The magic number

Three years ago I started compiling a monthly playlist of new and recent tracks I’d been enjoying – an 11 track ‘mixtape’. Originally these were to accompany a newsletter I was writing on LinkedIn (one has now long outlasted the other).

I liked the idea that they were a modern equivalent to a magazine covermount CD and it scratched an itch of wishing I was the editor of Smash Hits! magazine in the 90s, rather than someone trying to raise their profile on the B2B social media platform of choice.

As the latter activity ran its course in that particular format, I already had a few months worth of the playlist. It had become one of the highlights on my month to put together. I’d made similar digital mixtapes sporadically before, but always failed to make it into the series I hoped they’d become from the outset.

In this case, where the mixtape hadn’t been the initial focus, I held less pressure on it in my mind. Lo and behold it grew organically.

I’m grateful that there are a small contingent who keep up with each edition, or have dipped in and out over the past three years. Knowing that I’m making these for someone else and being curious which tracks will land (and for who) has definitely inspired me to continue.

I believe three is a magic number for our endeavours in life, perhaps because of the ‘trilogy’ concept? It gives a feeling of substance and satisfaction. I’ve often been happy to dip out on something I’ve done three times, or for three years and feel that an activity or era is complete.

This all sounds a lot like I’m leading into telling you that I’m calling time on the mixtape. In this case, I’m not, although I am forever looking for the best way to present it to you (with some unease about certain platforms, the owners and their questionable business interests), so there may be changes ahead, but for now it continues as it has, 11 tracks on the 11th of each month. Listen to the latest mixtape here

I’m currently trialing an Apple Music edition. I hope this makes it more accessible to those who subscribe to that service? Please let me know, and if you have suggestions for alternative, more ethical platforms, that would be music to my ears.