An Editorial by someone unqualified to talk about most things.

Most people if you asked them would argue intensely that they grew up in the best era of pop music. Obviously you’re bound to have some attachment to the music you heard on the radio during your formative years, it’s natural to feel like what you grew up hearing was the pinnacle of musical achievement. That said I’m here to tell you all those people are wrong, because quite obviously I (a 2002 kid) grew up in the greatest era of pop. The late 2000s to mid 2010s was a phenomenal period for music, treating us to the likes of Rihanna in her prime, Beyoncé, and don’t even get me started on Lady Gaga. Recession pop was something that truly had a sound to it, and while not being particularly deep in its contents, the lyrics of these songs will forever be ingrained in my brain.

Here’s the problem though. 2010 was 15 years ago, and whenever I have the misfortune of being somewhere with a radio on, every 3-5 songs I end up hearing a song that’s a minimum of a decade old. There’s a handful of reasons for this, one of them being that the Internet has broadened us to such lengths that there is less of a monolithic “pop” to play, and radio stations are struggling adapt to that for obvious reasons. The other reason I think is far more important, that being that I don’t think pop music has really done much of anything new in the last 5-10 years. Obviously there is a formula that works, and I’m not here to act like there’s not a place for the newest Sabrina Carpenter or Chappel Roan. These are things that are popular for a reason; people like them, but I just know in my heart of hearts that we could be doing so much more. The modern era of music production and its accessibility has opened up the pop culture landscape to sounds beyond our wildest imaginations and yet we largely aren’t tapping into them at all, bar a few exceptions.

Enigma’s Atlas is a sneak peek into exactly what I mean. This is not a song that turns the conventions of pop music on its head, it’s just a song with interesting sounds instead of the same recycled 80s synths, recession pop holdovers or trap influences. It’s a song that very much qualifies under the standardization of the pop music formula, and yet I’ve never heard anything quite like it. I’ve had the pleasure of gushing about this song to the man himself over a Discord call, and in his own words he said he likes to make pop music “from the future” which is exactly the kind of inspired thinking the industry at large is missing

gottsy’s rot is another example of this same phenomenon, arguably in an even more subtle but equally effective approach. If you want to read about my love for this song in full I’ve previously covered in THE ARCHIVE, but for the sake of maintaining this specific tangent rot is a pop trap track with character. The synths are abrasive but not offensively so, the synth work is very based in electronic music but not in a way that pulls it out of being a pop song, and the sound choices and overall composition are very inspired yet in line with the conventions of radio pop. So with all that said, why doesn’t Arianna Grande sound like this?

It really boils down to old institutions banking on safe money. Small artists are free to make the choices they feel are right free from the fear of it not making them a billion dollars, which means we get their take on what these genres could be. Make no mistake, no label would have ever released Lil Nas X’s Old Town Road had it not gone viral because songs that take huge swings are not in their profit motive. It’s a mindset created by old rich white dudes that has stunted the growth of our culture at large, and is only now slowly being undone by the advent of music discovery on TikTok. With 84% of last year’s Billboard top 200 gaining traction initially on TikTok it’s becoming less and less up to the labels what we care about; culture is now truly decided by consumer trends and how we influence the algorithm. So what does that mean for you as a consumer of media? What is the TLDR for what all this means?

Put simply it’s this: if you like some kind of music, interact with it. Like it, comment on it, share it with your friends. It’s dumb and cliche and the same shit every influencer has been shoving down our throats for years, but these are the metrics that from now till the end of time will decide the direction in which culture moves and you as an individual get the unique opportunity to shape it so directly for the first time in history. Obviously public opinion has always been the deciding factor in what succeeds, but until now the only things that you would see to begin with were the ones backed by million-dollar record deals, and that’s simply not the case now. Take pride in that. If you like something show someone, because that single action helps decide if your favourite sinks or swims. And if you don’t know where to look to find small artists you can shove down people’s throats, then oh boy do I have this great music blog to tell you about.