For a while, the “name that tune” game Heardle wasn’t just a music trivia phenomenon, but a pretty good gauge of how well-remembered songs were thanks to metrics supplied by the game’s creator. After the game was sold to Spotify, that information was no longer shared, and Spotify’s clues became more obscure, and more obviously geared toward a younger crowd. Now, Spotify is closing Heardle and veteran programmer Guy Zapoleon takes a look at why.
The demise of the music-trivia game Heardle is the sad tale of how important it is to have experienced people who understand music, the channel they are working on, and the audience. Like radio programmers, they must know how to read music data, to assist them in curating the perfect playlist every quarter-hour of every day to reach a mass-appeal audience.
Originally launched by a UK web designer who called himself Nigel Heardle, the app challenged users to “name that tune” with five chances to guess a song intro. When Heardle launched in February 2022, taking advantage of the excitement around Wordle, it was mostly hit after hit from the past five decades, with the occasional wild card thrown in. From time to time, there would be a song that was a bigger hit in the rest of the world, reflecting the British POV. Spotify purchased Heardle last July 12.
One sign that Heardle was becoming extremely popular was when I saw five answers out of the week’s seven appearing on Shazam’s June 13 chart, a month before Spotify’s purchase. If every song was not a hit, there were enough hits to keep the average user attempting a guess.
Here’s the week’s worth of Heardles, and which ones made the Shazam chart that week:
June 6: “Oh, Pretty Woman” by Roy Orbison (no)
June 7: “When Doves Cry” by Prince (yes)
June 8: “Sweet Disposition” by the Temper Trap (yes)
June 9: “C.R.E.A.M.” by Wu-Tang Clan (yes)
June 10: “Best of My Love” by the Emotions (yes)
June 11: “How Deep Is Your Love” by Calvin Harris (yes)
June 12: “Time of Your Life” by Green Day (no)
Something happened shortly after Spotify’s purchase. Was it a new curator? Misleading research? Most likely it was a directive to expand the app’s appeal with a younger audience. Suddenly, you could go almost an entire week without a hit song from any decade. Songs such as the Temper Trap or Wu-Tang Clan weren’t across-the-board radio hits, but they were generational anthems. Now, the clues were regularly more obscure. Only a very small percentage of the big all-ages audience Spotify had acquired knew them.
By September, the Heardle clues were being Shazamed less often, even when they were hits. By the week of Sept. 22, only the oldest song and biggest hit was actually searched for on Shazam:
Sept. 16: “Ivy” by Frank Ocean (no)
Sept. 17, “Never Seen the Rain” by Tones and I (no)
Sept. 18: “Speechless” by Dan + Shay (no)
Sept. 19: “Play Date” by Melanie Martinez (no)
Sept. 20: “Listen to the Music” by the Doobie Brothers (yes)
Sept. 21: “Mine” by Bazzi (no)
Sept. 22: “Come as You Are” by Nirvana (no)
By October, songs older than 1990 were disappearing. By the week of October 1, none of the following were Shazamed.
- “Shimmy Shimmy Ya” by Ol’ Dirty Bastard
- “Close” by Nick Jonas & Tove Lo
- “Holiday” by Green Day
- “No Type” by Rae Sremmurd
- “Never Be Like You” by Flume
- “It Wasn’t Me” by Shaggy
- “Linger” by the Cranberries
(Editor’s note: Six out of seven of these were radio records, but notice how many of them are familiar primarily to today’s smaller audience for contemporary music at radio.)
In November, the clues became even more obscure:
Oct. 31: “Freaks” by Surf Curses (yes)
Nov. 1: “Last Nite” by the Strokes (no)
Nov. 2: “Pink + White” by Frank Ocean (yes)
Nov. 3: “Attention” by Charlie Puth (no)
Nov. 4: “I’ll Be There” by Jess Glynne (no)
Nov. 5: “Cry Me a River” by Justin Timberlake (no)
Nov. 6: “First Day Out” by Tee Grizzley (no)
By January, the clues were much more mass-appeal again, but after five months, the lack of Shazams suggests that the mass audience was gone. None of these were among the most-Shazammed songs that week:
- Trammps, “Disco Inferno”
- Haley Steinfeld, “Starving”
- Sam Smith, “I’m Not the Only One”
- Capital Cities, “Safe and Sound”
- Imagine Dragons, “Natural”
- Vanessa Carlton, “A Thousand Miles”
- Neil Diamond, “Sweet Caroline”
In the final week, there is only one clue among the top Shazams, Sia’s “Unstoppable.” The others were:
- P. Diddy, Usher, and Loon, “I Need a Girl (Pt. 1)”
- Oasis, “Wonderwall”
- Jordin Sparks, “Tattoo”
- Alice in Chains, “Man in the Box”
- Khalid, “8teen”
- Cage the Elephant, “Cigarette Daydream”
Heardle’s users stopped playing the game because of the initial changes. By the time the clues changed again, they were no longer engaged. It’s why Spotify’s major channels, SiriusXM, and broadcast radio all have professional curators working on the most important stations and channels. Algorithms and AI tools don’t replace the moment-to-moment instincts required for curating the most perfect playlist for the broadest possible audience.
When Reis & Trout’s released their Immutable Laws of Marketing many years ago, I added rule No. 23: “Know your audience and deliver to their expectations to help maintain your audience.” Find out what they like best about your channel/radio station and give that to them 24/7. If you throw in something for variety, do it only occasionally, not all the time. Otherwise, they will leave and not come back, and you will suffer the deadly fate of Heardle.
Personally, the loss of Heardle is very sad. It was originally a lot of fun to play, but it’s certainly a cautionary tale for creating the best playlists or apps. It’s also a reminder of the distance between a curator’s frame of reference and that of the audience — especially when it comes to today’s music.
Thanks to my friend (and friend of ROR) Ed Gursky for alerting me to the cancellation.
This story first appeared on radioinsight.com