20 Years of Listening

20 Years
of Listening

237,690 plays
24,962songs
1,104artists
2,198albums
73playlists

One iTunes library, catalogued from November 8, 2006 to Sep 4, 2026.

Twenty years, added up

641.5 Days

of continuous audio

15,396 hours · 1.76 years

Play count × track length, summed across the library

Spread across the 7,240 days since the first recorded play, that is 32.8 plays a day — every day, for twenty years.

01

Top Artists

Ranked by lifetime plays.

  • 01
    Counting Crows
    3.1% of all plays · 24.8 days · 547 tracks · 40 albums
    Top song — Palisades Park (175)
    7,440
  • 02
    Motion City Soundtrack
    2.9% of all plays · 16.1 days · 120 tracks · 9 albums
    Top song — Last Night (187)
    6,975
  • 03
    Cold War Kids
    2.2% of all plays · 13.1 days · 188 tracks · 21 albums
    Top song — Double Life (130)
    5,162
  • 04
    Third Eye Blind
    2.1% of all plays · 14.0 days · 173 tracks · 14 albums
    Top song — Motorcycle Drive By (181)
    5,072
  • 05
    Jimmy Eat World
    2% of all plays · 13.2 days · 197 tracks · 20 albums
    Top song — Night Drive (120)
    4,677
  • 06The Airborne Toxic Event1.6% · 10.8 days · top: The Graveyard Near the House3,788
  • 07Bleachers1.6% · 9.1 days · top: Hate That You Know Me3,781
  • 08Foster the People1.5% · 9.9 days · top: Call It What You Want3,579
  • 09Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness1.5% · 8.9 days · top: Fire Escape3,506
  • 10Alkaline Trio1.5% · 8.0 days · top: Bleeder3,495
  • 11Pearl Jam1.4% · 9.0 days · top: Sometimes3,306
  • 12Jack's Mannequin1.4% · 8.9 days · top: Dark Blue3,224
  • 13Spoon1.4% · 8.1 days · top: You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb3,206
  • 14Collective Soul1.3% · 8.5 days · top: Compliment3,142
  • 15Blind Pilot1.3% · 8.3 days · top: 3 Rounds and a Sound3,116
  • 16Local Natives1.2% · 8.1 days · top: Cubism Dream2,845
  • 17Red Hot Chili Peppers1.2% · 8.2 days · top: The Getaway2,773
  • 18Manchester Orchestra1.2% · 8.1 days · top: I Can Feel a Hot One2,765
  • 19Twiddle1.1% · 9.9 days · top: Syncopated Healing2,736
  • 20Hot Mulligan1.1% · 5.2 days · top: Dirty Office Bongos2,575
24.8 days

spent listening to Counting Crows.

02

One Man, Four Names

The chart above says Counting Crows is the most played artist in this library. The chart above is wrong.

Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness3,506
+Jack's Mannequin3,224
+Something Corporate1,019
+Andrew McMahon360
= 8,109
plays for one songwriter

More than Counting Crows's 7,440. These are four genuinely different bands, so they stay separate everywhere else on this page — Something Corporate and Jack's Mannequin sound nothing alike. But it is the same person, and taken together nobody else comes close.

Fire Escape by Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness

The most-played song

Fire
Escape

Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness

269×

15 hours of one song

Last played Jun 22, 2026 · Zombies On Broadway · 3:25

03

The Next Nineteen

"Fire Escape" is number one, above. These are songs 02 through 20 by lifetime plays.

Live takes rank separately from studio versions — a different night is a different recording — so the same composition can appear more than once.

