An Album A Day: A University Student's Symphonic Experiment

A University Student from Dagenham, East London created a blog where he reviewed Albums every day for two years on a journey to expand his music taste. What started as a curiosity for new genres of music grew into a full-blown journalistic project that kick-started his career as a reviewer. D’rel Gayle, a 20-year-old Queen Mary University of London student and station manager of his university’s radio station Quest talks more about why he started this experiment and explains if his musical hypothesis came true.

Gayle said he started his experiment on New Year’s Day in 2019 when his house was blasting overplayed music and old pop bangers. “I went to hide in a backroom and listened to 5 albums in a row that morning and was struck by the volume of music I had just heard and loved the rush.” He started to indulge in more genres to the point that music started to become the centre of his life.

“I had my frame of influence when it came to music but I wanted to hear more. A wider range, more experimental and older music and just broaden my horizons- And it gave me something to do admittedly!”

Gayle set up his Instagram account @album_a_day_experiment to document all the albums he would listen to, rate it out of 10 and write a review of how he found the album. He would create playlists to share the songs he discovers and discusses with other music-lovers on their opinions on the songs or albums. He would primarily listen to the albums through listening to streams on Spotify although he sometimes buys the odd vinyl record, which has become increasingly more popular. In 2020, he moved his experiment over to his university radio station and started his own radio show.

When asked about what his favourite album he’s ever reviewed is, Gayle said: “Oh that’s super tough! There was so many great albums, not just of what was released in 2019 like IGOR by Tyler the Creator, or Little Simz and Fontaines D.C dropping albums. But I have to say Schlagenhein by black midi was my favourite album by far. Super cool experimental, math/prog rock, I loved it.”

His main goal was to diversify what types of music he listens to and experiment more with music. I asked him if his assumptions were true. What does he look for in music now? Does he judge the lyrics, the production or the music genre itself?

“It is definitely leaning more towards more “creative” and experimental music. Not entirely anti-mainstream, I just like pretty creative and unique sounds. I listen out for more texture in production and stuff now instead of like focusing on lyrics for example. And even then, I listen to a lot more instrumentals and soundtracks lately.”

The experiment was put on hiatus last year due to Gayle taking on more projects with Quest. I asked him what his listeners might have in store and if he’s planning on continuing his experiment again in the near future. “Well, I’ve been running the university radio at Queen Mary, Quest Radio, for the past year which has been great fun. Lots of connections, hosting events, broadcast experience and above all, keeping a close relationship with music through radio and podcasting. I hope to maybe pursue a job in it or use it to my advantage. I’ll be looking to work in the summer, continue to work on my music podcast with my friend and I guess see if I want to try the Album a Day Experiment again this year. “

Throughout his project, Gayle’s relationship with music has strengthened and he wanted to show his passion through writing reviews and recommending artists that people may not know or albums that are extremely under-appreciated. A devotion to sharing music with others turned into a consistent blog that ignited Gayle’s blossoming journalism career. This is definitely not the last we’ve seen of this project and we’ll be seeing more reviews from D’rel in future including his most recent podcast ‘That Film You Like’ with his friend Adam.

You can view D’rel’s experiment on Instagram @album_a_day_experiment and listen to him on QMUL Quest Radio.