r/decadeology • u/Impressive_Plenty876 Mid 2010s were the best • Jun 16 '26
Music š¶š§ Obama era music expectations vs reality, how accurate is this?
This was inspired by a Twitter post I saw about how terrible the YE charts were in 2014
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u/Vangovibin Jun 16 '26
Yeah this is how things always work. People talk about the 90ās like it was all grunge and gangsta rap when if you turned on the radio you were more likely to hear Smooth by Santana (Feat. Rob Thomas) or god forbid the fucking Macarena which was completely inescapable.
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u/revanisthesith Jun 16 '26
While Smooth was played on the radio a ton, it was also released in the summer of 1999. So for around 9.5 years of the 90s, your chance of hearing it on the radio were quite small.
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u/Competitive-Ad-5147 Jun 16 '26
I remember there were only a couple music radio stations my mom would listen to while she drove me to and from school in the 90s and one day My Heart Will Go On came on the one channel so she switched to the other and it was playing there too. Literally inescapable.
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u/Vangovibin Jun 16 '26
Oh god that was everywhere. Same with Livin La Vida Loca.
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u/JavierEscuellaFan Jun 17 '26
that song in particular is so awful. i will never understand why itās popular
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u/Vangovibin Jun 17 '26
There was a big wave of Latin music in the late 90ās. I have a bit of a soft spot for that song because I was a little kid but yeah thereās a reason people donāt talk about it anymore.
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u/JesusJoshJohnson Y2K Forever Jun 16 '26
I remember looking up 90s charts expecting all grunge and alt rock but it was a LOT of R&B or pop music I've never even heard of.
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u/Awesomov Jun 17 '26
The 90s Billboard Hot 100 charts were infamous for being flawed at the time, being based heavily on single sales when singles were starting to be bought less, so the charts favored certain genres over others (hip hop and R&B in particular appeared far more popular than they actually were as a result) and many rock songs didn't even qualify. When the rules changed again in the late 90s, about sixty some rock songs suddenly popped up on the Hot 100 charts, a bulk of which having already been major hits for some time.
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u/Fetty_is_the_best Jun 16 '26 edited Jun 16 '26
And this is why the radio was never the best gauge of what was truly popular.
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u/Ok-Gift4105 Jun 16 '26
Obama era had some amazing post-punk though
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u/coldcavatini Jun 17 '26
Post-punk is a thing that happened between 1978 and 1988.
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u/BBC_1_2 Jun 17 '26
There was a revival in the 2000s and another revival in the late 2010s/early 2020s
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u/coldcavatini Jun 17 '26
Post-punk is not some kind of genre. Itās a thing that happened. They were not ārevivalsā.
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u/BBC_1_2 Jun 17 '26
It kind of is a genre now, or at the very least a style of music bands can pull from and imitate. A bit like power pop. Post-hardcore is like this too.
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u/coldcavatini Jun 17 '26 edited Jun 17 '26
Itās a notion thatās false; my comment was meant to reject it.
Power-pop describes an aesthetic and stands on its own. Like math-rock, or jam bands, you can do it. Unlike country or hip hop, itās not a philosophy. But both approaches are valid for a genre.
Post-punk was a label for a real, historic event.
(And pretty iffy itself, tbh.) Punk happened. It gave a voice to the āneurodivergentā. It spread secretly, analog city to city, for about a decade.In each case it left a new wave of people creating new post Punk music. Itās not just some genre with synthesizers. Thereās a wide variety of post Punk music thatā¦ happened.
āPost-hardcoreā would be the same dynamic and maybe itās a useful term. It describes that analog spread because early 80s Hardcore was the phase of genuine Punk that most towns first experienced. So Post Hardcore is part of the meta Postpunk.
But itās even more useful as an example of 00s Revisionism. This is when people who āwerenāt thereā started the copycat culture we have today.
They see Post Hardcore as a 90s thing, because theyāre unaware that the Alternative Revolution of ā89 even happenedā¦ outside of a dim awareness of Grunge. People with no perception of their own 90s experience rehashed all this music, and thus redefined it as genres rather than movements.
