Spotify Australia has called out Victorian Liberal MP Michael O'Brien after he jumped on the Spotify Wrapped trend to take aim at Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews.
On Thursday, as Spotify users shared their top artists, songs and genres from 2021, Mr O’Brien posted a “Wrapped” graphic slamming Mr Andrews in an edit that mimicked the official format from the music-streaming service.
“2021 Spotify Wrapped playlists often tell you a lot about your year. Daniel Andrews really went hard on his this year…” the graphic, posted to Twitter and Facebook, read.
Beneath the heading “Top Songs”, the number one song was “Lockdown laws”, followed by “World’s longest lockdown” and “Highest debt in Australia”.
Under “minutes listened”, the post read: “ 262 days locked down”. Mr Andrews’ top genre for 2021 was listed as “arrogance”.
Spotify Australia was quick to distance itself from the post.
“Just in case it needs to be clarified for anyone. This is not Spotify data,” Spotify replied on Twitter, in a tweet that has since amassed more likes than the original post.
Social media users in the comments weren’t so sure the meme landed.
“Australian political parties just can’t meme,” wrote one Twitter user.
“I bet even the young lib work experience kid tried to talk your staff out of posting this,” wrote another.
Mr O’Brien wasn’t the only official page to piggyback off the Spotify trend.
The Australian Greens Party also filled their Instagram with Spotify Wrapped-themed content, with the hashtag, #CLIMATEWRAPPED2021.
Instead of listing the year’s top songs, the party listed the Coalition’s top donors since 2012, with gas producers, Woodside and Santos taking the top spots. The Labor Party also shared the same top donors in the time period, the Greens Party reported.
One slide from a Greens party Instagram post slammed Australia as being in “the bottom 1% of countries taking urgent climate action this year," copying the percentage given to users on their leading artists.
The Liberal minister and Greens Party are the latest politicians to use pop culture to talk to their online audience.
On Friday morning, One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson’s Youtube channel posted the third episode of her party's animated series ‘Please Explain’ which mimics the popular show ‘South-Park’.
The cartoons shy away from overtly political statements, aiming instead to poke fun at students, with Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Greens leader Adam Bandt and Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce portrayed as school pupils. But, the videos sit on the platform alongside speeches from Ms Hanson against vaccine mandates.
"Love it Pauline. Great way to communicate and reach many, well done," one person wrote beneath the video.
