The phrase “music culture in the streaming age” often gets listeners rumbling about the death—or, at least, the increasingly strained relevance—of genre. We still recognize the conventional differences among, say, “Not Like Us” (hip-hop), “Need a Favor” (country), and “Please Please Please” (pop). There’s still hip-hop, country, and pop radio, of course, but these are waning formats, as streaming has outgrown radio in terms of listenership, and streaming, rather unlike radio, has a way of collapsing all artists, fan bases, and subcultures into singular platforms. Modern artists furthermore take an expansive view of their own musical forms. Post Malone is a rapper who primarily sings. Country music is full of trap drums. Pop is all-consuming—it claims both Drake and Morgan Wallen. You could view these shifts pessimistically, as the relentless homogenization of mainstream music culture. You could also view them optimistically, as the boundless interplay of previously disparate styles.
Read Full Article »
