Music in the 2000s

For a history of music in all times, go to Timeline of musical events.

Over the course of the decade, while people remained faithful to the fads and genres of music popular in the 1990s, the way in which people listened to music changed significantly. The CD, a popular music format of the 1990s, declined in popularity as mp3 players such as the iPod became popular and people's source of music came from the internet with downloading and social networking sites . The use of the internet for music increased widely in the late 2000s.

The most famous artist of the 2000s is pop singer Britney Spears.

United States and Canada

Hip Hop, Urban Pop and R&B

Hip-hop becomes the choice of music for youth, at times being more popular than pop-rock, although pop-rock and dance became the most popular music genre again in the later years of this decade

• Artists such as T.I., T-Pain, Kanye West, The Game, Soulja Boy, Flo Rida, Outkast, Missy Elliott, Ice Cube, Lil Jon, Lil Wayne, Young Jeezy, Ludacris, Lil' Kim, 50 Cent, Nelly, and Eminem were the dominant hip-hop artists that defined the hip-hop genre in this decade thus far. Distinct regional differences also developed outside the hip-hop/rap strongholds of the 90s, New York City and Los Angeles; while the southern scenes, particularly Atlanta, emerged "crunk" hip-hop (which eventually gave way to (snap music) in 2005), resulting in southern hip hop as dominating the mainstream for most of the decade. The New York scene remained strong, coasting on stars such as 50 Cent, who released the most anticipated hip hop debut album in more than a decade, Get Rich or Die Tryin' in 2003. Eminem is the best-selling artist so far this decade, with the Marshall Mathers LP and Eminem Show selling 10 and 8 million copies respectively. Eminem has sold over 70 million albums worldwide.[3]

• Alternative hip hop, almost unknown in the mainstream, except for a few crossover acts such as Atmosphere, The Roots and Gym Class Heroes evolves throughout the decade, in response to the gangsta rap that dominates the mainstream. Instead of being about money, sex, and image, alternative hip hop is philosophical, positive, and complex, and could be said to be related to both the old school hip hop culture of the 1980s and the indie rock and hipster subcultures.

• R&B becomes even more popular than it was in the 1990s. Artist such as Mary J.Blige, Mariah Carey, R. Kelly, Brandy, Usher, Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera, Beyoncé, Alicia Keys, Jennifer Lopez, Ne-Yo, Rihanna, and Chris Brown, are popular mainstream R&B artists in the 2000s. The style is sometimes fueled by combination with Rap or hip-hop beats. Pop R&B, along with Hip Hop, dominates mainstream music in the earlier part of the mid '00s, with the comeback of more traditional styled R&B music around late 2008. Neo-soul is also popular during the early part of the decade.

• Urban pop, teen pop and adult contemporary with R&B and soul influences, replaces the white-bread boy band and diva music of the late 1990s, beginning in 2001. Popular artists include JoJo, Rihanna, and Jordin Sparks.

• The production of Timbaland, defines the sound of the pop music in the latter end of the decade.

• The use of lighter synthesizer sounds, more dance-like instrumentals, and more brighter melodies such as Disco become promiment in Hip Hop and Pop music in the late 2000s. By 2007-2008, electropop appears to be lead genre in popular music with massive popular songs like Umbrella, Don't Stop The Music, Disturbia, The Way I Are, Gimme More, Forever, Sexyback, Closer and Womanizer.

Rock

• Rock has remained popular, despite the increasing popularity of Hip-hop, with both genres about equally popular among youth, often to the exclusion of the other.