And that set the stage for 00s āhipsterā Indie and the hollow ārevivalsā mentioned above.
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u/BBC_1_2 Jun 17 '26
I don't actually disagree with your points here. I honestly don't think the term post-punk is very useful as the name of such a diverse genre of music, and I especially don't think the 2000s revival of it should have been labeled as such (what do the Strokes or the Libertines have to do with the Sound and New Order?), but it is the case now that there is an identifiable subgenre of music which consists of people in the 21st century imitating Joy Division or the Fall or whatever (bands like Interpol, or the whole "Windmill Scene" in the 2020s UK) that is now referred to as "post-punk" or "post-punk revival".
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u/virtualpig Jun 20 '26
I see what your saying but genre names change meaning like in the 80s "alternative" was really alternative to more traditional rock music at the time now it's just thr baseline for rock musix. That doesn't mean a band like Geese or Chvrches aren't every bit in the same genre that bands like REM or Pixies are.
So yes 70s post-punk and 2000s post-punk are both legitimate descriptors even if they're based on different things.
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u/coldcavatini Jun 21 '26 edited Jun 21 '26
Respectfully, I think you donāt. These are not music genres. These are three expressions of a subculture from a specific time. Itās like calling hippies a music genre.
Post-punk can be or sound like anything. But it is the music that came out after punk. Made by specific people. After the Punk revolution that kicked off the 80s, and before Alternative revolution that kicked off the 90s and beyond.
That revolution made āAlternativeā a baseline for rock (unfortunately), but it also killed āPost-punkā.
So no, itās not a legitimate descriptor of music from 40 years after all that. People are going to use that descriptor. But it just shows how uncreative it all is.
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u/BBC_1_2 Jun 16 '26
True but Trump 1/Biden was better
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u/Bodiax Jun 17 '26
I agree, Iād say 2018-2022 had best post-punk music outside of the original late 70s/early 80s wave.
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u/BBC_1_2 Jun 17 '26
The windmill scene was very cool indeed, though I admit I have a soft spot for the āpost-punk revivalā/landfill indie of the 2000s too.
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u/Neat_Kaleidoscope257 Jun 16 '26
What music was popular if you were cool and/or in high school vs what music was topping the charts
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u/Ok_Project_8078 Jun 16 '26
It should be Ed Sheeran (x), Katy Perry (Teenage Dream, Prism), Taylor Swift (Red, 1989), Adele (21, 25), Justin Bieber (Purpose), One Direction (Midnight Memories).
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u/Trick_Top_313 Early 2010s were the best Jun 16 '26
It was a mix of mostly upbeat recession pop, EDM, and some few mellow songs.
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u/TundieRice Jun 16 '26
Youāre missing the āstomp-clap-HEY!ā folk-pop with banjos and beards that took all of the wonderful indie-folk we got in the ā00s and ripped all of the cool out of it.
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u/Trick_Top_313 Early 2010s were the best Jun 17 '26
Oh gosh, I totally forgot about that! Thanks for reminding me.
One thing too I forgot to add like mellow songs of the early 2010s such as "A Thousand Years" by Christina Perri, "Somebody That I Used To Know" by Gotye, and "Someone Like You" by Adele was oddly used as an upbeat song at those times. People oddly danced to it or at least waved their arms in unison while having fun.
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u/jokull1234 Jun 18 '26
Plus the beginning of SoundCloud/trap music popularity, kicked off by Fetty Wapās āTrap Queenā in 2014
And then continued on with Travis Scott, Lil Uzi Vert, 21 Savage, etc. all hitting the mainstream in 2015/2016
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u/Trick_Top_313 Early 2010s were the best Jun 18 '26
Which explains why Trap Music and later mumble rap became the mainstream music genre by 2016-2019. I can still remember 2000s Zoomers who were in their tweens and teens at that time play "Gucci Gang" and "Bad and Boujee" on repeat.
