[SB #234] Just chill
Hi, I’m Matt, and welcome to Steady Beats. If you like to walk for a better life, and also like Dire Straits’ “Walk of Life,” you just might like this newsletter.
My friend, co-worker, and good-natured occasional antagonist Charlotte Greysolle stopped listening to music when she works out:
Alas, my mind remains weak, Charlotte. It’s a process.
But what kind of music to listen to …
Just chill
Chill music seems extremely popular, and I’m on its relaxed and easy-going bandwagon.
Chill music represents one of our greatest rebrands since the McConaissance.
in the days when cell phones weighed 11 pounds, we called this music Easy Listening. It was on radio stations for the oldest citizens amongst us, buoyed with ads voiced over by Wilford Brimley, who pitched oatmeal and questionable financial products to the geriatric set.
(Henry Winkler would voice these ads today. But I digress.)
Today, Easy Listening has facelifted itself with synthesizers, hand claps, and echo effects, and capped itself off with a cool new name.
Chill music is Easy Listening living its best life.
And I find Chill music to be an ideal compadre for portions of my life journey. Apple Music has curated a bunch of Chill music playlists I use regularly, so here are some use cases and favorite playlists:
Long cardio sessions
Crushing a list of light-to-medium work tasks
Grinding through a challenging and stressful work project
Getting my wife to say, “Ugh, what are you listening to?” while playing Chill music on the Sonos house speakers at any time
All of the above
When the mood hits in a workout, I sometimes turn to my self-created Yacht Rock and Yacht Adjacent or 1980s (now at 1,299 songs) playlists. And the best streaming service of all which no one talks about, SiriusXM, makes its way in with various sports and music channels. But Chill remains the straw that stirs the drink.
What music gets you through your work and workout grind? Or do you run silent?
Thank you for reading.
Let’s keep the Steady Beats going. 💚
If you enjoyed this edition, would you mind giving the heart below a click? If you didn’t enjoy it, tell me where I’m wrong.
P.S. Speaking of Charlotte, she’s looking for a phenomenal freelance designer to help us build slides for Cohort 12 of Write of Passage. Interested?
➡️ Learn more here.
I'm with Charlotte on this one though without judgment for anyone that enjoys music. My runs are sans music. Experiencing the run itself is part of my enjoyment. For treadmill runs i would listen to audio books because it was so tedious. Ultimately both the listening and treadmill went away and I only run outdoors now.
I used to say I couldn’t possibly workout or run without music. Then I started listening to podcasts. Now I listen to nothing most of the time.
Was kind of a natural progression for me… just started enjoying listening to nature and/or my thoughts while working out or running. But the odd time I do throw music on I appreciate it 100x more than when I used to have to play more intense, louder music each workout as my baseline increased continually.