Table of ContentsTable of ContentsHow to train your Spotify algorithm dragonMy new tasty profileIm part of a Spotify family. Sure, the work I do means that Im also a regular user of other music streaming services such as Apple Music, Tidal, and Qobuz, but more often than not its my Spotify account thats streaming through the devices in my familys home, car, and on my phone. Dont get me wrong, Im not complaining. While Spotify doesnt have that pristine clarity and definition of the hi-resolutionstreams of those other services, Spotify has them all beat when it comes to its user friendliness, music discovery, and its algorithm-generated playlists. Well, except for one little problem thats dogged me for years.You see, I have tinnitus. This means that when I sleep, I use white noise to help cancel out the annoying tone that rings in my head when its quiet at night. It kind of sounds like a low idling a truck or like when you put your thumb on the tip of a live guitar patch cord and hold it there indefinitely. It can be maddening.Recommended VideosThe only thing that Ive ever found that stops it dead in its tracks is a 180Hz Brown Noise track that I found on Spotify. Its only 3:26 in length, so I play it on repeat all night when I sleep. Its blissful and I cant live without it.My Brown Noise 180Hz tinnitus track Derek Malcolm / Digital TrendsThe problem is, the repetition wreaks havoc on my Spotify algorithm, and it thinks that all I want to hear is weird new-age ambient music, zen ocean sounds, and soothing night rain storms with rolling distant thunder. My new release suggestions and other generated playlists, especially the all-popular Discovery Weekly, have been wrought with the stuff forever, and while Spotify does offer several other ways to discover new music, Ive longed to just fire up that weekly, tailored playlist, enjoy the tunes and maybe find something new.RelatedFirst-world problems, I know. Like I mentioned before, I do listen to other music services, and that track is available on those services as well, so finding a fix for this hasnt been a top priority. But enough is enough, so I recently decided to get to the bottom of it. It took about a week, and Im happy to report that it worked.This isnt a new technique, but it was new to me. To train your Spotify algorithm to ignore certain music you dont want fouling up your generated playlists, you can remove things from whats called your Taste Profile. Its easy to do, but it only works with playlists and not albums or individual tracks. Luckily, my sleep playlist is just called Tinnitus Relief, and it just has the one track in it. Heres what I did.Step 1:Create a playlist with all the tracks or examples of tracks and music genres that you want the algorithm to avoid. In my case, its just that one brown noise track, but it has to be on a playlist.Step 2:Open the playlist and tap the three-dot menu.Step 3:Scroll down and tap Exclude from your taste profile. A notification is generated that says Listening to this playlist will have less impact on your taste profile and recommendations. Thank the maker.1. Tap the three-dot menu2. Select Exclude from your taste profile3. Let it work its magicStep 4: One thing to note is that your algorithm is also based on tracks and albums that youve liked. Also, if you play any of the tracks in your excluded playlist(s) on their own from outside the playlist, then it is tracked and may inform your taste profile.Step 5: If you want to go one step further, before going to bed I also went through the Spotify apps Settings andPrivacy and social areas and selected Private session. This apparently also hides whatever youre listening to from the algorithm, but only for a period of up to 6 hours. I did both, just to be thorough.I didnt see results immediately, as the Discover Weekly playlist is updated, um, weekly on Mondays. But lo and behold, the following Monday my Discover Weekly playlist was no longer dominated by night-time cricket sounds, spacey ambient artists, and rain storms. It instead features a nice mix of music I frequently listen to as well as some surprises and even stuff Ive never heard of before. Much better.1. My old, ambient-sound, sleepy-time Discover Weekly2. My new, much cooler Discover WeeklyIm going to keep training it with new playlists to see how dialed in I can get my algorithm. I also have a 13-year-old daughter who has several playlists on my Spotify account, and while shes developing an excellent taste in music, theres some lingering Katy Perry and other anomalies on there that are worse than an idling truck.Editors Recommendations