Merging Spotify and iPod Classic into one UI so I can travel back in time for a minute.
Have your permission slip signed before the trip.
I was perusing the Medium Daily Digest and noticed a comprehensive redesign of Spotify’s UI imagined by fellow Bootcamp contributor, Petra, who was inspired to action following a frustrating search for happy music to get through a very noisy morning commute. Upon finishing Petra’s amazing article, I was shocked to find that both Spotify’s current UI and the beautiful redesign that was created were equally new to me.
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Baffled, I took a few moments to reflect and realized that my personal Spotify experience has always been less about listening to complete albums or discovering new music. My time on the app has been more about quick access to the same small collection of curated playlists. In my near decade as a subscriber, I had never taken the time to explore any other parts of the popular music platform.
As a 90s kid, I remember the time when billboards dictated what we all collectively listened to. MTV was still mostly devoted to music videos, VH1 took you Behind The Music, and FM radio was king. Back then, my definition of music was whatever my mom listened to. Driving around Hernando County running errands, she would blast Warm 101.9 FM’s smooth jams as her soundtrack. From the passenger seat of our family car, I was introduced to folk musicians like Carly Simon and Carol King, power ballads from Foreigner and REO Speedwagon, disco tunes by ABBA and Earth, Wind and Fire, and wildly popular country hits from Randy Travis, young Taylor Swift, and Reba McEntire. Music on demand, at the time, meant calling up your local station and begging them to play your favorite song again.
Eventually, CDs became the standard. Long gone were the days of patiently waiting through hours of airtime, hoping that your new favorite song was still in rotation. You no longer needed to perform emergency surgery on the loose, wrinkled ribbon guts of a busted cassette tape with the end of a #2 pencil. I still remember my childhood friend’s brother giving me a demo of his brand-new 6-disc player. He asked me to call out a number from the back of his Soul For Real CD in my hands. With the press of a few buttons, the player whirred and clicked to life. I sat wide-eyed in disbelief as Jase’s, mellifluous voice began to magically reverberate off the room’s walls.
After moving a few times, we eventually landed in New Jersey. The quiet towns we called home had thriving music communities of their own and, living so close to Manhattan, you had the benefit of being in the flight path of most bands on tour. It didn’t take much effort to travel and see them. I discovered KROQ 92.3 FM and WFMU. I bounced around different social circles and was kindly introduced to music from various genres. Some of my friends played instruments and worked hard to gain an audience for their bands. Music floated, in abundance, all around me. There was always pressure to discover new music early and enjoy it in local, intimate settings before bands moved on to larger record labels in the city, evolved their sound into something more produced, and jacked up their ticket prices.
Collecting music was a physical pursuit. Each purchase served as a souvenir from the adventure you went on to get it. Maybe you picked up a handmade EP at a basement show. You might plan a day trip to Princeton Record Exchange or Generation Records to flip through endless rows of used CDs. A musically inclined friend could burn you a copy of something from their collection or you might race to Best Buy on new music Tuesdays, hoping to find the fresh album from that one band on sale for under $10.
Even if you had your finger squarely on the pulse and could slip in early, music was still so expensive. You needed cash to purchase each new album, a Discman (anti-skip or don’t bother) to play said albums, and batteries to keep your Discman alive. I shudder remembering the times you received a low battery warning and realized you forgot to pack an extra set of AAs in your messenger bag. You needed transportation to get to shows and record stores. You needed time to listen to an album, pour over artwork and liner notes, memorize song lyrics, read magazine interviews, and troll Myspace for new bands and indie labels.
Finally, you needed space to house your acquisitions and keep your collection organized. Remember leaving the house with a new album in hand just itching to jam out on the way to work or school only to find, once you’re on the road, that the jewel case you brought is empty or contains some other disc that you thoughtlessly put in its place and promptly forgot about?
And CDs were so incredibly delicate. Remember loaning out an album from some extinct band and, if you ever saw your precious item again, it would be returned to you full of scratches? Then, to add further insult to injury, now every track plays fine except your favorite track, and no amount of anti-skip technology, microfiber cloth rubdowns, or toothpaste facemasks brought it back to its original, unblemished condition.
So, before Spotify, music was a real status symbol. If you owned a large, pristine album collection, possessed a deep knowledge of bands, could talk at length about different genres, complex music theory, obscure chord progressions, had enough life experience to be able to glean some deeper meaning from each album and could poetically explain said meaning to others, you were probably a respected figure in the community. Not to mention if you were also well-traveled and able to impress people with music recommendations from other countries.
Then… the iPod dropped… My digital design professor showed us the commercials and a news segment about its launch during one of our studio classes. I remember sitting slack-jawed, salivating over this beautiful $500 bright white rectangle as it mockingly gleamed on-screen.
At my college, graphic design majors were required to purchase a design laptop before graduation. My father was kind enough to send me a white Macbook. A few days later, the doorbell rang and a deliveryman handed me a small box and asked for my signature. When I opened the package, I found an iPod 4th generation classic staring back at me. I was speechless. When I called to thank him, he said the salesperson mentioned that the iPod was included with any new Macbook purchase. A way to free up inventory for new models, I suppose. Either way, I couldn’t believe my luck.
