Today I reset the play counts on all of  our family iPods after a year of pretty much continual music spinning. I’ve been doing this each December since we got our first iPod in 2007. I used to wait until December 31, but I’ve found that we usually want some fresh mixes through various holiday trips and hectic work season, so now I generally reprogram everything after I complete my Best Albums report in early December.

We have a lot of iPods in use at this point, and since Apple is doing its usual evil empire thing and phasing out gadgets like these in favor of packing everything onto its phone/tablet platforms, I’ve actually nabbed a couple of spares (still in their boxes, safely) so I can keep using the ones I like; old Nanos and Shuffles, mainly:

The most interesting playlist every year, for me, is the automatically-calculated “most played songs” count. Since we synch all of our gadgets to one computer and one iTunes account, this “most played songs” list in our household represent the aggregated play counts from my train commute, my travel time, our car, Marcia’s gym, Marcia’s apartment in Des Moines, and the collaborative family iPod that stays in our Chicago apartment stereo dock and is played by whoever is home at the time.

So the “most played songs” of the year are often unexpected, since they represent the heart of a musical Venn Diagram where our family’s tastes most closely overlap, even though each of us individually may like very different things. We spun about 5,000 songs in 2017 — out of about 12,000 stored on my computer. The list below shows the ones that earned the most frequent listening love in aggregate since December 2016, with “Biological Speculation” by Funkadelic taking the title of Most Played Song in our lives this year. (It is very apt for our current political environment, if you don’t know it).

So as I push the “post” button here, I also push the “reset” button on the iTunes play counts. Kaboom!! It’s a new musical year!! Huttah!!

1. “Biological Speculation” by Funkadelic

2. “Camouflagellant” by Jowe Head and the Demi-Monde

3. “Little Birds” by Guadalcanal Diary

4. “You’re Crossing A River” by Golden Suits

5. “The Night Watch” by King Crimson

6. “You Gave Me The Answer” by Paul McCartney and Wings

7. “Death Is A Star” by The Clash

8. “The Garden” by Einstürzende Neubauten

9. “Book of Saturday” by King Crimson

10. “No Plan” by David Bowie

11. “Angels (feat. Saba)” by Chance The Rapper

12. “That’s The Way Of The World” by Earth, Wind and Fire

13. “Fantasy” by Earth, Wind and Fire

14. “Midnight Cruiser” by Steely Dan

15. “Playing Harp For The Fishes” by Wire

16. “The Mincer” by King Crimson

17. “Háa C” by Moses Hightower

18. “Humble” by The Þorgrímur Jónson Quintet

19. “Garry” by Dean Ween Group

20. “Ástin er Undarleg” by Guðmundur Rúnar

21. “Europa and the Pirate Twins” by Thomas Dolby

22. “Forever and a Day” by Wire

23. “I Went Back To Bed” by The Finks

24. “Early Days” by Paul McCartney

25. “Winchester” by Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians

26. “Doors of Your Heart” by The English Beat

27. “All Night (feat. Knox Fortune)” by Chance The Rapper

28. “If You’re Going To The City” by Mose Allison

29. “Stella Maris” by Einstürzende Neubauten

30. “Merman Blues” by Jowe Head and the Demi-Monde

31. “One Of Our Submarines” by Thomas Dolby

32. “Dirty Work” by Steely Dan

33. “Stutt Skref” by Moses Hightower

34. “Bury Me In Willow” by Asia

35. “Save It For Later” by The English Beat

36. “Night Club” by Mose Allison

37. “Blue Jean” by David Bowie

38. “Killing A Little Time” by David Bowie

39. “Dissidents” by Thomas Dolby

40. “This Time” by Wire