FEATURE:
Odes to Joy
PHOTO CREDIT: @batelstudios
What Will the Sound of Post-Pandemic Pop Be?
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I have been thinking about…
IN THIS PHOTO: Charli XCX
the look and feel of Pop music after the pandemic has passed. Maybe that is not going to be for a long while yet, though I know that artists will be reflecting the turmoil. we have faced and how we will get through the other end. I have been intrigued by promotional photos for Charli XCX’s upcoming single, Good Ones. The song is out next month and, looking at the images, I am envisaging something that is a bit 1980s! The hair is big…and I get the impression we might hear something 1980s-ish. Perhaps not. Maybe I have covered this subject recently, but I do think that there are a lot of artists today looking to the past for inspiration. That has always been the case but, during the pandemic, this is especially true. Will Pop music later this year and next be very different to what we heard pre-pandemic? By ‘Pop’, I mean artists near the mainstream. A particular genre rather than what is deemed ‘popular’ across multiple genres. What I haver noticed regarding modern Pop is that artists are trying to blur genre lines and not be too easily defined. Perhaps it means that we do not have the consistency of Pop from the past, though there are artists who have plenty of personality and originality. Relative newcomers like Olivia Rodrigo, beabadoobee and Arlo Parks. Billie Eilish, perhaps, is one of the best-known modern-day Pop icons. I feel that her sound has changed quite a bit since her 2019 debut album, WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? Her new album, Happier Than Ever, is confessional and has darkness to it. I feel it is her most revealing and honest work yet. Will Pop music post-pandemic be more honest? There has been no shortage of confessional Pop music the past few years. That said, more and more, I am noticing Pop artists who are opening up more. By that, there is a greater sense of letting listeners into something more intimate and difficult to discuss. After such a turbulent 2020 and 2021 so far, there will be this desire (in artists) to connect more with fans.
The opening up of venues and festivals will lead to more physical music – in the sense of energy and something raw. That sounds like a mix and mess. Pop music will be broader than it has ever been and, as we are seeing future-looking artists sit alongside those with a hint of the 1980s and 1990s about them, this variation and depth will be felt widely. To me, if one could label a genre as ‘Post-Pandemic Pop’, it is going to include more uplifting sounds. One of my gripes is that modern Pop music is still too sad, edgy and lacking in the same warmth, hooks and choruses that we enjoyed decades ago. This is a change that has occurred over the past fifteen years or so. I think that, on a psychological level, music has been affected by lockdown and the pandemic. Sex and something more intense have been lacking from genres like Pop and R7B – definitely compared to the early-2000s and 1990s. With this sense of nostalgia and artists looking back, with that, I feel we will see a Pop scene that is not only more open and soul-baring; many artists will be more exploration regarding their passions and love. Looking at an artist such as Charli XCX transform in her new promotional images has got me wondering. Her 2020 album, how I’m feeling now, is future-thinking, experimental and hook-filled. It is also pretty honest and revealing. I reckon her upcoming music – whether Good Ones is part of a new album – will have more of an element of escape and lust. Perhaps there will be less edge and more lustre. Pop acts (if you can narrow them down that much) such as Jessie Ware (What's Your Pleasure?) and Dua Lipa (Future Nostalgia) produced Disco-infused albums last year, as did Kylie Minogue (Disco). This, in my view, will become more common. Not to say that sad bangers and more anxious Pop. The sense of release and passing through a scary time is going to have a big impact.
One of my big hopes is that there are going to be scenes and movements. Modern music, because few want to be defined by genres, does not have clans, movements and scenes. Britpop was an example of one from the past. I do remember that I have explored this question before! I feel it is worth coming back to the subject of Pop music in late-2021 and 2022 onwards. Many of us will want to be cheered and listen to music that has a hopeful nature. Even so, Pop artists are going to reflect the stresses of the past year or two, and there is going to have to be some recognition of wider issues such as global warming. Nothing seismic will happen with Pop music. To feel we will return to the 1980s and 1990s in terms of the quality and sound would be far-fetched. Modern artists, as much as they look back, want to make their music personal and fresh. I hope that more optimism comes into things. After a collective trauma, many will year for that sort of catharsis and positivity. Energy is going to be a big thing. We have all spent a long time feeling down and scared. Whether that energy manifests itself into anger or joy has yet to be seen – maybe it will be a combination of the two. Personal revelation, in terms of sex, will be more common in the mainstream. Not to be salacious but, as there will be a need for collective embrace and something hopeful, there has been this tension because of physical restraints and social distancing. Things are starting to improve and, with live music starting to gear back up, we get the chance to hear songs that artists have had in their pockets for a while. There are albums that have been out for over a year that have never been played live! Whether new/post-pandemic Pop is lighter, more nostalgic, angrier, deeper or more sexually revealing, there will be a faster acceleration and change now than there has been in Pop for many years. Who knows, maybe new cultures and scenes will form! Whatever is brewing up, I think that we will all witness…
QUITE a change.