Now, instead of hauling around my Discman and heavy books of CDs, or fumbling through cracked jewel cases in my car, yearning to hear a certain song on the one album I realized I left at home, I could merge my entire music collection into one never-ending listening experience and select any song, at will, to match my preferred mood.
I spent a lot of time manicuring my digital music library. One of my favorite things to do was spend evenings sitting alone in the dark, my iPod’s cool blue LCD screen keeping me company. With this new device, I noticed I listened to more music and I could quickly recall song titles and their respective track positions on each album. CDs had become something to hold onto long enough to transfer their contents to your iPod. With the introduction of Apple Music years later CDs, for me, slowly faded into obsolescence altogether.
Then, Spotify happened. I was working in the city and eventually made the switch away from music-dedicated devices because I enjoyed being able to commute in with just my keys, wallet, phone, and noise-canceling earbuds. Since then, I have mostly listened to the same music I did in college, spread out over a few playlists. I was older and I was tired. I no longer had the same energy to pursue music the way I did when I was younger.
Spending the past year on the couch recovering from burnout, however, returned me to the times of those evenings in my youth, sitting at home alone in the dark. Even though I could open Spotify on my phone and listen to whatever I wanted, I still deeply missed my old iPod and its little blue screen. I missed the rituals I built around that device, the focus it requested from me, and the escape it provided. I wanted to create a new experience that takes you back to that time but also brings with it something new.
Project goal: Create a concept for a new music listening experience that does not ask you to purchase a separate device or migrate your existing collection to a new service.
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I took to Figma to figure out a realistic way to combine Spotify and vintage iPod into one unique listening experience. The concept flow is simple. Connect your Spotify account. Gain access to your playlists. Enjoy music on your phone like it’s the early 2000s.
I no longer own an iPod so I Googled what my old one used to look like. I studied the menu navigation of classic models from different generations and thought about what items and design details would be most effective to show in this concept.
I took great care to replicate the feeling of a classic iPod screen, selecting VT323 font for its 8-bit qualities. I also added layers to the menu screen and shadows to the elements to give the feeling that your 2023 phone had been magically transformed into a 2002 music device with an authentic LCD.
I decided to briefly interrupt SpotiPod’s vintage-inspired design with the actual Spotify login screen to give listeners a sense of security and trust that their credentials and music data were in legitimate hands.
OK! We’ve got some good vintage design cooking now. But we’re backed with the power of a modern smartphone, so I also thought about what else I might want SpotiPod to do besides play music. I decided that I wanted to include the early 2000s experience of taking old-timey photographs on one of those 2.5-megapixel cameras we all carried with us on our travels.
When you press the camera button in the lower right-hand corner of the UI, the LCD transforms into a camera viewfinder. The home button now serves as a shutter button. The new camera’s controls overlay on top of the previous player’s UI. You can review your captures by pressing the button to the left of the shutter button. Now, your camera view is replaced with a vertically scrolling, filmstrip-style photo gallery roll.
And now for my favorite part, backlight activation! Want to spend a quiet evening pretending you’re back in college and using your free time to listen to music in the dark? No problem! Simply navigate to the backlight option in the main menu. That familiar little blue screen is ready to keep you company during your evening listening session.
Maybe you find yourself in a mood where traditional classics just won’t do. I hear you! It’s 2023 and, with our smartphones, we can do so much more. Simply navigate to the Backlights menu under Settings in the main navigation. Here, you’ll find the ability to further customize listening sessions to your satisfaction.
With SpotiPod, you can program custom backlight colors using your preferred color code. You can also suit your mood intuitively with an RBG color wheel picker.
Your early 2000s style music experience is now hopefully enhanced.
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My first concert was Saves The Day and Thursday at Club Krome In Sayreville, NJ. I heard “Shoulder To The Wheel” for the first time on an emo compilation I got for sale at Hot Topic. I bought Through Being Cool and listened to the entire album on repeat for the better part of a year. One of my first online orders was an issue of AP magazine with the band on the cover.
My friend found out they had an upcoming show near us and surprised me with a ticket. There I was, standing in the bustling crowd of my first concert. Saves The Day finally entered the stage to Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” and quickly played their set. I felt like Knives Chau standing dazed in line, buying merch directly from them after the show.
The next day, I found myself back in my quiet town. The previous night was now a memory. Did all that really happen? Just when I started to feel like I had made the whole thing up, I realized I was wearing their sweatshirt and listening to their new album, Stay What You Are, as confirmation. Then “Freakish” played again and my face became wet with tears. It was an experience that was too much to put into words and all I could do was sit in the dark and listen.
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As you can tell, I’m feeling pretty nostalgic these days but sometimes you find yourself wanting to run back to the past. I still play those old albums to spark old memories as I’m doing mundane things like riding the subway or washing the dishes. When I’d rather forget the days I spent than try to stay afloat in shallow water, it’s amazing to be able to use design to revisit better days and be reminded that sometimes life can be wonderful.
Even though SpotiPod isn’t a real thing (yet?!), I’ll still end this thing with a Spotify playlist I made 3 years ago. It contains some music I listened to in high school and college. If you’re into the same kind of music, hopefully this playlist will serve as a nice field trip back to those times.
That’s it. Thanks for reading.