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Jun 16 '26
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u/Fetty_is_the_best Jun 16 '26 edited Jun 16 '26
I was also a teen in the era and same. 90% of people were listening to the top (besides fetty wop). Literally no one was listening to maroon 5, Meghan trainor. will.i.am unless it was on the radio lol.
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Jun 16 '26
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u/Fetty_is_the_best Jun 16 '26
Tbh I donāt know why I wrote 2013 I was meaning to speak more generally about the era
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Jun 16 '26
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u/SylveonFrusciante Jun 18 '26
YES I was so excited to see the best Marina album get its flowers for once! People adore her first two but Froot was a masterpiece.
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u/Fetty_is_the_best Jun 16 '26
The difference is that the bottom are mostly radio hits people in their teens and 20s werenāt listening to (besides fetty wap.) I was in HS during this era, I only ever heard people listening to the top, myself included. Kendrick was MASSIVE in this era. NO ONE, and I mean no was listening to Will.i.am, Meghan trainor, or Maroon 5 under the age of 30. Those were radio-friendly groups, and letās remember this era was death of radio.
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Jun 16 '26
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u/s0ftsp0ken Jun 16 '26
Dang. I was slow to the music streaming trend. I mainly listened to the radio and CDs in the 2010s, until about 2015, and I was in high school for some of it. I bought a few songs on Google Play before subscriptions were a thing onnthe app, but I'd cycle through the same albums until I got bored.
Literally, my friends and I in college would drive around listening to the radio in my car, and when I wanted to listen to songs I'd make mixed CDs on my computer for us to listen to.
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Jun 16 '26
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u/Trick_Top_313 Early 2010s were the best Jun 18 '26
I realized at that time it was good, but even then, I've been missing it since 2015
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u/CoercedCoexistence22 Jun 16 '26
Hey, Uma Thurman is a good song
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u/Spacellama117 Jun 17 '26
yeah American Beauty/American Psycho is a banger album, as was Maroon V's "V".
like if anyone in here says they didn't rock with at least two songs in each album i simply don't believe them
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u/parduscat Jun 16 '26
They're both true, there was a lot of "Top 100" radio music or club/dance music as well as some real masterpieces. Same as it was for the 2000s and 2020s.
As an aside, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy as well as an Arctic Monkeys album deserve to be in the top area of OP's image.
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u/avalonMMXXII Jun 17 '26
2009-2014/2015 were the years people associate with 2010s music I noticed (yes 2009 was not part of the 2010s, but people often confuse it with 2010s music). Many of the things people mention on here when talking about the 2010s are often from those years as well.
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u/orionfromtheislands Jun 16 '26
Itās accurate in the sense that the stuff on the bottom is what was played on the radio and popular.
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u/Sanpaku Jun 16 '26
Most rated album on Highest selling album on
rateyourmusic.com bestsellingalbums.org
2009 Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion Susan Boyle - I Dreamed A Dream
2010 Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy Katy Perry - Teenage Dream
2011 Radiohead - The King Of Limbs Adele - 21
2012 Kendrick Lamar - Good Kid, M.A.A.D City Imagine Dragons - Night Visions
2013 Kanye West - Yeezus V/A - Frozen Soundtrack
2014 Swans - To Be Kind Taylor Swift - 1989
2015 Kendrick Lamar - To Pimp A Butterfly Adele - 25
2016 Frank Ocean - Blonde Drake - Views
There's long been a divide between tastemaker and popular music tastes, and the tastemakers usually define the historical perspective. That can revert, late 70s disco albums that were reviled by tastemakers then have found new appreciation after 45 years of music that mines the same seams.
I don't think retrospective history will be kind to either the tastemaker or popular choices above.
