Saturdays don’t have to just be for the boys. Have you ever been dragged to a party that you REALLY don’t want to go to, but obliged anyway just because your friend was excited about it? We’ve all been there. Your experience at these parties is purely dependent upon one factor: the music. Sometimes the twenty year old frat boy on aux does not match the right vibe and you’re just awkwardly shuffling along to a really bad remix in a dark basement, all while getting your eyes assaulted by god-awful strobe lights. When he hits the right mark though, it brings the experience to beyond enjoyable. He’s getting everyone hyped up. Everyone’s having a good time. The girls, the gays, the frat guys, and everyone in between! There’s a couple making out in the corner that isn’t paying attention to the music very much, but they’re enjoying it too! You begin to question – does this frat boy have a little fruit in him? (It’s me, spoiler alert: I do!) Whatever it is about him, he’s doing a great job at keeping the party going.

Believe it or not, curating playlists to appeal to wide audiences is truly an art. We live in such a polarized time (in regards to music taste, of course). We section ourselves off into categories of music tastes, therefore making it difficult to get everyone to “turn up” at the same time. A great deal of anxiety was brought upon me when I was told I would be the one making the playlist for our first party this semester, so I knew I could not disappoint. I spent hours upon hours on Spotify going back and forth, adding and deleting songs, listening to clips of each, and debating whether I would like to hear them at a party or not. When looking back at the playlist that I created before the first party, I realized that the majority of the playlist were throwback songs, and I took a long time trying to figure out why. It finally dawned on me that the one thing that we all had in common was a shared sense of nostalgia for music of the 2000s and 2010s. Suddenly, incorporating hours of music from this era made so much more sense, because it allowed me to experience great moments in my life once again.

Nostalgia pulls us together and allows us to remember the music of the childhoods we so dearly hold close to our hearts. Was it really appropriate for us to be dancing to “Moves Like Jagger” by Maroon 5 and Christina Aguilera at age eight? Definitely not, but that song hit like no other. I have vivid memories of getting turnt to that in my living room at three in the afternoon in like 2011. These weird, yet sweet, memories are the ones that we remember when we hear a throwback anthem during a party. Suddenly your dance moves reflect those that were in the music video you tried to make with your cousins on Christmas Eve. Everything is right in the world, and you’re having a good time. Singing these dirty lyrics that we thought nothing of brought us immense joy, and we cannot help but feel this at every party that we go to now. Throwbacks hit extremely hard, and there is no denying that.

A few artists stick out for me in particular when I reminisce on the songs of my childhood. Flo Rida, a surprisingly on topic artist considering he just performed here at AU, comes to mind immediately. “Low,” “Right Round,” “Club Can’t Handle Me,” and “Where Them Girls At” all had a chokehold on me during my childhood. I lose my mind whenever I hear them at a party, and I’ve noticed many others feel the same. Taio Cruz also comes in strong with “Dynamite” and “Break Your Heart.” I could not tell you what Taio Cruz is up to these days, but he rocked my world back in the day for sure. Lastly, Mr. Worldwide himself had an immense impact upon our society and continues to in current times. Searching through my playlist, I have nine songs that have Pitbull in some capacity added. He’s a guaranteed way to make everyone have a good time.

While some of these artists may not be entirely relevant in this day and age, or not have as much relevance or popularity as they used to, it is impossible to deny the impact that nostalgia has on us. We will forever hold these songs in our hearts and our slightly not-so-present minds at these parties. 

Check out “getting fraternal fr” by Jimmy Grebenstein on Spotify for a closer look at the playlist I’m talking about 🙂