key) screaming with emotion. After the second trip, I listened to the entire This is The Local Train playlist on Spotify on repeat, quickly falling in love with a few of them before slowly loving them all. I don't usually like rock music but maybe it was because I had mostly listened to English rock. I became so obsessed with The Local Train's music that I had a dream where I discussed how good their music is with someone else.

I am planning to write a whole post on CHPTRS already, maybe I can try to write about The Local Train at some point too because I can say a LOT about their 13 songs (so far, very excited for rumoured new music). Until then, let me leave you with a quick few suggestions. I'm not too sure about whether you'll love it as much if you don't understand Hindi because their lyrics are bangers and a big reason why I love the songs, but you can try.

If you're into slower melodious music, listen to Dil Mere. Choo Lo is a banger that I think everyone would love, because it balances all aspects and doesn't lean into rock too much. Khudi is my #1 favourite, I love everything about it. It's proper rock music which somehow delights my ears every time I listen to it.

I spoke earlier about how most of the English music I listen to is as background music. Let me elaborate more on that. I'm not alone in thinking this, I know because I've discussed this with others and have seen similar opinions online from other multilinguals.

English lyrics barely delight me while my regional language's music lyrics often do. The English language has a lot of words. Even if I like the lyrics of songs, it's mainly for emotion and not the words themselves. I don't often listen to a song and think, "what a good word choice for what is being conveyed" or "that's an amazing stanza, I want to hear it again".

Let's pick a popular example: Taylor Swift's songs. She's known for her songwriting and she's written a lot to prove it. I can agree that a few of her songs have good lyrics like would've, could've, should've ("give me back my girlhood it was mine first"). But to mention this song, I actually had to go through my playlist because it didn't come to mind. It didn't leave that much of an impression compared to others.

Although I love CHPTRS's songs, all of them blend together (that's why I use them as background music so much) and their lyrics don't stand out. To be fair, their main focus is instrumentals anyway. I don't think any of Hazlett's lyrics can compare to The Local Train's.

Off the top of my mind, the only English song whose lyrics made such an impression is Mercury by Sleeping At Last. The first time I heard "I am dissonance waiting to be swiftly pulled into tune", I was blown. The lyric, in context with the lines that precede it, is a showstopper. I listened to that part again and again and I like the word dissonance till today because of that lyric. That line lives rent free in my mind, just a second's reach away. I actually haven't heard the song in years but I hum it fairly often.

On the other hand, if you asked me to talk about regional songs whose lyrics I love, I can list many. Kadhal Kan Kattude is probably my favourite. "Aasai mul kutthude, arugil ponaal thaen sottude. Paravaiyai thirindhaval, irugu pol tharaiyile vizhigiren, Iravilum pagalilum thodarum un ninaivilae karaigiren. Kaatru neeyaaga veesa, en dhegam koosa, yedhai naan pesa." (English translation here.) Yes, I wrote the entire stanza. I love it. I sing the song often, just enjoying it. I wish my voice was good enough to belt out the chorus.

Tu Hi Hai Aashiqui duet version's ending stanza. "Poori hai rehguzar, poora hai aasmaan, poori hai zindagi, poora jahaan. Sang tere raasta, sadiyon ka waasta, phir se jeene ki ek tu hi wajah. Tujhme likhi hoon main, tujhse judi hoon main, tu mera rog hai, tu hi dawaa. Tu hi hai aashiqui, tu hi awaaragi, hum mauj, humnasheen ab hoon zinda." I sang this about 4 times while writing the above.

I cannot skip mentioning Yaariyan here. The movie broke my heart and the song breaks my heart every time I listen to it. I have never heard another heartbreaking song about friendship like this. "Marz bhi hai deti, chain bhi hai deti, dard bhi hai deti, jaan bhi hai leti yaariyan." I love both the Yaariyan original and Yaariyan reprise versions. (English translation)

Breathless by Shankar Mahadevan is such a cool song. It's sung in literally one breath. (English translation here.) I spent a few days when I was in school learning the entire song so that I could sing it properly too. The lyrics are beautiful. "Khwaabon ke par jaise aankhon mein ghulne lage, khwaabon ki duniya bhi kitni haseen aur kaise rangeen thi."

Puthiyoru Lokam is a recent favourite. I can't help but close my eyes and give the song all my focus every time it plays. It's a malayalam song but has enough Tamizh lyrics that I understood most of it without looking up the translation. "Malar chendil oro mottum oro swapnam, avayil kaanarakuneethoromoham oro varnnam, aaraaro paaduvathaare, neehaaraardra raagam, ariyaamo piraakkale, inginiyen jeevitham." That's poetry. (English translation.)