  • 02The Graveyard Near the House The Airborne Toxic Event19 hours · last played Mar 31, 2026230
  • 033 Rounds and a Sound Blind Pilot16 hours · last played Aug 5, 2026216
  • 04Last Night Motion City Soundtrack10 hours · last played Jan 7, 2026187
  • 05All At Once The Airborne Toxic Event16 hours · last played Jul 5, 2026184
  • 06Dark Blue Jack's Mannequin13 hours · last played Mar 5, 2026182
  • 07Motorcycle Drive By Third Eye Blind13 hours · last played Jul 25, 2026181
  • 08Young Fathers Typhoon13 hours · last played Jul 25, 2026181
  • 09One Red Thread Blind Pilot13 hours · last played Aug 5, 2026176
  • 10Palisades Park Counting Crows24 hours · last played Aug 5, 2026175
  • 11Oviedo Blind Pilot11 hours · last played Aug 4, 2026169
  • 12Sometimes Pearl Jam8 hours · last played Oct 14, 2024169
  • 13When I Dream of Michelangelo Counting Crows9 hours · last played Aug 5, 2026168
  • 14We Are the Tide Blind Pilot9 hours · last played Aug 13, 2026168
  • 15Possibility Days Counting Crows12 hours · last played Jul 21, 2026168
  • 16St. Robinson in His Cadillac Dream Counting Crows14 hours · last played Aug 5, 2026165
  • 17Go On, Say It Blind Pilot9 hours · last played Aug 5, 2026163
  • 18A-OK Motion City Soundtrack10 hours · last played Dec 5, 2024160
  • 19Holiday From Real Jack's Mannequin8 hours · last played Mar 4, 2026159
  • 20Point of Extinction Motion City Soundtrack7 hours · last played Jan 7, 2026158
04

There Is No Hit Parade

6,932 songs are required to account for 80% of twenty years of listening.

25%
675
songs
50%
2,164
songs
80%
6,932
songs

Cumulative share of all plays

Top 100.8%
Top 251.9%
Top 503.4%
Top 1005.9%
Top 25012.3%
Top 50020.4%
Top 1,00032.2%
Top 2,50053.7%
Top 5,00072.0%
Top 10,00087.9%

The shape of it

Your hundred most-played songs account for 5.9% of everything. A thousand of them still only reach 32.2%.

There is no small set of songs carrying this library. The listening is spread across thousands of them.

05

Top Albums

Plump by Twiddle
01
Plump

Twiddle

1,767plays
28tracks
5.9 dayslistening
02
My Dinosaur Life
Motion City Soundtrack · 12 tracks · 3.5 days
1,479
03
3 Rounds and a Sound
Blind Pilot · 11 tracks · 3.8 days
1,432
04
All At Once
The Airborne Toxic Event · 11 tracks · 3.9 days
1,375
05
Even If It Kills Me
Motion City Soundtrack · 14 tracks · 3.1 days
1,322
06
Everything in Transit
Jack's Mannequin · 12 tracks · 3.8 days
1,317
07
White Lighter
Typhoon · 13 tracks · 3.2 days
1,293
08
Commit This to Memory
Motion City Soundtrack · 13 tracks · 2.8 days
1,215
09
Gone Now
Bleachers · 12 tracks · 2.8 days
1,205
10
Tilt At The Wind No More
Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness · 11 tracks · 3.0 days
1,205
11
Cold War Kids
Cold War Kids · 12 tracks · 2.5 days
1,169
12
Zombies On Broadway
Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness · 11 tracks · 2.9 days
1,159
13
Sacred Hearts Club
Foster the People · 12 tracks · 2.9 days
1,151
14
You'll Be Fine
Hot Mulligan · 11 tracks · 2.3 days
1,141
15
Torches
Foster the People · 11 tracks · 3.2 days
1,130

Played the whole damn thing

Albums of eight tracks or more where every single track has at least five plays — no skipping to the singles.

AlbumArtistTracks PlaysLeast-played track
v2.0GoGo Penguin1029727
Tilt At The Wind No MoreAndrew McMahon in the Wilderness111,20599
Why Would I WatchHot Mulligan1256540
You Deserve LoveWhite Reaper1054846
Agony & IronyAlkaline Trio1230121
TorchesFoster the People111,13086
Mirror MasterYoung the Giant1243630
We Breed ChampionsRoyal Bangs1048539
06

Still in Rotation

54 of the top 200 songs of all time were also played in the final ninety days before this snapshot. Not nostalgia — still working.

Zombies On Broadway
Fire Escape

Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness

269 lifetime plays, and still played Jun 22, 2026

3 Rounds and a Sound
Blind Pilot
216Aug 5, 2026
All At Once
The Airborne Toxic Event
184Jul 5, 2026
Motorcycle Drive By
Third Eye Blind
181Jul 25, 2026
Young Fathers
Typhoon
181Jul 25, 2026
One Red Thread
Blind Pilot
176Aug 5, 2026
Palisades Park
Counting Crows
175Aug 5, 2026
Oviedo
Blind Pilot
169Aug 4, 2026
When I Dream of Michelangelo
Counting Crows
168Aug 5, 2026
We Are the Tide
Blind Pilot
168Aug 13, 2026
Possibility Days
Counting Crows
168Jul 21, 2026

Lifetime favourites played recently — not "most played recently." The export records one last-played date per track, never a frequency.

