I think about the app Shazam a lot. In fact, I probably think about Shazam more than most people who work at Shazam think about Shazam. I think Shazam is perhaps the most compelling, fascinating, and beneficial app ever created. I may be slightly exaggerating, but…not really. I’ve Shazamed in stores, restaurants, and fast-casual cafes, between sets at concerts, on the street, in my car while stuck in traffic as somebody in an adjacent vehicle with the windows down was playing a catchy indie pop jam on a summer day, and on the subway when someone was listening to music at concerning decibel levels through their headphones next to me. I once Shazamed a song blaring from a stranger’s electric scooter — a song which I had tried and failed to figure out about a month earlier when I heard it playing at a store in the Berkshires — as I sat outside of a coffee shop in Philadelphia (it was “Daft Pretty Boys” by Bad Suns). I almost screamed aloud in despair at a noisy tapas bar the other night when I thrice attempted (unsuccessfully) to Shazam a great song and it ended, because I’ll likely never find out what it is and I think it could have been a really lovely addition to the soundtrack of my life. I Shazam morning, noon, and night. I Shazam here, there, and everywhere.
Of course, Shazam’s primary function — to identify songs one doesn’t know — is absolutely brilliant, practical, and life-enriching. I still remember the dark days before the apps’s advent, when I ran to the speaker at Great Scott, a now-shuttered Boston rock club, to press my ear against it and then type the lyrics using T9 into my Motorola Razr so I could look them up on my laptop when I got home in order to figure out the tune; “People In Love” by Art Brut remains one of my favorite songs of all time, so my comically complicated effort wasn’t all for naught.
But I’m also interested in Shazam for more…sociological reasons. I frequently and desperately wish that, privacy laws notwithstanding, there was some way to learn about not only my fellow Shazamers, but also the circumstances in which they were Shazaming. The way I see it, Shazam should not only be an app isolated for personal edification, but also a way to connect with people who also likely possess similar musical taste.
I recently discovered that even when not trying to identify a song, you can look up one that you know and see how many people have also Shazamed it. Intriguing from both a qualitative and quantitative perspective, no? So naturally, I set to work looking up some my most favorite obscure songs. “The Slip” by Bona Roba, for example, has 13 Shazams. 13! I demand to know the names of each and every one of the 13 human beings on this planet for whom this song also caught their ears. For me, I know the song because I saw the lead singer Neal competing on the reality show Rockstar: INXS in the summer of 2006 and found out that he had a Brooklyn-based band on the side that made self-proclaimed “dirty white boy rock ‘n roll” (coincidentally, one of my favorite genres). They never really took off and Neal was booted from the show fairly early on. However, I took a real liking to Bona Roba’s debut album, Reach In and Get Her, even once messaging Neal on MySpace to clarify some of the lyrics in the chorus of “The Slip” — to which he responded in short order (“silver spoon and unmarked bottles”) and called me a “wonderful, wonderful woman.”
Anyway, considering that the people who were introduced to the band in the same way I was wouldn’t be using Shazam for their songs, and that the app has been available for iPhone and Android since 2008, where on earth would people have heard it playing? I need answers.
I’m picturing, like, a bartender in Williamsburg who was friends with Neal and still had a copy of the band’s album who decided to take it back out for a spin on a random Saturday afternoon at the bar, and some 20-something hipster patron was like, “WHAT IS THAT MELODY?” and boom, there’s a Shazam. The possibilities are almost endless and I’ll obviously never know, but I sure love to think about it.
But speaking of which, how cool would it be to be able to see where exactly songs were Shazamed and when? It would be a sweeter and slightly less creepy version of that dating app that become moderately popular several years back, Happn, that surfaced people who you crossed paths with who were also on the app. As I’ve mentioned, I love me a meet cute, and it doesn’t get much cuter in 2024 than the idea of two strangers with their phones out, mere feet away from each other in a coffee shop or restaurant or bar, both attempting to unearth the name of same tune. Come on now!
So, to the powers that be at Shazam: consider this my official plea to expand your functionality for romantic music nerds like myself. I already have a new tagline at the ready: Find your new favorite song…and your new favorite person.
I remember the first time my son used Shazam in the car and I was like, "What mad sorcery is this?!" As a teen, I'd have to go into Tower Records and attempt to sing the lyrics I desperately tried to recall to a sales associate (who definitely deserved a raise after that!). :) I love your tagline and think it's a brilliant idea!