I won't lie, it was hard to choose only a few to talk about. It's not just Indian songs too. Sunset by DAVICHI, "nan hangsang i jariyeyo, eogimeobsi chajaol boratbit noeulcheoreom" (English) sounds beautiful. ¡Corre! by Jesse & Joy, "Toma todo lo que quieras pero vete ya, que mis lágrimas jamás te voy a dar, han sido tantas despedidas que en verdad. Dedicarte un verso mas está de más." (English)

Maybe it's just my bias. I find that songs in other languages sound more musical and stick easier in my brain. I can easily sing ¡Corre! entirely any time but I don't really feel like singing or humming English songs. The latter don't sound as nice without the background music but most songs from other languages sound beautiful without any background track.

Both my regular and slow playlists are multi-lingual. Everyone who sees my playlist comments on that first, asking why I do that. It just, works. Maybe because I've always had one giant playlist without separations. I don't often feel like listening to only one language at a time—one artist, yes, but not one language. I prefer a blend of all my languages because that's how I live. Living in South India is a multi-lingual experience.

However, I do think that slow music in every language has its own charm. Like, Tamizh melodies don't sound similar to Hindi ones or Korean ones. Definitely not English too. I could make separate playlist but then their unique charms won't stand out.

It's also interesting how songs from different languages blend together well for a specific mood or melody, and those random connections are found easier through shuffle. I can't think of combinations at the moment but many times during shuffle I've marvelled over two songs that played consecutively and match well.

My playlists probably have about 10 languages but I can't say for certain. I don't mind going for languages that I'm not familiar with but it takes a while for them to grow on me. I can connect to music in familiar languages faster because I understand more of it without looking up translations.

Wow, I wrote a lot. Back to Wednesday's shenanigans!

10 am: Decided to do some personal organization stuff for work which doesn't require a lot of brain so I played the regular playlist to bop to while I do that.

11:20 am: Grabbed coffee, spoke to a teammate about some things. Now headphones on, CHPTRS on, and time to work on a new task.

1 pm: I stopped the music at some point over an hour ago when a teammate asked something and didn't resume it. Now lowkey overhearing a conversation between my teammates because they're talking about how something works.

2:15 pm check-in: back from lunch, time to work! Resumed CHPTRS again.

5 pm: Been in a meeting since 3:30 pm. There was so much discussion and I used a lot of brain. Tired now.

5:30 pm: On my way home. Just resumed whatever was playing, I'm too tired to even open the app to choose something.

6 pm: Reached home but I have some work to do so switched the output device to the speaker and continued the music to work to.

7:20 pm: Finally done with work. What I was working on turned out to be way more complicated than what I expected. CHPTRS is still playing. It's really the best choice for background music, it is soothing and goes with everything. Paused the music now to freshen up though.

10 pm check-in: Didn't listen to music because I was talking to mom. I watched Winx Club season 4 episode 1 while having dinner though, randomly felt like watching it. I used to love Winx Club when I was younger and season 4 is my favourite. The title music is also so cool. I remember the entire song! "WINX, we're back again! Everyday, we're ready to play. Everyday we're liiiving in a fairytale." I played it again while watching because it's so fun.

Time for the night routine, back to the CHPTRS playlist.

thursday

I woke up with Puthiyoru Lokam on my mind, so I played that first this morning and then put the regular playlist on shuffle. I didn't skip any songs while getting ready but I skipped liberally while writing morning pages because some songs are too distracting.

Didn't listen to music on the way to office since I had company again. Put on my headphones on the way to breakfast though, since I didn't find my teammates to have it with. I continued sumedha's playlist. Although I say "continued", I don't start listening from the middle of any song. I either rewind to start from the beginning or skip to the next song. I only listen to songs from the middle if I'm very familiar with them like CHPTRS's songs.

I have a secret: I like singing out loud in pockets of public spaces where I'm alone. For example, I was alone in the elevator on my way back to my desk after breakfast so I sang the song out loud in the elevator. On my commute to my previous job which mostly consisted of walking, I'd sing if there was no one else walking near me. Those are the only times I ever sing in public so it feels good 😂 It's fun and freeing.

My mom's side of the family is filled with singers. My granddad was fairly well known in the area he lived in and my mom's voice is beloved by all her friends. They're carnatic singers, though. My mom tried to teach me when I was younger but I rebelled against it and didn't like it as she does. I don't sing well either, nowhere close to her voice. However, due to that bit of music in my family, music comes easily to me. I'm not bad at singing but I'm not good either—it might be better if I trained throughout my life like my mom.

