"Switched on Pop" book lets you analyze music without having to hear it

It’s back to regular programming on most radio stations, now that Christmas is in the rearview mirror.

For many of us, that means the earworms we bring back from going out in public (or any place where we don’t control the dial) are pop hits.

Insert eye roll, right?

That’s what songwriter Charlie Harding and musicologist Nate Sloan used to do … until the day they began wondering why so many people loved certain songs, versus disdaining them for it.

Enter the podcast Switched on Pop and, now, a book of the same name.

Harding and Sloan shared a few of the book’s findings on how pop music works and why it matters (the subtitle of the work, in fact) in an interview with Ari Shapiro.

For the music-free version of the interview, head to NPR’s website, which has both an article and a complete transcript, or listen below if you’re unafraid of earworms.