• Throughout the decade, the post-grunge sound remained popular on adult alternative, modern rock, and pop radio stations alike. The Foo Fighters was one of the few post-grunge bands that carried over their success from the 1990s and only increased in popularity with their 2005 album In Your Honor. Nickelback achieved mainstream success from their hit #1 single "How You Remind Me" from their album Silver Side Up (2001). All of their albums since have achieved multi-platinum success, with several songs from All the Right Reasons (2005) achieving widespread airplay. Staind also achieved success in 2001 with their breakout single "It's Been Awhile" from the album Break the Cycle (2001), and remain popular to this day. Seether, with Disclaimer (2002), and Shinedown, with Us and Them (2005), have been among the more recent entries into the mainstream post-grunge world. Chris Daughtry following his strong performance on American Idol landed a major label deal and released his debut album Daughtry (album) in 2006, which proved to be a massive hit. Hinder is the most recent entry with its breakthrough hit "Lips of an Angel" from their debut album Extreme Behavior (2005).
• In the metal world, a new form of metal that fused elements of melodic death metal, thrash metal and hardcore punk called metalcore achieved popularity. Bands such as Avenged Sevenfold, Atreyu, Killswitch Engage, As I Lay Dying, Trivium, and System of a Down and many others of this new genre achieved success in the 2000s.

• The popularity of nu metal music carried over from the late 1990s into the early 2000s. Slipknot pioneered this as they continued to produce hit record albums such as Iowa, Vol. 3: (The Subliminal Verses) and All Hope Is Gone, rising them to the top of the nu metal genre. Limp Bizkit continued to produce hits early in the decade, but faded from the scene after about 2003/2004, while KoЯn continue to produce hits. Papa Roach, P.O.D. and Linkin Park were introduced to the nu metal scene near the beginning of the decade, all becoming instant hits with their major label albums (Infest, Satellite and Hybrid Theory respectively), all in 2000-03.

• Rock itself would see a surge of popular female performers such as Pink, Katy Perry, and Avril Lavigne, and female-led bands such as The Ting Tings, and Paramore. (see Fourth-wave feminism)

• Pop-punk music, although popular in the 1990s, evolved in the 2000s and exploded into mainstream success. This started mainly with Blink-182's breakthrough album Enema of the State (1999). The band's 2001 album Take Off Your Pants and Jacket proved to be popular as well. This opened the door for a glut of pop-punk bands overwhelming the airwaves, with such pop-punk bands as Sum 41, Good Charlotte, Simple Plan, and Yellowcard all achieving breakthrough success from 2001-2003. Green Day, highly popular during the 90s, released American Idiot in 2004, featuring a more modern pop-punk sound and drawing a huge new fanbase, but was also criticized for "selling out" by many previous fans.

• Emo music, an indie rock genre of the 1990s that influenced some pop punk bands of the early 2000s, has proven difficult to define as the label is given more for who listens to the music than for any key element in the music itself. Emo sprouted from this pop-punk popularity, with such bands as Dashboard Confessional, Hawthorne Heights, Taking Back Sunday, and The Used breaking out in 2003 and 2004. This has since been followed by Fall Out Boy (From Under the Cork Tree) enjoying widespread success in 2005 and 2006. Fall Out Boy built on their budding popularity in 2007 with the release of their Infinity on High album, which proved a huge hit, and produced the hit This Ain't A Scene, It's An Arms Race. Although emo is accepted as a popular breakthrough genre with the youth, widespread disagreement has ensued on which bands should be considered emo and which pop-punk, with fans of bands often rejecting the emo label. My Chemical Romance, with their 2004 breakthrough album Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge, has further blurred these lines, for while to many they define emo, they do not identify as emo, to the point of calling emo "bulls--t" .

• The return of New Wave music, post-punk, and synthpop, as there is an increase in interest in both technology and 1980s music. Artists including The Killers, Metro Station, Lights, The Postal Service, and Hellogoodbye become popular toward the end of the decade as numetal and similar modern rock loses popularity.

Pop

• • By 2002, the teen pop of the late 1990s was no longer popular. Several artists of the era (i.e. Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Justin Timberlake and Jessica Simpson) still maintain a strong presence on the charts and in the media by branching into urban pop and having a strong tabloid presence. The teen pop genre morphed into a more adult-alternative or pop-rock oriented sound early on in the decade.

