‘TIS THE SEASON TO FACE THE MUSIC.

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When I was a kid in the 90s, there were two ways to mark the countdown to Christmas. The first was the humble chocolate advent calendar. The second was the Coca-Cola ‘Holidays are Coming’ TV advert.

The countdown has changed a bit since then. For one thing, it starts earlier. In late November, the John Lewis advert premiers on our TV and dominates the office chat the following day. “The Fox? Yeah. When it’s jumping. Bawling.”

December arrives, and you open the first door of your not-so-humble advent calendar. Gone are the days of the teeny-tiny chocolate. Brew Dog and Molton Brown are just two of the many brands offering ‘luxury calendars.’ Now, you can countdown to the birth of Jesus with a can of Punk IPA or a teeny bottle of pink peppercorn body butter.

Recently, another tradition has been added. In the first week of December, our Spotify becomes wrapped.

This is when the Swedish music streaming service Spotify presents you with a vibrant, animated PowerPoint presentation about your music habits throughout the year. And this could feel invasive and unnecessary, but we’re too intrigued to care. Tell me, Spotify, who am I?

At the end of the presentation, they offer virtual cards with your five top songs and artists and how many minutes you’ve spent listening to music that year. Some friends happily share their cards on social media, while others keep theirs very quiet.

This is understandable. The music we listen to gives an insight into who we really are. When we want someone to like us, we tend to use the get-out card of, “I listen to a bit of everything.” But our Spotify Wrapped unveils this lie. You didn’t tell me that you were a fan of Take That, Stephen.

Since the dawn of puberty, I have used music to make friends or to try and make someone fall in love with me. (There was a slightly awkward Green Day phase).

I was a classic teenager, constantly blasting music into my ears. Before the iPod came out, I would carry a CD wallet and Walkman everywhere. My parents would comment that I was being antisocial, but I didn’t see it that way.

Bloc Party’s new album, A Weekend in the City, was one of the only things I could talk to boys about. In the classroom, I would often be attached to my friend Meg via a white wire. She had one bud in, I had the other, and she’d show me her latest favourite song. The lyrics were her MSN name for that week.

“Things you say they sound so fake. And make me drink until I ache.“

(10 points if you know the band and the song).

Every school had a LimeWire kid who would burn illegal CDs. That was me. I specifically remember making a CD with Don’t Phunk With My Heart by Black Eyed Peas for one of the older girls. She had cornered me in the hall after assembly and asked me to do it. I was just happy she knew my name.

Liking the right bands was also essential. In my day, everyone was into indie-rock – the craft beer of music genres. The Subways, The Kooks, The Libertines…and these were the bands I told people I listened to. I was less inclined to reveal that I also listened to Avril Lavigne and McFly. And I was aggressively against anyone putting my iPod on shuffle at parties, just in case my full music taste was exposed. But there were times I let it slip….

I was 15 when I had a Christmas house party. My crush was in my room, and things were going great…until he spotted the red album in my CD rack. He made a slight snort sound.

“Why do you have the Ting Ting’s?”

I had to think quickly.

“Oh. My auntie got it for my birthday. Super cringe.”

I’m relieved Spotify Wrapped was not around in my school days because my delicate ego would have been smashed to pieces. Even this year, as a grown-up, I find myself wincing at my Wrapped statistics.

It’s no surprise that Taylor Swift was my most listened-to artist this year. Fine. But I didn’t realise how much I listened to her.

I spent 10,000 minutes listening to Tay Tay this year. I was in the 0.5% of listeners. OH, GOD. I cringed harder than when my crush discovered my Ting Tings album. It got worse. Taylor Swift appeared on my screen in her sparkling leotard. Oh no. She had been dragged away from her busy schedule to film a video message to thank me, a 33-year-old woman, for being one of her top listeners. Even she looked a little uncomfortable doing it, like the prom queen thanking the creep for voting for her.

(Yes, I know she wasn’t actually talking to me…before anyone calls this out).

My top song was I Can Do It With a Broken Heart. It’s a catchy song. It was so catchy that I listened to it 161 times, apparently

🎶 All the pieces of me shattered as the crowd was chanting “More”
I was grinning like I’m winning, I was hitting my marks
‘Cause I can do it with a broken heart (one, two, three, four) 🎶

My second favourite song was THANK HEAVENS, not one of Taylor’s. It was Maggie Rogers. I hadn’t taken much notice of Maggie until I heard ‘So Sick of Dreaming’. …and then I listened to it again and again and again and again….

🎶Oh, ’cause I’m (ooh-whoa)
So sick of dreamin’
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah 🎶

I became so obsessed that I dragged Sausage to Maggie’s gig in Madison Square Garden in October. Sausage didn’t know who she was, and at one point, I looked over and saw her trying to Shazam the song that Maggie was singing live.

Just after Maggie sang ‘Alaska’, Sausage yelled in my ear. “When’s she going to sing that Alaska song?”

It gave me flashbacks to when I went with Hermione and Amy to see Taylor Swift’s Era’s concert.

“What era is this?”

“FOLKLORE!”

They only had large T-shirts left, so now I have a Maggie dress.

I thought my friends had problems. Why don’t they know the eras of Taylor? Or the songs of Maggie? But then Spotify Wrapped came out. And it revealed that I had spent 88,647 minutes listening to music this year. That is two months of my life not talking to people.

So, maybe it’s me who has the problem.