Just Push Play: Your Life Radio

Listening, singing, dancing, imagining: How music just makes life better

Photo by Paweł Czerwiński on Unsplash

A few years ago, I created a Spotify playlist called Ddubs Life Radio. Ddubs is me, in case you were wondering, and funnily enough, it’s a nickname a friend in college gave me right around the time he made me an amazing mixtape I still remember to this day. Packed with tunes ranging from Disney hits to French rap, Broadway musicals to punk rock, angsty emo to breakup ballads, Ddubs Life Radio was to serve as a musical timeline of my life. It has had many uses since its creation: inspiration for karaoke, mood booster after a bad day, familiar comfort in moments of anxiety. There’s something both special and reassuring about knowing every lyric, bridge, and guitar solo that’s about to play. 

Come to me now / Lay your hands over me / Even if it's a lie / Say it will be alright / And I shall believe

— “I Shall Believe,” Sheryl Crow

This is not just a personal point of view. Music has been around for tens of thousands of years — the oldest musical instrument is 40,000 years old! — and it’s present in all human cultures. There are hundreds of articles and studies out there praising the properties music has for both body and soul. Music has been shown to help reduce symptoms of dementia, depression, and stroke patients.

I listened to a fascinating talk last year by Professor Shihab Shamma on how actively imagining a song can create near-identical brain waves to performing it out loud — that makes me feel a whole lot better about all those times my brother told me to “sing in your head!” when I got carried away on road trips.

This brings me to the benefits of singing. I took my first proper singing lesson last December, and the best way I can describe my feeling afterwards is being high on life. Don’t just take my word for it: there are specialised musical programs devoted to singing as a therapeutic practice. I’ll list a few references and studies at the end of this article, if you want to find out more.  

I got chills. / They're multiplyin' / And I'm losin' control / 'Cause the power / You're supplyin' / It's electrifyin'!

— “You’re The One That I Want,” John Travolta & Olivia Newton-John, Grease

I don’t think I realised exactly how much music affected my wellbeing until we went into lockdown. Not being able to travel to see my family, missing out on concerts and musicals, skipping dinner parties with friends — these are just a few of the things that really got me down.

Thank goodness for Ddubs Life Radio. When I hear Train’s “Drops of Jupiter,” I’m suddenly in a Changi Airport waiting room, on my way to see my Mum in Australia. When “Last Resort” by Papa Roach comes up, I’m locked in my teenage bedroom, screaming my pent up angst out. Cue The Offspring’s “Pretty Fly” and I’m jumping up and down swinging my arms in pure dance-like-nobody’s-watching glee. When the opening of South Pacific’s “One Enchanted Evening” starts, I’m emotionally reliving my wedding dance. Suddenly, it’s Crazytown’s “Butterfly” and I’m in junior high chatting on the phone all night with my best friend. I could go on… there’s a memory for each song, and if I close my eyes, it’s like traveling through all of my most character-shaping moments. 

But tell me, did the wind sweep you off your feet? / Did you finally get the chance / To dance along the light of day / And head back to the Milky Way?

— “Drops of Jupiter,” Train

This year, I started a new tradition of listening to Ddubs Life Radio while cooking dinner. It’s the perfect music to sing to without being too distracting, and it has made a routine, domestic chore (I am not a natural cook and it’s not my favourite thing to do) one of the most fun and light-hearted moments of the day. I blast it loud and let it take me on a mental voyage through happy times, emotional milestones, and carefree bliss. I sing at the top of my lungs and dance my stresses away, for just one hour every day. 

River running free / You know how I feel / Blossom on a tree / You know how I feel

— “Feeling Good,” Nina Simone

Listening, singing, dancing, imagining. Music brings me so much emotion, physical release and happiness — yes, actual happiness! — I don’t know what I would do without it. If you’ve seen me at a karaoke night, or learning bachata with my partner, or watching a musical of any kind, you know it’s my ideal date. I wish for everyone to feel that kind of insouciant ease when it’s most needed, especially now.

So here’s my challenge for you: take some time and create your own Life Radio. Start with the first tunes you can think of, and keep adding them as you remember them. Most streaming services have great recommendation algorithms to help you on your journey through time, and if anything, it’s a nice time capsule for future reference. 

Wait for it, wait for it / I am the one thing in life I can control / Wait for it, wait for it / I am inimitable, I am an original

— “Wait For It,” Leslie Odom Jr., Original Broadway Cast of Hamilton

If you want some inspiration and grew up in the 90s-00s, you can listen to mine here. No heckling, though. 😉

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Recommended reading & additional resources 

Just a few interesting things I’ve come across on the topic. This is by no means an exhaustive list on the subject, and I’d love to get other recommendations if you have any! 

• Brown, S. and Jordania, J. (2013). ‘Universals in the world’s musics’, Psychology of Music, 41(2), pp. 229–248. doi: 10.1177/0305735611425896.

• Blood, A. and Zatorre, R., (2001). Intensely pleasurable responses to music correlate with activity in brain regions implicated in reward and emotion. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 98(20), pp.11818-11823.

• Psychology Today, (2017). Music Is Good For The Soul, And Your Health. [online]

• Harvard Health Publishing, (2011). Music And Health - Harvard Health. [online] 

• Stephanie Martin, Christian Mikutta, Matthew K Leonard, Dylan Hungate, Stefan Koelsch, Shihab Shamma, Edward F Chang, José del R Millán, Robert T Knight, Brian N Pasley, (2018). Neural Encoding of Auditory Features during Music Perception and Imagery, Cerebral Cortex, Volume 28, Issue 12, December 2018, Pages 4222–4233

• Koelsch, S. (2014). Brain correlates of music-evoked emotions. Nat Rev Neurosci 15, 170–180. 

• Di Liberto, Giovanni & Pelofi, Claire & Bianco, Roberta & Patel, Prachi & Mehta, Ashesh & Herrero, Jose & Cheveigné, Alain & Shamma, Shihab & Mesgarani, Nima. (2020). Cortical encoding of melodic expectations in human temporal cortex. eLife. 9. 10.7554/eLife.51784.