• • In 2002, this new "teen pop rock" movement began. Michelle Branch was arguably the first artist to take this new direction in pop music, with her contemporaries such as Avril Lavigne and Vanessa Carlton not far behind. American Idol winners become a big part of the American pop sound, but only one winner became a staple. Kelly Clarkson experienced huge success and tons of hit radio singles with her pop-rock sound. The younger sibling of Jessica Simpson, Ashlee Simpson, experienced a breakthrough success with her teen pop-rock sound as well.

• • By about 2007, people too young to remember the pop of the late 1990s became teens and preteens, and Disney bands like the Jonas Brothers and Miley Cyrus revived teen pop to the top 40, playing music of a more produced quality than pop in the mid 2000s, and with somewhat less of an urban influence.

• • Dance music, particularly electropop becomes popular in 2008. (Look above on this same webpage, in the section "Urban Pop" for more information.)

Country

Country slipped in mainstream popularity in the early 2000s, due partly to the public retirement of Garth Brooks. However, the upper part of the Billboard album charts generally has many country albums, including some that go more than double platinum, indicating that the genre has a strong niche in the music industry. The genre grows during the mid 2000s from artists such as Carrie Underwood, who became the first American Idol winner to go into country instead of Pop or R&B. Artists that were popular during the decade were mostly artists who were already successful in the 90s, but the artists include: Dixie Chicks, Toby Keith,Taylor Swift, Gretchen Wilson, Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, and Kenny Chesney among others.

Adult Contemporary

Music by artists such as Norah Jones, Vanessa Carlton, Michelle Branch, Natasha Bedingfield, Celine Dion, Michael Buble, Jack Johnson, Nick Lachey, Rob Thomas, James Blunt, Josh Groban and Daniel Powter continues to be popular in sales, but by the late-2000s, due to the rise of electropop their singles on the pop charts are not as big-hit makers as they once were in the early to mid 2000s.

Dance Music

Unlike the 1990s, where dance songs often topped the charts, few do in the 2000s, with an exception for the year 2000 and 2008. Heaven (DJ Sammy song) in 2002 and Everytime We Touch (Cascada song) in 2005 become the biggest dance hits of the decade. Rihanna helps bring dance music back to the top of the charts, with hits like "Don't Stop the Music" and "Disturbia". Kylie Minogue has had numerous dance club play hits in the 2000s and received four nominations for best dance recording at the US Grammy's. Her biggest Dance oriented hit was her 2001 release, Can't Get You Out Of My Head.

Ethnic music

Ethnic music, especially in near tropical locations is mainstream for most of the mid to late '00s, especially with M.I.A. and the rise of Reggaeton and Reggae/Pop/Dance artists like Sean Paul, Sean Kingston and early Rihanna in the mid to late 2000s. In 2005–2006 Diplo and M.I.A. third world democracy bring Baile Funk to mainstream dance culture from Brazil. M.I.A. achieved a mainstream hit in 2008 with her song Paper Planes (song).

• The musical style of the 1970s and 1980s begins to influence pop music in the middle of the decade, as seen in Rihanna's hit "S.O.S." (a sampling of Soft Cell's "Tainted Love"), as well as in Jessica Simpson's album A Public Affair, which is a mix of 1970s-influenced music ("A Public Affair (song)") and 1980s music (Simpson's cover of "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)"). Madonna released a non-stop dance album in mid-2000s, Confessions on a Dance Floor, with songs reminiscent of ABBA, Saturday Night Fever, and even some of her earliest work in the 1980s, (especially her debut album, Madonna).
• Children's music rises significantly in sales, especially with Disney (High School Musical, Hannah Montana and The Cheetah Girls among others). Both High School Musical and Hannah Montana albums were among the best-sellers of 2006 and 2007 and reached the number 1 position.

