The Musical Trends of the Past Five Years

As we wrap up our celebration of five years of Hidden Track, we wanted to take a look back and reflect on the various trends across the music landscape since we’ve been in existence. Clearly, there have been some seismic shifts in the business of music including the demise of record sales, a complete overhaul of the avenues for distribution, and the rise of the internet as a means for breaking new acts, but this column will focus more on the actual music and the fans who consume it.

[Graphic by Elaine Fogel]

Jamband Fans Have Segregated – We talk a lot around here about the late nineties and the good heyday of the jamband, and that is not meant to be a self-congratulatory proclamation, but the fact is the jamband scene was significantly different. The community element was much more prominent. If somebody liked jambands, they pretty much liked all jambands. If Widespread Panic came to town, you went to see them. If String Cheese Incident came to town, you went to see them. Shit, if Ekoostik Hookah came to town, you went to see them too. It was always the same people at the same shows with a common interest: improvisation. Nowadays, for better or worse, it’s a totally divisive beast. Of the people who still actively listen to jamband music today, it seems the vast majority listen only to Phish, and virtually nobody seeks out truly new jamband acts.

NPR – Music’s New Tastemakers – I’m not sure that anyone would have seen this coming, but NPR Music has legitimately become the go-to place to discover new music  – and we’re not talking about the lesbian-Afro-Norwegian-funk music of Nefertiti’s Fjord, or  the intellectual singer-songwriter types that appeal to tote bag carrying suburbanites. NPR Music, with its flagship program All Songs Considered, has become the one-stop shop for music fans from its on-air content to its smartly written blogs to its live festival and concert coverage to its amazing Tiny Desk Concert without pigeonholing itself into the stereotype of what an people thought an “NPR act” is supposed to be.

The Festival Bubble – It’s hard to believe how much festivals have changed the landscape of music in recent years. In the early part of the 2000s, festivals were still in their infancy outside of the old guard like Lollapalooza, H.O.R.D.E., Telluride Bluegrass, the Phish Festivals and High Sierra. But once the more mainstream audience got a taste and Bonnaroo opened its doors to a broader audience, the whole industry went on its head. Today, there’s essentially a major festival in every region of the country for each weather-permitting season coupled with hundreds of smaller regional festivals. Furthermore, bands of all sizes have begun introducing their own proprietary festivals with the ability to curate a like-minded lineup. At this point, we’ve reached a full on festival bubble and the downside has begun to rear its head as were seeing more and more failures every year. From poor planning, financial difficulties, inability to deal with weather and even full on disasters (i.e., stage collapses), we think we’re just getting the tip of the iceberg. After all, the problem with a bubble is sooner or later, it’s bound to pop.

Americana Revival – In the 1990s flannel and long unruly hair was the instantly identifiable trademark of the grunge-era. Fast forward some 20 years later, and there are a whole new generation of acts that have embraced that fashion sense, but whose sounds are a far cry from the crunchy guitars and the disaffected nature of those bands. While it may not be as reactionary as say the singer-songwriter movement that followed the psychedelic era, since we came onto the interwebs, Americana, or as one-time NPR blogger Carrie Brownstein dubbed it Beard Rock, has become arguably music’s biggest break-out genre with acts like Fleet Foxes, Bon Iver, The Avett Brothers, Dawes, and Mumford & Sons leading the charge.

PAGE 2 = The Stream, Full Album Performances and More

The Stream – This trend is still on the rise, but it’s one of the undeniably positive elements the internet has provided music fans. Not only can fans stream more of their favorite bands by the day and virtually any major festival around the world, but it has created a completely new revenue stream for bands in an era where bands desperately need new revenue streams. The flip side of this equation will be if this trend has a cannibalizing effect on ticket sales, but still, sky is the limit for this development and it’s only going to get better.

Pop Stopped Being a Bad Word – Anyone who grew up listening to the classic rock of the ’70s, the hair bands of the ’80s or grunge in the ’90s will agree: the label “pop” was derogatory, a downright insult even. You pretty much couldn’t get any less cool. Yet suddenly, across of genres of music, the pop suffix attached to anything is a blessing. There’s synth-pop, punk-pop, psych-pop, folk-pop, you name it. For the most part, the letting down of this guard is a good thing, but it’s also giving credence to short musical attention spans and propelling the flavor of the month mindset. As most art forms work in cycles and evolve though reactions, it’ll be interesting to see if there is a backlash against this trend. Hopefully, the hipster set will start embracing more sophisticated music with more adventurous time signatures, instrumental emphasis, and less traditional song structure.  In the meantime, lets just pray to God that there never becomes a jam-pop genre.

The Full Album Performance – As Phish fans, it’s always secretly rewarding to see our conventions make their way to the broader music culture. Perhaps, the biggest Phishy trend to catch fire in the past five years has been the full album cover. We’ve seen it in all shapes and sizes from My Morning Jacket doing their own entire catalog over five nights, to the Flaming Lips doing Dark Side of the Moon, to the Allman Brothers doing their Fillmore recreations. This is a trend that we can get behind a million times over, especially if it means tackling a full work of somebody else’s. In my mind, this trend simply speaks to working hard for your fans. It’s hard enough to learn one song well; I can’t even imagine mastering a complete album. Kudos to any band who execute something of this magnitude.

Page 3 = Rise of Social Media and Reunion Mania

Social Media’s Instant Access – I don’t think we really have to explain this one, but the music world has certainly taken to social media like white on rice, with its ability to instantly connect artists with their fans, and on the flip side giving people almost immediate access to pictures, video and running commentary of a show as it’s happening. Both Facebook and Twitter have revolutionized the way we interact as music fans, while they’re will still be the diehards that take the message boards to dissect things, the real time social conversation happening through the search of hash tags and wall posts make it possible to people to feel like they are a show without actually being there.

Reunions – We never thought we’d see the day that Police reunited, that Pavement reunited, that God Street Wine reunited (which we like to believe we had a little tiny part of making happen), or that Van Halen, and those were all great days. But hot damn, if anybody reading this post doesn’t know what happened on March 6th, 2009, then shame on you. That day, my friends, changed the life of this blog forever. The whole progression leading up to that event was surreal. From the Jammy’s that year when we all speculated if Phish might play a tune together as they presented a lifetime Jammy award together, to Trey’s now famous “left nut” comment, to the rumors galore, to the actualization were unlike anything excitement we’ve seen at Hidden Track. In retrospect, it’s crazy to think about, but until that day, there was actually a possibility of never seeing our favorite band play together ever again.

– Ryan Dembinsky and Jeff Greenblatt