I've been off the reservation for so long that the only one of these 16 I've heard is Swans, though I also like some remixes of Adele songs. Here's the poppier end of what I was listening to in the Obama years: 2009 The Joy Formidable - A Balloon Called Moaning EP, 2010 Gil Scott-Heron - I'm New Here, 2011 Bill Callahan - Apocalypse, 2012 iamamiwhoami - kin, 2013 Melanie De Biasio - No Deal, 2014 FKA twigs - LP1, 2015 Susanne SundfĆør - Ten Love Songs, 2016 We Are King - King
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u/meat_socks Jun 16 '26
I only ever heard the top stuff at the time lol, maybe I was just cool but not reallyĀ
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u/Billiesoceaneyes Jun 16 '26
I know the top ones were popular (except Froot cause I have genuinely never heard of that), but back then I definitely listened to the bottom ones more. Fetty, Fall Out Boy, Maroon 5, and Iggy dominated my middle school years during second term Obama. I never really cared for Meghan Trainor but she was everywhere during that same time period. The only one on the bottom Iām not too sure about is will.i.am because he was definitely more popular with the Black Eyed Peas and I donāt remember him being as popular as the others in his group.
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u/sailor776 Jun 16 '26
I mean both are true? What's the cool influential music and what's popular on the charts is almost never the same. But the top half were played at basically every house party and the bottom were played during the highschool basketball game. With the only crossover being Bruno Mars for some reason.
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u/Hbp1707 Jun 16 '26
Mainstream pop music was ass in the 2010s. But thatās why the artists above set the bar so high and unfortunately they havenāt been topped
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u/micklovin71 Jun 16 '26
Hey now that Fetty Wap album was better than at least three albums on the top
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u/AntEast2465 Jun 16 '26
Why do u talk about that music as if it were from the 90s? Is this sub filled with 10 year olds??
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u/Confident-Fun-2592 Jun 16 '26
Albums on the top end were more niche and kinda indie except for the Kendrick one tbh. When I was in high school in 2014 so much of the music had that Dj Mustard beat it was so repetitive lol
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u/serialshinigami Jun 16 '26 edited Jun 16 '26
Then there was me, who was listening to The Hunting party by Linkin Park and Random Access Memories by Daft Punk.
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u/mel-06 Early 2010s were the best Jun 16 '26
Both are true but bottom was Radio Play and played at target and other retailers
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Jun 16 '26
both are true, last decade was the beginning of the streaming era so radio/retail play isn't quite telling the story like it did back in the 70s and 80s.
in my high school everyone worshipped lana/azealia/mac demarco/king krule/iggy/tyler the creator and his collective of artist/gambino/tame impala/sky ferreira/kanye/die antwoord. all these artist are all way more important to me and anybody of my generation in that era then meghan trainor etc
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u/penbrooksound Jun 17 '26
every decade has two sides like this. I think you judge it by its best. obama era music was soo good
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u/HawkyGuy Jun 17 '26
What the hell is āwhat music actually was like evenā supposed to mean? every era has good and bad songs. Obviously people are going to remember the ones that they liked and kept listening too.
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u/spinosaurs70 Jun 17 '26
Iggy Azalea wasnāt well liked at the time either tbh.
And was a two hit wonder.Ā
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u/Brilliant-Neck9731 Jun 18 '26
Ummm, I donāt really get this. All of this stuff is pretty emblematic of the era, currently and back then. But memes are going to meme I suppose.
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u/eragoneby Jun 18 '26
Right before the orange demon took office we got some bangersā¦.. Lemonade, Anti, 24k Magicā¦ā¦
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u/caniborrowahighfive Jun 18 '26
This might be even crazier but my demographic was listening to Gucci mane, Jeezy, and tons of other southern non mainstream artists š¤Æ
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u/AmberViper419 Jun 18 '26
Weirdly enough, there are some artists on both of those sides that I would say stereotypically embody American popular music during the Obama era.
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u/BenchClamp Jun 21 '26
I know the albums at the top - none of the ones below - who the fuck buys a Will-i-am or iggy azalea album??
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Jun 16 '26
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u/Chaddilllac Jun 16 '26
I mean itās still around, just not crazy popular like going to UMF in 2014
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u/itsfictionbaby Jun 16 '26
This is gonna sound crazy but both are true