This year as part of its annual Spotify Wrapped feature, which tracks users’ listening habits, the streaming service included a new feature called “sound towns,” or a geographical location that most closely corresponds with one’s musical taste, at least according to Spotify’s nebulous algorithms. It seems that, at least among listeners of your typical indie/alternative fare, people were disproportionately matched with Burlington, Vermont. The small city, of course, welcomes the attention.

The Washington Post got in touch with John Flanagan, the communications director of Burlington’s arts department, who said he hopes all the attention “will inspire folks of all tastes and interests to come experience the amazing, inclusive arts community we have here.”

“We’re excited but not surprised to see so many listening habits align with the tastes of Burlingtonians,” Flanagan went on. “We’re an eclectic and welcoming city that takes enormous pride in our vibrant arts and music scene.”

Though you might have seen a whole lot of people assigned Burlington as their “sound town,” only 0.6% of Spotify users had the city as their ideal musical destination. Also popular among indie-ish listeners were Berkeley, CA (0.3%) and Cambridge, MA (0.1%) — probably not coincidentally, all three are college towns.

https://twitter.com/Spotify/status/1729912929636561002

In other Spotify Wrapped news, Taylor Swift was the most-streamed global artist in 2023, taking the top spot from Bad Bunny, who held that position for the last three years. As Variety notes, Swift had 26.1 billion streams worldwide. The most-streamed single was Miley Cyrus’ Flowers with 1.6 billion listens.