What’s up with Spotify’s Sound Towns?

If it’s possible to ‘win’ Spotify Wrapped, it seems Burlington, Vermont, has emerged victorious. Before the holidays, the 44,000-person town was the subject of much Internet fame, thanks to the music app’s new Sound Town feature. Sound Towns was a new feature this year, likening listeners’ music styles to an entire town, based on how their taste compared to where their favorite artists were most streamed. About 0.6 percent of Spotify subscribers were paired with Burlington, according to Business Insider. That may not sound like a lot, but that encompasses about 3.4 million people—75 times the size of the town’s population.

Perhaps that’s why Burlington received so much more hype than other ‘common’ Sound Towns, which included San Luis Obispo (the most popular town, matched with 0.8 percent of listeners), California; Berkeley, California; and Cambridge, Massachusetts—each of which also paired with about 0.1 to .08 percent of total listeners. But in total, there were 1,300 Sound Towns across the globe, including Jakarta, Indonesia; Cuiabá, Brazil; and York, England. Even half a percent of total listeners is a pretty big share of the pie, since each town would have about 0.07 percent of total listeners if they were distributed evenly among all 1,300 Sound Towns.

Spotify hasn’t revealed how they selected the list of Sound Towns. But they did disclose that users were paired with their Sound Town match based on their top artists and how those artists are streamed in those cities. The app also published sample playlists of the top songs making up the listener profile of a handful of Sound Towns. Burlington’s profile, for example, consists of many songs by Vermonter Noah Kahan, Cruel Summer by Taylor Swift, Flowers by Miley Cyrus, as well as songs by SZA, Lizzy McAlpine, Richy Mitch & The Coal Miners,Ice Spice and PinkPantheress.

After Spotify’s 2023 Wrapped campaign was launched on 29th November and over 3.4 million people were shown Burlington on a map, for a brief moment, the small town was foisted into the collective consciousness of music lovers. Folks on the internet pondered if the Sound Towns campaign would spin into music fests in the towns or concerts featuring their matched music artists. So far, that hasn’t panned out, but Cambridge Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui told NBC News that the ranking was an “awesome way to look at the music that resonates with our community,” and that Cambridge might “incorporate some of these tracks into our next annual citywide dance party!”

So as of right now, Sound Towns don’t seem to be leveraging their newfound Google trending fame to bring in travelers. Spotify hasn’t revealed any behind-the-scenes partnerships with towns, and leaders in those communities seemed to be surprised (albeit pleasantly) by the designation.

But the awareness could also impact tourism in more subtle ways. Burlington and Vermont had such a hot moment on social media that they were the subjects of many memes and Instagram reels jokingly showcasing what life is like inside a Noah Kahan album. As those videos—and others showcasing Sound Towns elsewhere across the globe—make their way around the internet, who knows. Maybe people will get curious enough to book a plane ticket, or for artists to bring their tours to new venues.

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