As the outro of “Sailor Song” by Gigi Perez slowly fades out with a final guitar stroke, I queue it up for the 15th time in a row. I close my eyes, lean back on my bed, and let the song wash over me again.
I am a chronic music repeater. This habit of repetition started with my first love: the preschool radio. Curled up during naptime, “Destiny,” by Jim Brickman, and “A Thousand Years,” by Christina Perri, and even “Uptown Funk,” by Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars, filled my afternoons with joy—then my nights too, as I played them on the house speakers like clockwork. So, when my YouTube Rewind—a summary of my music listening for 2025—told me that I had spent a third of my listening time on my favorite singer, Gigi Perez, or that my top album and second top album were two versions of that singer’s album, I wasn’t shocked.
It may be a bit peculiar, but I have found that the repetition is beautiful. It is an anchor point that gives comfort, focus, and entertainment. For me, each era of my life has been accompanied by different musical obsessions, and they have helped me through stressful parts of my life.
Last year, I moved across the world from Cambodia to the U.S., and—in a period of instability—music helped to keep me rooted. Gracie Abrams’ song “Cedar” blared in the background while packing up seven years of my life, driving away from my best friend for the last time, and even taking off on the plane.
“Cedar,” a song about drifting away from someone in the aftermath of a breakup, reflected what leaving my home felt to me. Regardless of what was happening, I had something I could return to time and time again to miss my home wholly, and that was enough.
Through less dramatic events in my life, music helps me to concentrate. To focus while I study, I listen to one song on repeat because not having to think about what song will come next eliminates the risk of my attention being diverted by a new song. Every time I hit a chorus, I will type or scribble or read with more vigor, and every bridge brings a short moment of rest where I can bask in the music. Hours of work fade into a blur when they are instead measured by four-minute song repetitions.
Repeating music doesn’t just benefit me, though. A study by Gavin Bidelman from the National Library of Medicine reported that listening to familiar music lowered mind wandering while performing tasks, increased task enjoyment, and led to quicker comprehension and recall.
That’s what I felt listening to “Cedar,” “Sailor Song,” and “Uptown Funk”: calm comfort that led me to focus each time I listened to them. The familiar songs are a rock for me to hold onto in everything from schoolwork to moving around the globe. They follow me everywhere I go as something I can fall back to all the time. So, I will lay on my bed again and play some music—and if it is the same song I listen to over and over while staring at my ceiling, know that I am at complete peace.
