Sunday, January 01, 2023

Let's look back at it all, shall we

Hello, 2023! Welcome. So glad you're here. Let's get to the stats, stat.

 

 

Top 30 Plays in 2022

  • LP, “One Last Time”
  • Shakira, “Whenever, Wherever”
  • ABBA, “Chiquitita”
  • Kate Bush, “Burning Bridge”
  • Prince and the Revolution, “I Wonder U”
  • Tears for Fears, “Mad World”
  • Air Supply, “Sweet Dreams”
  • Pitbull feat. Anthony Watts & DJWS, “I Feel Good”
  • Lil Jon, “Work”
  • Holy Boy, “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine (Anymore)”
  • Tina Turner, “The Best”
  • Dee Gees, “Shadow Dancing”
  • Florence and the Machine, “Free”
  • Hadise, “Dum Tek Tek”
  • Prince, “1000 X’s & O’s”
  • ABBA, “Take a Chance on Me”
  • Andy Gibb, “An Everlasting Love”
  • The Doobie Brothers, “Long Train Runnin’”
  • OMD, “If You Leave”
  • Jennifer Lopez, “Papi”
  • Florence and the Machine, “Dog Days Are Over”
  • George Michael and Aretha Franklin, “I Knew You Were Waiting”
  • Jorge Luis Chacin, “Sueltala (J. Verner Total Dance RWK)”
  • Cat Stevens, “Peace Train”
  • Max Richter, “Summer 3 (2012)”
  • Billie Eilish, “everything i wanted”
  • Janelle MonĂ¡e, “Dance Apocalyptic”
  • Jim Croce, “I Got a Name”
  • Rosanne Cash, “Blue Moon with Heartache”
  • Simon & Garfunkel, “The Boxer”

 

Plus one: Regina Spektor, “Loveology,” which didn’t actually make the cut but almost certainly would have done if I’d bought the album when it first came out.

 

Once again this year, I listened overall to complete albums more than to random tracks. My most-played album was Florence and the Machine's Dance Fever, which is brilliant! It's the next thing I'll play today. Other top plays include LP's Churches and Prince's HITnRUN Phase One, which is currently my go-to album for difficult days. At present I'm listening extensively to Regina Spektor's new one, Home, before and after, and various albums by Max Richter. Looking to fill some gaps in my collection with gift certificates I received in the last couple of weeks, too!

 

According to last year's post, one year ago today I had approximately 22,450 tracks in my iTunes library. Today that figure is approximately 26,200. So, a substantial change — and I was able to listen to most of those tracks (roughly 83%) despite many problems with iTunes. 

 

What were you listening to this year? If there's something great that I missed, let me know!

 

 

Reading in 2022

Well, unsurprisingly, like many people, I found that my attention did not bounce back in 2022 — particularly after the nasty surprise of shifting back to online teaching in Winter 2022 — so my reading stats look somewhat dismal. I'm genuinely surprised that I finished 100 books. Most of what I read was genre and gentle, but there were a few standouts:

  • Ryka Aoki, Light from Uncommon Stars
  • Richard Osman, The Thursday Murder Club and sequels
  • T.L. Huchu, The Library of the Dead

 

My year-end total was 115 books. Of these, 83 were by female-identified authors, 27 were by male-identified authors (bizarrely, a substantial chunk of them in December), and 5 were by nonbinary authors or multiple authors. I plan to continue to read the work of Ben Aaronovitch, Iona Wishaw, and Guy Gavriel Kay in the new year — and will hope for another volume in the Thursday Murder Club series.

 

What tickled your fancy this year? Let me know!

 

 

In other textual news...

For us, the pandemic was not over in 2022, so we did very little of what we might have done in the Before Time. We did see one play at the beginning of December, and went to one small live-music event at the end of November; we also went to a book launch in Victoria in May, and I attended a few others early in the fall. We saw no movies in theatres but did watch a few on streaming services, including Knives Out and Glass Onion.  We continue to consume mostly comedy — it's about all my brain is prepared for these days.

 

So once again, here's to the new year. Not to pressure anyone or anything, but I'm hoping it's better than the last few...