I wish I could sing well, though. Sometimes, in my head songs feel so easy and beautiful but my voice doesn't make it 🥲 I cannot do high or too low notes. I can sing songs that don't have too much reach but only passably. I have zero confidence to sing without the track accompanying me either.

9:15 am: Back at my desk and starting work. I usually start with basic things like checking my emails etc. which don't need much focus so I keep the regular playlist on. I don't like switching to "focus music" preemptively unless my work requires it.

10:17 am: Working on a fairly complicated task and the regular playlist is distracting. Switched to CHPTRS.

11 am: Stopped the music since I have a meeting now.

I did not listen to music after that for almost the entire day. I worked without music after the meeting before lunch. Working only for 30 minutes after lunch because we had a team outing planned! We went for mystery rooms, laser tag, and bowling before heading to dinner together. It was a fun time.

10:40 pm check-in: Reached home at 10 and freshened up. Now playing CHPTRS while I do my night routine and read a bit before going to sleep. I'm tired 🥱

friday

Woke up at 8 am (later than usual since it's a Friday and to recover from the long day yesterday). Unlike the week so far, I didn't play music while getting ready and writing morning pages. I just didn't feel like it. I wrote in silence. Thankfully the world outside was silent too except for the sounds of nature.

This is actually new for me. For years, I played music any minute I could. After getting the speaker in 2023, I was listening to music all day. It has reduced only this year because I realized that I'm not giving my mind any space to think or be properly bored. I actively worked on not listening to music all day for a few months and I'm in a much better place now. I still listen to music a lot but it's not 100% of the times. I choose silence sometimes too.

I put on my regular playlist on my way to work and the first song that popped up in shuffle was The Great Escape by BOYS LIKE GIRLS. This is so reminiscent of 2000s vibes. It reminds me of the songs we listened to during my teenage years—full of new feelings and angst. I discovered this artist through Hero / Heroine (not sure where I found that song) and eventually added a few of their songs to my playlist. I'd have loved this band during my teenage years.

I listened to music till a teammate joined me during breakfast. I left 15 minutes later though because I had work to get to. Resumed the playlist.

10:30 am: Still listening to sumedha's playlist. Now on my way downstairs to get coffee. It can take around 15 minutes to get coffee at this time because everyone will be at the café for their morning caffeine. I usually keep listening to the music while I wait on the side. The baristas know my name and order at this point so they usually find me in the crowd to signal that my drink is ready, I don't need to have my headphones off to hear my name called 😆

11 am: Okay, time for CHPTRS and some serious work. Fridays are my best days for focus work because less people are the the office and we usually have no meetings on Fridays. I'm able to carve out a good few hours for deep work. I take advantage of it, especially if the rest of my week wasn't great for deep work like this week.

12 pm: Time for a break, my teammates and I are off to play table tennis. I'm usually too deep in my focus zone to notice the time and remember that I need breaks. Thankfully my teammates are fairly good at remembering to take a break around 11 am or 12 pm every day to play a couple of games and they call me as well.

1 pm check-in: I've been back at my desk for about 30 minutes but was working without music. Will probably go for lunch soon.

4 pm check-in: Was lost in my work after lunch, with CHPTRS helping me keep my focus. I got so much done. Listened to music on-and-off since 3 pm though because I was discussing something with my team.

Because my headphones weren't on my ears, I clearly heard the massive thunder that signalled a storm. For a few seconds I wondered whether it was a large building that collapsed nearby because it sounded that scary. Everyone around me, even those who were wearing headphones, looked out the windows with me when the thunder hit. I'm sure that the sound would have broken my focus even through my noise-cancelling headphones, it was that loud.

I put on headphones after a few minutes because the rain was loud enough to break my focus.

4:45 pm: A teammate and I were supposed to go for a Zumba session at 5 pm but the rain was too much so we decided not to. The Zumba class is in the next building and it was raining too much for us to walk 100 metres to the other building. Super disappointed, went to play table tennis instead. After playing a while, we went to have drinks and chat since no one felt like working.

6:30 pm: I had a cab scheduled at this time but it was super delayed due to the rain. Put on my headphones and continued listening to sumedha's playlist while I texted friends and lowkey people watched (there were two people reading books while waiting for their cabs!).

7:00 pm: Still waiting for my cab. Still listening to music and started rereading Bride by Ali Hazelwood on the Kindle app on my phone.