07

Where Did You Go?

Songs with heavy lifetime play counts that simply stopped being played.

Somewhere Under Wonderland by Counting Crows
John Appleseed’s Lament

Counting Crows

141 lifetime plays

Last heard

2021
Untitled (Love Song)
Counting Crows · 132 plays
2017
Earthquake Driver
Counting Crows · 122 plays
2021
White Light
Twiddle · 112 plays
2021
Getting Old
Hellogoodbye · 110 plays
2020
Cowboys
Counting Crows · 106 plays
2018
Blacking Out the Friction
Death Cab for Cutie · 106 plays
2017
Four Winds
Bright Eyes · 95 plays
2016
Yer Spring
Hey Rosetta! · 93 plays
2021
I Was a Kaleidoscope
Death Cab for Cutie · 90 plays
2017
Hospital
Counting Crows · 89 plays
2017
Last Exit
Pearl Jam · 88 plays
2017
People, Turn Around
Delta Spirit · 88 plays
2020

No claim is made about when those plays happened — only that they did, and that it has been a while.

08

Your Music by Decade

1960s0.9%
1970s2.2%
1980s2.2%
1990s17%
2000s38.6%
2010s31.7%
2020s6.4%

Centre of gravity

2006.0average release year
2007median release year

Weight every song by how often it was played and the library lands almost exactly in 2006.0.

How the library grew

6,913 tracks added in 2006 — the original import
200427
2005152
20071,564
20081,037
20091,337
2010962
20111,403
20121,788
2013975
2014814
2015792
20162,078
2017797
2018529
2019630
2020747
2021471
2022725
2023404
2024366
2025224
2026300

Date Added is a real event, so this is genuine time-series data — it shows how the library grew, not how much was played in any year. 2006 is held out because a single migration would flatten every year after it.

09

What Kind of Music Was It?

iTunes files 72.5% of this library as "Alternative & Punk". That describes nothing. We can do better.

26.3%
Alternative Rock
24.4%
Indie Rock
17.6%
Emo & Pop-Punk
Classic Rock7.9%
Indie Folk & Americana6.8%
Pop3.8%
Grunge & Hard Rock3.5%
Hip-Hop3.5%
Jam1.2%
Singer-Songwriter1%
R&B, Soul & Funk1%
Holiday0.8%
Jazz0.7%
Punk0.5%
Electronic0.5%

A hand-built taxonomy of 17 categories, weighted by plays rather than by track count. 94.4% of all plays are classified from 319 individually curated artists; the remainder falls back to a mapped-down iTunes genre. Album overrides catch artists who genuinely cross categories — a Christmas record does not make someone a holiday act.

10

Deep Cuts

Listening spread thinnest

The figure is each artist's biggest-song share — what fraction of their plays comes from one track. Low is the interesting result.

  • Cage the Elephant2,205 plays spread across 96 different songs2.2%
  • Collective Soul3,142 plays spread across 173 different songs2.4%
  • Counting Crows7,440 plays spread across 382 different songs2.4%
  • Cold War Kids5,162 plays spread across 186 different songs2.5%
  • Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers2,542 plays spread across 212 different songs2.6%
  • Jimmy Eat World4,677 plays spread across 197 different songs2.6%
  • Live909 plays spread across 129 different songs2.6%
  • Motion City Soundtrack6,975 plays spread across 120 different songs2.7%
  • Wilco1,362 plays spread across 141 different songs3.4%
  • Childish Gambino710 plays spread across 140 different songs3.4%

One song carries it

The opposite shape, among artists with 250+ plays. Even here, no one passes 33.9% — the concentration simply is not there.

  • Bright Eyes95 of 280 plays — Four Winds33.9%
  • Andrew McMahon111 of 360 plays — Synesthesia30.8%
  • Mimicking Birds77 of 309 plays — Burning Stars24.9%
  • Wild Sweet Orange70 of 334 plays — Tilt [acoustic]21.0%
  • Band of Horses55 of 266 plays — Laredo20.7%
  • Butch Walker and the Lets Go Out Tonites67 of 324 plays — Hot Girls in Good Moods20.7%

The weird exceptions

Drop the threshold to 100 plays and the specialty catalogues appear — a Christmas single, a one-off collaboration.

