It's easy to build habits when it comes to media consumption. How can we expand our horizons when we become increasingly content with the same thing? This quandary is one reason why I've enjoyed the emergence of streaming music services. Musical horizon-broadening is frictionless.

So, how do we start? Randomly, of course. I wrote a small script to provide lists of artists from randomly-chosen music genres available on Spotify. The spotipy library was very helpful. Today, I'll delve into the history of a single genre, depending upon what the script tells me to listen to.

That genre is: Merengue!

Peaks. Yes, I know what the difference is. From Tamorlan on Wikimedia Commons.

Spotify tells me I should start with Juan Luis Guerra, so he's first. Then it's Frank Reyes and Antony Santos. After them, it'll be some Toño Rosario and, in an effort to find some historical context, Wilfredo Vargas.

Observations:
How did I feel?
Fairly happy - even the more downtempo songs have a steady pace (which makes sense as this is dance music, after all). It's easy to work with it in the background as I know just enough Spanish to understand the lyrics but not enough to follow the lyrical context. It usually seems to be something about dancing or grandmothers.

What was memorable?
El Baile del Perrito.
Antony Santos - Me Quiero Morir (With that title, I guess it's actually merengue bachata)