It feels surreal that I am writing this article while listening to music. My headset is over my ears, feeding them melodious tunes as my fingers hover around the keyboard to impress the words in my mind onto the screen. My love for music goes way back, and even though I don't have a good singing voice, I never mind singing or humming along when a song I like is being played.
I learned about different kinds of songs through the radio, but self-described music freedom came when I got my first smartphone in my late teens. I started collecting music from friends and shuffling them, choosing the ones I liked and deleting the ones I didn't. This process was slow, but access to music apps brought much greater freedom and access to a plethora of music at my fingertips.
Music has had a profound emotional and mental impact on my life and currently. There is different music for different kinds of emotional feelings; when I feel down, happy, sad, bored, or I need to focus, music has a way of transporting me into a transcendental state.
I have a wide range of music genres that I listen to, from rock to pop to Afrobeats, and sometimes I enjoy listening to music in foreign languages like French and Portuguese, just to mention a few. That is why some of my pals will find my taste in music distinct or weird.
Last year (2024), according to my music app, Boomplay, I listened to about 1210 different songs throughout the year. That shows how large my music library is, and it is ever-growing because I tend to discover new music almost every day or week.
Also last year my most listened-to artists were Enya, Passenger, and The Rolling Stones.
It is no surprise that Enya was my most listened-to artist in the past year. Enya creates melodies with a wide range of instruments, and her voice is so soothing that it helps relieve me from stress and anxiety. Her kind of music is referred to as new-age music.
Passenger is an amazing artist whose music falls under folk rock, indie folk, and indie pop. He usually utilizes acoustic instruments, raw vocals, and emotional lyrics. His lyrics and singing style make his music so profound that I enter an introspective mood while listening to it.
The Rolling Stones are one of the greatest music bands ever. They are most known for their rock genre, even though they occasionally sing other genres.
Since I listened to different kinds of music from a wide range of artists, I feel these artists deserve to be mentioned in no particular order: Beautiful Nubia (a Nigerian musician who sings in Yoruba and English), Abba (a Swedish pop group), Fun (an American pop rock band), Imagine Dragons (an American pop rock band), Ed Sheeran (an English singer), Angelique Kidjo (a Beninese-French singer), and Jon Bellion (an American singer).
I don't have a favourite song; for some time, a song temporarily becomes my favourite song after it gets taken by another song, and the cycle goes on. I have instead a playlist for my favorite songs, and this playlist is exclusive to songs that I find worthy to be on the list.
Currently, I have about 31 songs on the list. But five worthy mentions are "You Can't Always Get What You Want" by The Rolling Stones, "Santé" by Stromae, "I Like It Like That" by Pete Rodriguez, "Like a Rolling Stone" by Bob Dylan, and "Bibia Be Ye Ye" by Ed Sheeran.
Last year my most listened-to was "You Can't Always Get What You Want" by The Rolling Stones. I played it 123 times, and I still don't get tired of it.
Perhaps I can say it is my all-time most listened-to song. The song was released in 1969, but it is evergreen. Anytime I hear the song, especially with my headset, I can't help but get drawn into the harmony of the various instruments used to create the song.
Is it the Bach choir opening, the acoustic guitar + French horn/percussion, the piano and organ interlude, Jagger (The Rolling Stones lead singer) screaming, the conga, or is it the philosophical lyrics that made the song a beauty?
I think it all combined makes "You Can't Always Get What You Want" one of the greatest songs of the 20th century and still counting. I end this piece with a phrase from its lyrics:
"You can't always get what you want.
But if you try sometimes, well, you just might find
You get what you need."
