Chance discoveries are music to DJ Julie Adenuga’s ears | Rebecca Nicholson

Playlists generated by algorithms are pervasive. So a personal recommendation is a thrill

Julie Adenuga hosts the afternoon show on Beats 1, the Apple radio station that manages to combine excellent broadcasting, star names and exclusive interviews with an almost impenetrable approach to actually making it easy to listen to. Still, Adenuga’s show is one of the best of a good bunch and she recently explained that a new approach to finding music was what kept it fresh. “I made a point of not looking for new music any more,” she told the BBC. “I made a point of allowing it to find me.”

The problem was that in being sent truckloads of new stuff every day, she lost her “natural connection to the music”. I’m sure that’s partly down to it being work, but she described a feeling that is increasingly familiar to me as a music fan. I have always found nostalgia, particularly when it comes to music, to be wearying, a sort of narcissistic one-upmanship about one’s own past and tastes. But I do miss the necessity of finding new songs and albums to love without algorithmic assistance.