Omnivorous (about music)

I am always hungry. Not for food — though Stanford dining hall hours have tested me — but for sound. For something new in my ears. For the next chorus, the next bass drop, the next voice that sings to me.

My appetite is indiscriminate. I consume music the way some build balanced plates: a little protein, a little comfort, a little sugar, a little spice. If you scrolled through my Spotify, it wouldn’t make sense. But if my taste had flavors, it would break neatly into the five.

1. Sweet: Pop

“Six Feet Under” by The Weeknd has reigned number one on my Spotify Wrapped for three years straight. It’s my lock-in studying song — the equivalent of chugging a Celsius in Green Library and deciding I will finish the problem set no matter what. It’s blasting “Golden” from “KPop Demon Hunters” while eating chicken tenders with friends at TAP. Pop is my sugar rush. It doesn’t ask much of me except to feel good.

2. Sour: Hip-Hop & Rap

Hip-hop is the bite that wakes me up. I play Eminem on my walk to Wallenberg for my 9:30 a.m. PWR class. The same genre carries me back at midnight from CoDa, campus nearly empty, my footsteps syncing with bass lines from Travis Scott’s “Nightcrawler.” In the morning, it sharpens me; at night, it steadies me. Hip-hop is sour in its energy — impossible to ignore, impossible to dilute.

3. Salty: Electronic

Salt tastes like sweat. It’s bass vibrating through your ribs at Phi Psi, that specific frat-house EDM drop that makes strangers frat-flick with each other like they’ve known each other for years. It’s losing yourself in a crowd and not minding that you have. I love electronic music because it is pure sensation. I hope to attend Ultra Music Festival in Miami this year to fully feel that immersion — flashing lights, sound so loud it feels physical, like the music isn’t just in your ears but in your bloodstream.

4. Bitter: Rock & Folk

Producing “Grease!” for Ram’s Head’s Spring Show means “You’re the One That I Want” has been looping in my head for weeks — bright, catchy, almost artificially sweet. But after enough late rehearsals, even the gloss starts to wear down. You begin to hear the nerves under the choreography, the strain beneath the smiles, the quiet pressure of wanting something to be good. That same undercurrent is what pulls me back to “Iris” by Goo Goo Dolls. I heard it in-person at Live Fest — a music festival in my hometown — and the chorus felt raw. Rock and folk don’t hide the ache. They let it sit in your chest a little longer than is comfortable.

5. Umami: Jazz & Classical

Umami is home. I grew up loving jazz — especially Louis Armstrong — because of my dad. “What a Wonderful World” was always being sung somewhere in the house. At Stanford, classical music feels different. Strangely, I don’t listen to it while studying; I listen to it while sitting with friends. There is somehow always an insanely talented pianist in the Cedro lounge — and, honestly, in every dorm. Someone will casually sit down and play something that sounds concert-ready, and the rest of us will keep talking like this is normal. Chopin drifts through conversations about problem sets and weekend plans. My dormmates have made me appreciate classical music as more than just background noise. 

My taste shifts the way my moods do. I use Spotify DJ so I don’t have to choose what comes next. I like surrendering to the algorithm, letting it hand me something I wouldn’t have picked myself. Lately, I’ve been trying to write more album reviews for Arts & Life, so if you see me crossing White Plaza with AirPods in, I’m probably tasting something new — an unfamiliar album, a voice I haven’t heard before.

Because being omnivorous isn’t about liking everything. It’s about refusing to starve yourself of possibility. I am not loyal to one genre because I am not one emotion. I am hungry.

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