  • Bright Eyes, Britt Daniel & SpoonSpent on Rainy Days — 70 of 12356.9%
  • Old 97'sI Don't Know What Christmas Is (But Christmastime Is Here) — 81 of 14356.6%
  • Blind MelonNo Rain — 55 of 10253.9%
  • MidtownYour Love — 60 of 11651.7%
  • The AtarisBoys of Summer — 60 of 12050.0%
11

The Live Archive

Buried inside the library is a second one: 3,343 live and session recordings, most of them bootlegs filed by city and date. 285 songs exist here in more than one performance.

Same song, most nights

  • 01Rain King Counting Crows131 plays across every version21×
  • 02Round Here Counting Crows117 plays across every version19×
  • 03Mr. Jones Counting Crows72 plays across every version16×
  • 04Omaha Counting Crows47 plays across every version15×
  • 05Anna Begins Counting Crows25 plays across every version12×
  • 06A Murder of One Counting Crows28 plays across every version10×
  • 07Sullivan Street Counting Crows23 plays across every version9×
  • 08Ghost Train Counting Crows17 plays across every version8×
  • 09Time and Time Again Counting Crows17 plays across every version8×
  • 10Perfect Blue Buildings Counting Crows18 plays across every version7×
63% of Counting Crows's 547 tracks here are live — 343 recordings across 25 shows
17% of their plays

A collection, more than a rotation.

5.0% of all listening is a live recording. None are merged with their studio versions.

12

What You Said vs. What You Played

502 songs carry five stars and 197 are marked Loved. The play counts tell a different story.

What you said

Five stars, barely played.

  • Bennie and the JetsElton John1
  • Hey Ya!Outkast1
  • MaybelleneChuck Berry1
  • Suffragette CityDavid Bowie1
  • Billie JeanMichael Jackson2
  • RememberTyphoon2
  • Long Time ComingFly Golden Eagle2
  • When My Time Comes [live]Dawes3

A museum of songs you know are great. Bennie and the Jets: played once.

vs.
What you did

Never rated, never Loved, played constantly.

  • All My HeroesBleachers104
  • Don't Stop (Color on the Walls)Foster the People101
  • Built to LastAndrew McMahon in the Wilderness100
  • Last RitesAndrew McMahon in the Wilderness100
  • GoodbyeBleachers86
  • Braindead MegaphoneCold War Kids81
  • When "You're" AroundMotion City Soundtrack78
  • Starring RoleCold War Kids76

The songs that actually got listened to were never given a rating at all.

13

A Few Weird Facts

24.4 hours
Most time on one song
Palisades Park — Counting Crows
175 plays of a single recording.
65×
Highest plays per track
Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness
Every one of their 54 tracks has been played 65 times on average — the deepest commitment to any substantial catalogue here.
38 min
Longest song you actually play
Better Man — Oasis
12 plays of a 38-minute recording.
104 sec
Most played under two minutes
Cold War — The Morning Benders
142 plays. Barely a song, played more than most albums.
1954
Oldest recording still in rotation
Unsquare Dance — The Dave Brubeck Quartet
Recorded 1954, last played 2025-10-01.
1,700
Never played
6.8% of the library
Tracks with no recorded play at all. Imports, duplicates, and records that never quite landed.
14

The Full Record

The complete hundreds, for anyone who wants the whole chart.

About the numbers

Every figure is a lifetime total, counted from an iTunes library export taken Sep 4, 2026 and frozen on that day. The export records cumulative play counts and a single last-played date per track — never a history of individual plays — so nothing here claims when any play happened.

Track means one item in the library. Song means one distinct recording: 25,087 tracks collapse to 24,962 songs, because the same recording on both an album and a compilation is counted once. A live performance is its own recording, so it ranks as its own song — twenty-one nights of "Rain King" are twenty-one recordings of one composition.

Listening time is play count × track length. Album rankings exclude compilations and soundtracks. Artist names differing only by capitalisation are merged. Music videos, unchecked tracks, and 667 plays of standup and spoken word are excluded from the music rankings.