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A quick Spotify trick: see all of the songs that got away

A quick Spotify trick: see all of the songs that got away

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Still waiting on Lemonade

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Do you ever get the sense that your Spotify playlists are shrinking? Or that you’re hearing the same songs more often? Or maybe a few of your favorites unceremoniously disappeared?

Spotify automatically hides songs that artists have pulled from the streaming service without notifying you. But there’s a helpful trick to see the songs that disappeared, which is especially useful if you’d like to buy them for your personal (and more permanent) collection: go to Settings, and under Display Options, check “Show unavailable songs in playlists.”

Now that the invisible has been made visible, you can look upon your old playlists with grayed song titles, and slip into sad nostalgia. The option doesn’t include any information about if or when the songs will return, or why they left in the first place. Spotify did not respond to request for comment.

There are other ways to track Spotify’s departures. We already know that Jay Z left Spotify for Tidal, but some of the other songs that have quietly slipped away from Spotify may surprise you. They include: many of Lana Del Rey’s pre-2012 songs, “Where Bluebirds Fly” by Radiohead, “From Yesterday” by Thirty Seconds to Mars, and “A White Demon Love Song” by The Killers. I’ve made an incomplete list of some songs that are unavailable, which, you won’t be able to see unless you change your default settings in Spotify.

It appears that many K-pop bands and indie bands have also quit the service, but at least Taylor Swift is back on Spotify. Beyoncé’s Lemonade is a whole other story, though.