Music from the 1990s is more popular than music from any other decade right now — even current tunes, according to data that Luminate shared with Axios.
Why it matters: Savor this moment … a rare point of cross-generational consensus. They may not agree on bangs or jeans styles, but Gen Xers, millennials and “zoomers” (Gen Z) all appear to love ’90s music.
State of play: Americans born in the ’90s and 2000s are listening to music from the decade they were born at higher rates than other generations listen to music from their birth decades — TikTok plays a role here.
- And those born in the ’60s – ’80s, have increased their music consumption over the past couple of years as the pandemic drove an increase in streaming, said Rob Jonas, Luminate’s CEO.
context: The 1990s was the last pre-digital music era before Napster came along and blew up the business model.
- The industry is now living off the music made in the before times, as artists’ back catalogs from the ’90s and earlier are seeing massive paydays, as Axios has reported.
- In the early months of 2022, audio streaming of current titles was down 3.5% year over year, according to Luminate. Meanwhile, streams of older catalogs (songs more than 18 months ago) are up 20% since last year.
Our thought bubble: As a Gen Xer, I can say with confidence that the ’90s was the last great decade for music. We had huge hits from a range of artists from Nirvana to Notorious BIG to Whitney Houston. Don’t @ me.
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