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You Dress Like Your Spotify Wrapped

And you speak in lyrics.

SONGSBREW

Hello You

The music we love isn’t just seeping into our eardrums through headphones. It snakes its way into what you wear, how you speak, and even how you smell (yes, really). While it will always remain a work of art for us to enjoy, it has shaped our lives for years.

And it is now one of the most powerful marketing engines.

Oversized jackets, fishnet gloves, mod haircuts, sad pop girl TikTok captions, and scented candles named after a Frank Ocean song. Throw it back further to lyrics in your MSN name, or scrawling your first name next to your favourite popstar’s second name.

How deep does it go →

26th Avenue Band Rehearsal
Feature Story

You Are Your Playlists (and so we are)

On my free days, I usually explore through New York City to find out the best hole in the wall spots and to meet different people. I always love finding different vinyl stores…even if I don’t have a turn table. Ha!

It’s deep.

Long before marketing teams were paid thousands of dollars to appeal to the masses, rappers wore a jacket once in a photo or a live show, and it sold out immediately after.

Artists were then, and have been since, the most potent form of marketing. Now, they are paid millions to wear Prada dresses, hold bags, and use lip gloss on TikTok.

And feverish fans of the music will buy the products.

Sometimes, it is more subtle than this. Sometimes, you won’t even notice you’ve been influenced until you look down at your New Rock boots, flame arm tattoos, and Tool t-shirt.

No matter how much we like to think we aren’t influenced, we are (or maybe you know you are, and simply don’t care).

Even the choice to NOT buy something because other fans are is acknowledging the influence and taking action in the form of refusal. Even saying “I’d never wear that because it’s too mainstream” is just another way music shaped your taste.

Fragrance, footwear, and the Artist Economy

Taylor Swift; we would be completely ignorant to skip the impact that Taylor Swift has. If she wears it, it sells out; if she puts her name on it, it sells out faster. We covered the Swift Economy previously because the figures are stunning.

Does anyone remember Post Malone wearing Crocs long before he released his collab with the brand? Justin Bieber also wore Crocs, which shifted them from the ugly shoes of the gardener to the ultra-chic (ish) must-haves. Post Malone’s yellow Crocs sold out in ten minutes flat.

BTS’s ‘Artist-Made’ merch collection got so much traffic that they broke their own shop. Bags sold out in five seconds, and pyjamas sold out before you could read the material. Why? These items bring fans closer to the artist.

Sentimental Capitalism.

Every other month, an artist releases a new fragrance, in cute packaging, and while it might not sell out, it will become a scent staple.

We’ve seen a phenomenal increase in artists (Billie Eilish, Beyoncé, Ariana Grande, and so many more) releasing beautiful bottles ready for the shelves of fans and fragrance lovers alike. Britney Spears shaped an entire generation with her perfumes.

A quick scout on Fragplace showed us these gems from Oscar London, too:

Do, Re, Mi, Fa, and Sol are available - not so much an artist, but music as itself.

Influence And/Or Identity?

This is where it gets interesting. These aren’t just products but extensions of an artist’s persona. And when a fan buys them, they’re not just buying a hoodie or a pair of Crocs.

They’re buying belonging.

Think about it. No one’s lining up to buy a random tie-dye sneaker by the thousands on a Tuesday morning. But slap J Balvin’s name on it and suddenly you’re not just wearing colour, you’re making a statement. Same goes for G-Dragon’s Air Force 1s. That paint-chipped swoosh isn’t just a design detail. It’s something other owners and fans will notice.

And it works both ways.

Artists know this. Brands know this. This isn’t really about taste anymore. It’s about identity. The fan becomes the ambassador. The product becomes a piece of the artist’s catalog. And the moment it sells out, it becomes proof: this artist has cultural weight; they can make themselves and those around them big bucks.

They can move units. Fast.

What started as accidental influence, a rapper wearing a jacket, a pop girl using a body mist on camera, is now a fully monetized playbook. Co-signs became collabs. Collabs became campaigns. Today, artists aren’t just musicians. They’re brand ecosystems. And the smart ones? They don’t just sell merch. They sell moments.

Whole narratives are packed into a product drop. And we love it.

It’s why fans will buy something even if they’ll never wear it. It’s why resale markets exist. It’s why a McDonald’s nugget pillow can become a holy grail item (hi, Travis Scott).

We like to pretend we’re above it, that we’re smarter than the system. But we’re not. Influence isn’t subtle anymore; it is a slap in the face. And we turn the other cheek, and ask for one more.