8:30 pm: Finally home. Freshened up and winding down from the day/week by being a bit artsy. I've been slowly working on an illustration of a friend and I for a couple of months. I thought I was done but when I saw the illustration, I wanted to tweak it a bit. I'm going to add shadows and make the layers more prominent. Listening to the slow playlist while I do that.

9:10 pm: I'm done! I can do a few more tweaks but being a perfectionist doesn't help anyone. I'm calling it done. This is my first illustration in about 2 years, I think! At least 1.5 years. It's been nice to draw for no reason instead of drawing for blog posts. I absolutely love this photo of my friend and I so it's been fun to get back into art through it.

I watched Kpop Demon Hunters after that. A few friends raved about it so I finally watched it to understand the hype. I'm not usually a fan of movies because I find that they don't have enough depth, especially compared to books and TV shows. I understand that it's hard to have a lot of depth in 3 hours but I still find it too shallow. So I barely watch movies and didn't expect much from this one either.

Kpop Demon Hunters was too short and while I didn't dislike it, I didn't like it either. I hated the excessive Americanisation of everything, though. Even the characters' accents. It's set in Korea but they spoke with American accents and the girl band's songs were entirely in English. The songs' beats and rhythms were western too. I understand that the movie is targeted towards Americans but I expected more... Korea, I guess. It was present in small ways like the mythical cat etc. but it's made so palatable that viewers can just see it as an American movie but with the Kpop vibe.

Other than the totally English aspect of most of the songs, I didn't like any of them while watching the movie. I understood why Soda Pop is catchy but the lyrics were so shallow. A bunch of lyrics in other songs didn't work as well. My favourite song is Golden.

saturday

Midnight: I didn't want to go to sleep early so am simply chilling with music since it's the weekend. I'm listening to sumedha's playlist on shuffle and the song playing right now is If Today Was Your Last Day by Nickelback. This is a good song, although I often skip it when it comes in the background because the tunes don't match all moods.

Noon: I went to bed late slept a lot of hours 😂 I'm now writing morning pages with some coffee. Writing in silence without music.

4 pm check-in: I've been crocheting for hours with full focus. I tried listening to music while crocheting a few weeks ago but it didn't work well, since crocheting needs more focus and I was forgetting the row/group/stitch I was on. Hence, I usually crochet in silence. In fact, my mind wandered while crocheting a while ago and I stitched incorrectly for half a round 🙃 Had to undo the stitched, find where I was, and continue.

I haven't listened to music at all since I woke up. However, now that the check-in reminder triggered, I realized that I'm humming the Winx Club Season 4 theme song. It's simple enough to hum while crocheting, I guess. I'm pretty sure I've been humming it repeatedly for a while.

5 pm: It's been a lazy day so I decided to work out. I sometimes do simple workouts at home just to exercise and feel better. I played my regular playlist to accompany the workout. Not all the songs work well as a workout soundtrack so I skip songs sometimes. I've found that Ariana Grande's Positions works really well for workouts.

6:30 pm: Took a shower. Continued the regular playlist for background music while I dry my hair and putter around.

7 pm: List a candle and got tea. Stopped the music since I'm going to continue crocheting. I want to finish what I'm making soon.

9 pm check-in: Still no music. I've been sewing parts together since an hour. It's harder than I thought it would be because of the shapes and sizes.

10:15 pm: Took a break to recharge and got back to sewing while chatting with friends on Discord but couldn't do much more. I'm calling it a night now. My brain is a bit friend from all the deep work I did today. I will resume the regular playlist now and day(?)dream.

I got stuck at Tere Vaaste. After listening to it thrice, I went to it's radio on Spotify to listen to similar songs. It looks like I'm in the mood for Hindi dance music. I didn't find any familiar ones so I played Maahi Ve (my go-to Hindi dance song, I love it) and went to its radio. Found good familiar songs there—Tu Meri, Thug Le, Tumse Milke Dil Ka. I've started dancing around and vibing to these songs. Bollywood makes amazing dance music. The last one is actually a song that my friends and I danced to at another friend's sangeet recently. I still remember the dance steps.

Then, I remembered K3G's songs. K3G is the movie Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham, one of my fav Bollywood movies. It has a brilliant set of songs as well, each of them is amazing. So, I went to its playlist and started with Bole Chudiya. Another song from the film, You Are My Soniya, was a part of our sangeet dance too. I played the songs in order, skipping the sad theme song. It's been long since I heard Deewana Hai Dekho and I lowkey fell in love with it again while listening to it.

