I've become increasingly fed up with the visual noise of music streaming apps. Recommendations, automatically generated playlists, podcasts, promotional content and endless suggestions for things I might want to listen to. It's not that I don't enjoy discovering new music. But increasingly, it feels like I'm listening to what a streaming service wants me to hear, rather than spending time with my own music collection.
At the weekend, I found myself trying to bring my old iPod Classic back to life. It reminded me just how much I missed curating my own album collection: finding the artwork, organising everything in iTunes, and choosing an album to listen to from beginning to end.
There's something special about that experience. Albums are often written to be heard as a whole, and in order, with songs flowing into one another and telling a story.
And it's not just about the music. Albums can be like a familiar smell: unexpectedly encountering one can take you straight back to a particular time in your life — and the people, places and feelings associated with it. Some albums remind me of entire chapters of my life, not just the songs on them.
So I started thinking: what if there was a music app that put albums right back at the centre of the experience?
I wanted to explore something closer to my old music library, but with the convenience of a modern app. A place where my albums are the starting point, rather than recommendations or playlists.
I explored three simple areas: an album-first home screen, personal collections for grouping albums by periods of life, memories or moments, and an artist view that brings their albums together in one place.
The collections were perhaps the most interesting part. Not just genres or moods, but little time capsules of the music that made up part of my life.
It's a deliberately simple concept. I'm not trying to replace Spotify, reinvent music streaming or recreate the iPod. I just wanted to explore what a quieter, more personal music experience might look like.
Perhaps I just miss my iPod. But I think there's something worth holding on to about choosing an album, putting it on, and letting it take you somewhere.