Editor's Note, 11/21

I started bartending at the Loop this semester, and as a result I’m on a quest to create the perfect playlist for my shifts. I’ve composed all kinds of playlists for myself and others—playlists of songs for studying, for long drives, for heartbreak, for pregaming, et cetera. And now I feel the need to create a new kind of playlist: a playlist for the Loop Bar. I’ve wanted to make this playlist for a few weeks now, and I haven’t progressed too much. For the time being, we bartenders have relied on Spotify radio stations, which have been less than perfect. Therefore, our alternative is to curate a set of songs that more accurately captures the mood that we envision for this space in which our friends and fellow students congregate. In an ideal world, this probably means we would have multiple playlists tailored to a variety of conditions, but also in an ideal world, I would be acing all of my classes and getting nine hours of sleep every night.

Playlists can be tricky, especially when there isn’t a substantial amount of thought that goes into making them. Depending on the purpose of a playlist, the choice to put certain songs on it can evoke specific memories or emotions, and ultimately the playlist is responsible for setting the mood. When a playlist doesn’t achieve what it sets out to do or is just bad, it is uncomfortable and embarrassing.

A friend and I once took an impromptu bus trip to the north of Morocco, and seeing as her iPhone had just been stolen, I was left with the task of making an On-The-Go playlist on my 5th generation iPod. It was not the easiest thing to do; fielding through 30 GB of music with a click wheel gets pretty tedious. The end product was a hodgepodge of whatever struck my fancy. While there was no real thought or reason to making it in my mind, after about two hours of sitting on the bus and sharing headphones my friend told me she was sick of listening to my “dark fairy music.” I handed the iPod to her and let her make her own On-The-Go playlist, adding so many of the songs from my library that I had just passed over with the click wheel.

Normally I might be horrified or embarrassed to know that one of my playlists didn’t impress someone I like. You can imagine how terrifying it is to give a mix to a crush and then suffer through the paralyzing anxiety of awaiting their feedback. Not quite the same context as creating a bar playlist, but in a sense I am so terrified by the pressure of creating a playlist that should please everyone that I can’t bring myself to start.

On that bus in Morocco, I hadn’t really considered how to construct an experience for the both of us with whatever weird playlist I made. I also completely neglected the fact that the hash from the day before was not helping my friend see the world in the happiest light at that moment in time. Playlist creation is a test of emotional intelligence: do you understand how people feel or what they want to feel? And how do you help construct the appropriate experience through music? I don't want to listen to Bon Iver at a pregame. If I’m not at Ultra, please do not make me listen to dubstep.

True, drunk students at a bar probably aren’t the hardest to please in terms of music: throw on some Top 40, Disney, HAIM (you know who you are), and we’re probably good to go. But obviously I find playlist-making to be an art form, and a piece of art, let alone a playlist, is never really finished in my eyes. It’s a curse. And I refuse to crowdsource this one, either. By no means am I a qualified music snob, but again, I am looking for more sophistication than the tipsy masses would suggest.

This Loop Bar playlist will be the perfect soundtrack to my senior year of bartending, to win after win by Duke Athletics, to the commiseration among those who have no idea what they’re doing after graduation and to the elation among those over-21 underclassmen who look forward to their remaining time at Duke. If only I could start it.