Here's the thing: I absolutely love these songs but they're not on my playlist. Maahi Ve is one of my all-time favs but I cannot listen to it without wanting to move to it. If I have it on my playlist and it comes on shuffle, I will abandon whatever I'm doing. This is why I don't add some songs that I love to my playlist.

Unless I can listen to the song in background, I don't add it to my playlists. Songs that fit a specific mood aren't added too. Even if I love them. I don't keep a separate playlist for such songs either because it's not often that I purely listen to music without doing something else. Hence, my playlists don't actually contain all the songs that I love. Just the ones that I love and can play in the background while I do other things.

This is also the reason the playlists don't have a lot of Indian music compared to English music. They are English-heavy. I can very easily listen to English songs in the background and not care. But it's surprisingly hard with a lot of Indian songs, especially my childhood favourites. I play those songs when they come to my mind or when I come across them through other radios like above, but I don't keep them in my playlists. It works for me.

11:15 pm check-in: Stopped the music and started reading in silence.

sunday

11:20 am: I woke up a while ago but haven't listened to music yet. I'll put on the regular playlist while I do my laundry now. Deewana hai dekho, here I come. I haven't been able to get the song out of my mind since I listened to it last night.

After listening to the song on repeat for almost an hour (it's almost 6 minutes long so it's actually not too many times), I decided to add it to my regular playlist. I'm not sure if I'll be able to listen to it in the background all the time but I'll try it. If my mind wavers when it comes on in shuffle, I'll remove the song from the playlist.

1 pm check-in: I've been reading for a while, in silence. This is how you know that I've changed, I used to listen to music even when I read books until a few years ago. I didn't like being in silence and had music playing all the time. I'm slowly becoming more accustomed to silence now. Sometimes, my mind plays music (almost as if I'm actually listening to it because I remember entire songs) and/or I hum but it's fine.

5 pm: About to work out, played the regular playlist again. Deewana hai dekho sadly won't work for this. Running by Gaho came first in shuffle, it’s such a good song. It reminds me of the Start-Up drama too, which had this in its soundtrack.

6:30 pm: Freshened up and got tea. Sitting down to blog now. I'm actually starting this post! My friend is working on something too so we're on Discord voice channel together, in silence while we work on our things. I put on my blogging lofi playlist, starting with in my bedroom. We're listening to the youtube video together using the Teleparty Chrome extension—it's quite useful to watch things together virtually. We often watch Kdramas on Netflix together using it.

We started this a long time ago (mainly because of me, I'm used to group study on Discord). It took a while for my reader friends to get used to Discord and find benefit in virtually working together. I tried introducing music but it didn't take so until recently, I'd play music only for myself. A few months ago, I asked this friend if she wants to try music and she said ok. I played a time of youth video and she's been hooked ever since, haha. She listens to time of youth's playlists and is open to my choices for focus time too 😌

After a while, my friend's sister video called her and she forgot to mute herself, so I overheard their conversation and was entertained. As a single child, sibling relationships are interesting and funny to me. The sister, who's away for a few days, asked my friend why she's sitting on "my desk" when the entire house is available to her 😂

7:40 pm check-in: We got quite a bit of work done! My friend left for dinner so I left Discord but continued blogging with lofi. I switched the music to play on speaker instead of headphones and put on isophilia. I usually play the music on a different browser so that it's not on my screen and doesn't entice to watch something else.

8:30 pm: My brain stopped working. I'll stop blogging and the music.

9:50 pm: Night routine with CHPTRS. I should sleep soon, tomorrow's a work day. I also listened to Golden once, it's growing on me.

Note from Sumedha of 2 weeks later: I warmed up to the songs a few days later when they came up in my Spotify suggestions and I decided to give them a shot. Golden was still my favourite but I also warmed up to Your Idol, Free, and What It Sounds Like. Despite listening to them on repeat for a few days, I didn't add them to my playlists because I knew that they're not songs that I'd love for long and I wouldn't want them playing in the background as I worked. Another week later, I don't even think about the songs.

what do you listen to?

And that was my week with music! This was really fun to track and write, it made me realise a lot about my listening trends as well. It made me think about the ways I curate my music and how it's similar or dissimilar to my friends. And to think that I didn't even include everything, because I didn't "discover" new music that I added to my playlists. So I kind of want to do another one of these already, if there's interest 👀 I hope you had fun listening with me!

What music do you listen to? Do you curate your own playlists? How do you curate your music? Do you listen to music actively or passively?