After a full year of expanding our music taste and discovering new artists, Generation Z teenagers have long awaited the release of the Spotify Wrapped for 2019— and with the end of the year just around the corner— the wait is over. 

For any “boomers” who may not be aware of Spotify Wrapped and why anyone would care, it’s a yearly summary released by Spotify that includes your top artist, top album, number of minutes on the app, and tons more data. And this year is extra special because we have come to the end of the decade, so Spotify also released personal data about our music taste and trends over the last decade. For our generation, music is a major part of our day-to-day lives, and is a form self expression, so getting to sort through data about our listening habits and taste is extremely intriguing to us. 

“I like Spotify Wrapped because it’s cool to see how my music taste and mood changes throughout the year and how I’ve developed over the last few years as well,” Junior and Drake aficionado Bella DiGrande said. 

While many new and alternative landmark albums came out in 2019, the most loved one by Sequoia students across the board was infamous rapper Juice Wrld’s last album, Death Race for Love. As we all know, the 21 year old rapper passed away days after the Wrapped was released which was devastating to his huge following who was committed and dedicated to his music and his story. Although he passed, he left the world with some of the most powerful and meaningful music that our generation listens to. For Juice Wrld, Sequoia teens shared opinions with the rest of the world about his music; this album was the number one album on the Billboard 200 this year. He is gone, but his brilliant and emotional music will live on in our lives and will continue to dominate our Billboard hits and our Spotify Wrapped for years to come. 

After Juice Wrld, Billie Eilish’s album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? is at a close second. Eilish’s album could not be more different from Sequoia’s number one favorite, but it’s a beautiful album that encompasses the story-telling skills, emotion, and extreme talent of this 17 year old artist. In addition to the traction that this album gained on Sequoia’s campus, the music videos that were released from this album were popular and highly watched by Sequoia students. Her music videos are graphic and sometimes hard to watch, but often hard to look away from. The music video for her number one song, Bad Guy, was heavily watched by us teens, and was the third streamed video on YouTube in the U.S. this year. 

Next on Sequoia’s list of most streamed albums comes Lizzo’s groundbreaking album, Cuz I Love You. This album came out April 19 of this year, and rose high up on our lists because of her distinct voice, and her intentions to make “different” the new norm. Many teens confined in Lizzo’s album and listened to it on a personal and relatable level. 

The fourth most loved album for Sequoia students of the year did not come as a surprise to anyone. Ariana Grande’s album Thank U, Next was very high up on not only our playlists, along with most Americans. This was because Grande’s most recent album had a totally different sound than her previous ones which ended up really appealing to her listeners. The music that made up this album had a pop and r & b-like sound, but the words and messages were conveyed in a rapper-like way. “I just want to talk to my fans and sing and write music and drop it the way these [rappers] do,” Grande said in an interview with Stereo Gum. Grande certainly achieved this goal, and has left listeners anxious and excited for her next masterpiece. 

The next favorited album that Sequoia students agreed upon was Post Malone’s album Hollywood’s Bleeding. After the release of his previous certified platinum album, Beerbongs & Bentleys, which was released on April 27, 2018, Malone attracted a much larger and diverse following. This more recent album featured some similar sounds from old albums that fans knew and loved, but also included some new, fresh material that his listeners grew to know and love. Malone is loved greatly for his music, but many people keep coming back to his Spotify and YouTube profile for his extremely chill and relaxed personality. Malone doesn’t look nor act how he sounds, and it’s become a form of entertainment for his followers. 

While these big names released entire albums that Sequoia students fell in love with, there were tons of other specific artists who were high up on the list, too. Billie Eilish and Juice Wrld frequently came up for top artists, also followed by Travis Scott, Logic, Kendrick Lamar, Trippie Redd, Miley Cyrus, AJR, and Drake. 

And finally, Sequoia students spent a wide range of time on Spotify during the year; I must say, it was pretty entertaining to look through the data responses that displayed this wide range. Some students only listened to Spotify music for a few hundred minutes of the year, and spent the rest of their time doing some other unknown activities. And on the other side of the spectrum, some students spend a few hundred thousand minutes streaming music on Spotify. And to those students: I praise you. Listening to 250,000 minutes of music is no easy task. The rough average amount of time spent streaming music on Spotify for Sequoia students in the year 2019, however, was 75,500 minutes. 

After a year of new groundbreaking music from our most favorite artists, we can conclude that it was an incredible year of music for our generation. The albums listed above quickly became our favorites throughout the year, and will be kept close to our hearts throughout our futures. As 2019 has come to a close and the new decade is upon us, we all look forward to the amazing music that awaits in our futures, and especially for the Spotify Wrapped of 2020, of course.