According to Spotify, Gen Z has been experiencing “summertime sadness.”
The streaming platform has reported that searches for the term “sad” have skyrocketed among Gen Z users in recent months. In fact, “sad” is now the most-searched term on Spotify globally for Gen Z, compared to the 13th most-searched term for millennials.
Spotify has responded to Gen Z’s demand for sad music by creating new playlists for every sad variation you can think of: “Sad Crying Mix,” “Sad Love Song Mix,” “Sad Rap Mix” and their latest “bummer summer,” just to name a few. The company says that the new playlists are designed to help “normalize feelings and humanity,” and that they include a variety of songs that are “moody” and “soul-filling.”
“When people listen to sad music, only around 25 percent say they actually feel sad,” said Simon McCarthy-Jones, a professor of clinical psychology at Trinity College Dublin. “The remainder experience other, often related emotions, most commonly nostalgia. This feeling of nostalgia can help increase our sense of social connectedness, mitigate feelings of meaningless and reduce anxiety.”