Europe

• Electro, as well as music that combines it with House becomes mainstream in the dance music scene in the middle of the decade, replacing the mainstream of more jazzy and Latin influenced sounds from the beginning of the decade.

• Dubstep and Bassline House achieve more mainstream success within the dance music scene, with artists like Skream and T2 becoming well-known.

• Post-Britpop bands such as Coldplay, Keane, Muse and Snow Patrol top the album charts during the decade.

• Boybands do not exactly die out, but they evolve into teen pop-rock/pop punk acts, with artists such as Busted and McFly.

• Animated musicians become popular, with the likes of Crazy Frog, Gorillaz, and Schnappi, das kleine Krokodil.

• Dance Singers like Kate Ryan and September become massive around the world.

• British Indie rock and indie pop returns to popularity in the mid-late 2000s with artists such as Franz Ferdinand, The Kaiser Chiefs, Arctic Monkeys, Bloc Party, The Libertines, Lily Allen, Kate Nash and The Ting Tings achieving great chart success.

• In Germany, music sung in German becomes more mainstream as bands such as Wir sind Helden, Es ist Juli, Rosenstolz and Silbermond become popular.

• Girl groups Sugababes and Girls Aloud span successful careers throughout most of the decade.

• British female soul artists such as Amy Winehouse, Corinne Bailey Rae, Adele and Duffy and Leona Lewis achieve chart success in the late 2000s.

• Reality talent shows which gave people the opportunity of a singing career became very popular with UK TV audiences. Shows included Popstars, Pop Idol, Fame Academy and The X Factor

• 80's female artists Madonna and Kylie Minogue both have a big presence on the European music scene both having numerous hits in the 2000s which include for Madonna Hung Up, 4 Minutes and Music and for Kylie Spinning Around, Can't Get You Out Of My Head, Slow and In My Arms. Minogue today remains the most played female artist in UK radio history.

Australia and New Zealand

• Many new rock and alternative groups/bands form during the early years of this decade, consisting of 2 or 3 - 7 to 10 members. Instruments are almost always a guitar, drums, bass and sometimes keyboards, reviving youth interest in these instruments. Groups/bands such as The Vines and Jet become very popular amongst others around 2002–2003, paving the way for a mass of new groups midway through the decade such as, Evermore, Wolfmother and many others. This is speculated to result in a major breakthrough of the genre in Australia later in the decade similar to the grunge scene in the United States in the early 90s.
• Rock (popular artists include Tim and Neil Finn, Evermore, Wolfmother, The Feelers, Elimenop) and Hip Hop (popular artists include Scribe, PNC, Deceptikonz, Savage) remain the most popular music genre amongst youth in Australia and New Zealand, particularly Hip Hop, Rap and R&B, although later in the decade these genres lose favour to rock and alternative.
• Pop and Rock remain the most widely played genre's on mainstream radio stations. Most popular being the likes of the Australian Idol contestants, Delta Goodrem and The Veronicas. Artists such as Hilary Duff and Miley Cyrus are popular in Australia and New Zealand.
• Podcasting becomes popular in the later years of this decade with many radio stations podcasting several sections of their shows.
• Bands such as The Living End become increasingly popular amongst a new generation of youth, spurring interest in a sort of punk style revival.
• A popular American television show, The O.C., popularises many alternative Australian and New Zealand alternative rock bands by playing their music during the show. These bands include, Youth Group and Evermore.
• The most successful Australian female artist, Kylie Minogue still has a presence on the Australian music scene with her recent album X charting at number one along with it's lead single 2 Hearts becoming her 10th Australian number 1 single.

Latin America/Caribbean

• Rise of reggaeton hip hop, and Bachata music

Far East

• J-pop and K-pop becomes increasingly influenced by hip hop music and R&B.
• The Chinese metal scene is disrupted by the SARS scare in 2003, as some of the members of some bands have died.

See also

• 2000s
• Pop music