Pre Collab Machine

Before the doomscroll of Instagram, the fast product placements on TikTok, and before YouTube, we still wanted what musicians had. We wanted to dress like them, walk, talk, and act like them (10 points if you know the lyrics, 100 if you rapped in beat).

It was never planned; it naturally happened. We, simple creatures, want to be part of something - it is human nature to want to belong, it is how we survive and enjoy life, with people with whom we have stuff in common. Beatles mop-tops, Ramones and Guns N’ Roses bandanas and ripped jeans, Run DMC with their shell-toes, and anything Madonna wore.

Not a single thing is coming from a partnership pitch deck here. It came from the scene, the streets, from underfunded wardrobes, the do-or-die authenticity that made these acts icons.

If you are waiting for the mention of the anti-establishment, anti-polished, anti-younameit Punks, here it is: punks looked like punks, they had their own semi-uniform with personal twists. But you’d spot them a mile off. You knew one on sight.

We’re talking about a time before rebellion was for sale, before Cardi B x Reebok, and before every artist had a perfume. What people paid money for was simply to look like the artists they loved, without being marketed to.

Artists weren’t influencers yet, not in the way we understand it now. They were idols instead. People didn’t just want to support them. They wanted to be them. So they dressed the part. Bought the shoes. Cut their hair. And in doing so, they created the blueprint for everything we now call “a collab.”

There was no drop strategy. No exclusive promo boxes sent to celebrities.
There was just a look. A photo on a record sleeve. A moment on TV.

And that was enough.

The Era Of Amalgamation

The 80s and the 90s saw the biggest and most impactful shift. Musicians weren’t just on stage or MTV, they were suddenly in the front row, in the campaigns, and on the covers of Vogue.

Think Kate Moss dating rockstars, Courtney Love in Elle and Vanity Fair, ripped tights and smudged lipstick suddenly being called high fashion, and Tupac in Versace. Think Björk on Dazed.

Fashion houses, once reserved for the runway elite, started turning their gaze toward music. And music, with all its edge and influence, began looking back at high-fashion houses.
It was no longer just about influence. A new visual language was in the making. It became impossible to see where a brand ended and the artists began. And that blur trickled down into everything.

Magazine editorials turned into moodboards for high-street retailers. Artist covers became the reference points for entire collections. The fashion and music industries stopped orbiting each other and just collapsed into one. Repeatedly folded, until now you rarely have one without the other.

And now, with a slew of technology, it is faster, louder, and more invasive. Algorithms rule playlists and your timeline. You can purchase what you hear, Google what they wear, and buy it in seconds. And it doesn’t matter if it is an unbranded, no-defining-features item - the internet can find it anyway.

Or you can wear a vintage band tee you’ve thrifted, and like it or not, it is all the same thing.

Because you get influenced, and so do we.

You Look Like Your Spotify Wrapped

Whether you’re in Crocs, cowboy boots, or cherry red Dr. Martens, chances are they weren’t just picked out of nowhere. They were picked by influence. By the album you’ve had on repeat. By the persona you borrowed. By the mood a song made you chase, or a mood that made you chase a song.

The way you dress, speak, move, shop, it’s got fingerprints all over it.
Lyric captions. Tour tees. Lo-fi playlists with beige aesthetics. And, maybe even how you smell.

You talk in lyrics.
You wear moods.
You buy memories.

And all of it tells the world, this is who I am, or at least who you’d like to be seen as. And same, because none of us are immune to it.

So the next time Spotify Wrapped rolls around and tells you who you are in numbers, don’t be surprised if your wardrobe already beat them to it. And you’re mirroring your most-streamed artist.

But honestly, who are we if not the music we love? Because when it’s all said and done, what we wear, post, spray on ourselves, and save to our playlist is just another way of saying, this is me.

Or at least, the version of us the music helped us find.

The Essentials

Your Catch Up

Is new music rubbish?

And, what do we mean by new music?

The Headphone Test

Do yours cut it? Try the playlist.

Worst albums ever

And also, maybe the best ever?

Ovverrated Artists

We lost Kanye fans over this one.

The Playlist Edit 

Music Discovery

This week has been incredible for new music. Here are three of our favorites, and as always, you can check out the full UMG x 1824 playlist below!

Something we heard this week:

“It’s a perfect song that could be played in some cafe, but like I wouldn't open Shazam to find what song that is.

Got us thinking: Is the mark of a good track how far you will go to find it?

Until next time,

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