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Spotify combs through tons of tunes to find the best stoner playlist

Jammin’ to tunes and tokin’ up is an increasingly popular pastime these days — especially since several states are beginning to legalize or at least decriminalize the drug. Now, stoners can look to Spotify to provide their weed-soaked jams. The music streaming service celebrated marijuana’s unofficial holiday on 420 by analyzing several 4/20-friendly tunes, but for those who partake, its findings may be useful anytime of year.

“Music fans have created over forty thousand 420 playlists on Spotify,” explained a company blog post. “Spotify decided to crunch the numbers: 75 percent of the 40,000 plus playlists on Spotify with a ‘420’ theme in their titles are created by males.” The service also revealed that the most-streamed track among them is Cypress Hill’s “Hits From the Bong.”

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The music streaming service created a playlist of the 20 most streamed tracks from all of these 420-friendly playlists. While there are many obvious choices (Afroman’s “Because I Got High,” Sublime’s “Smoke Two Joints,” Bone Thugs-N-Harmony’s “The Weed Song), there are some surprises. For one, Kendrick Lamar’s “Bitch, Don’t Kill My Vibe” definitely isn’t about smoking blunts considering he reportedly hasn’t in years. And while D12 most likely do smoke the ganja, we’re pretty sure “Purple Pills” is talking about something more potent.

For the occasion, Spotify also got Willie Nelson — who launched his own brand of marijuana this spring — and Method Man to make 420-friendly playlists. Method Man’s playlist is particularly extensive: he handpicked 185 tunes from his own greatest hits, Nineties hip hop and some of rap’s more notable pot anthems. Other favorites include Eninem’s “Must Be the Ganja,” 50 Cent’s “High All the Time” and Rick James’ “Mary Jane.”

While most of us wouldn’t normally correlate algorithms with bong hits, Spotify once again showcases its ability to dig through sprawling fields of data to come up with some novel results.

Be sure to check out all the DT Playlists on our official Digital Trends Spotify page.

Chris Leo Palermino
Chris Leo Palermino is a music, tech, business, and culture journalist based between New York and Boston. He also contributes…
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