If you’re a Spotify user, you might have noticed the Behind The Lyrics slideshow that pops up when you’re listening to your favourite tunes. Sometimes you pay attention to them, sometimes you don’t but friends, please take a moment to go through them next time. They’re like sarcastic and slightly rude and also slightly concerning footnotes by a uni student forced to do their weekly readings.
Genius is the music intelligence company who created Behind The Lyrics and they also claim to be the world’s largest collection of song lyrics. The majority of the lyrics and facts are crowd-sourced from around the world which might explain how a few of the below slipped onto Spotify, although someone still must have played a hand in the selecting process. Spotify teamed up with Genius two years ago and gradually introduced Behind The Lyrics to their streaming surface.
Spotify and Genius first introduced the feature by launching it onto the former’s Hip Hop library. From there, it has gradually seeped its way into the majority of Spotify’s endless mainstream music library.
So where all funny a la petty things begin, Twitter is responsible for putting together the portfolio of anonymous-spotify-writer, who for this purpose, I’m going to name Genius… ‘cos well you know.
There are also a heap more of these all over twitter today if you’re feeling particularly salty.
To the footnotes.
So this entire thread is about Drake who this particular Genius seems to hate with a fiery passion.
https://twitter.com/realcaptainmorg/status/982819830016258048
Exhibit A:
Christ almighty.
And this one,
😂😂😂@Spotify @Genius what’s with the attacks on Drake😂 pic.twitter.com/bhoiQ6gdOF
— Kimori (@alexkimori) January 4, 2018
Then these two stand out for their sheer brilliance.
https://twitter.com/_CTierney/status/978343594095513601
https://twitter.com/OscarTollast/status/972790848550309888
Then this… interesting one.
Why is Spotify/Genius telling everyone this? Lmaooo pic.twitter.com/E0a4Gp6Yax
— ⬠ Kayton 🌻 (@kaytontingz) January 26, 2018
The more you know, I suppose.
Taylor Swift was also not immune to Genius’ wrath.
https://twitter.com/levittator31/status/948297686737973248
Kinda cruel and unnecessary, indeed.
https://twitter.com/getawayswift89/status/944163756631822336
Oh, and these ones twitter user Julia Reinstein discovered earlier this week that are truly concerning.
what are these Genius annotations???? I’m screaming pic.twitter.com/IwwrmbLpk4
— julia reinstein 🚡 (@juliareinstein) April 4, 2018
So, Alessia Cara’s song I’m Yours is quite an emotional one which Genius has noted in the first slide.
Slide One: Love isn’t the only thing Alessia Cara finds stressful.
Slide Two: As I’ve gotten older, Christmas has become a stressful holiday.
Slide Three: She might be right to be stressed – more people die on Christmas than other day of the year.
What?
Are these signs for help? I don’t know but it sounds like Genius needs a really long holiday and or a raise.
