(NewsNation) — At least two musical artists who became identified with the Great Recession from nearly two decades ago are releasing new albums as the U.S. economy sits on the edge of a precipice.
Coincidence? The reemergence of “recession pop” divas such as Kesha and Lady Gaga has not gone unnoticed on social media or in mainstream news stories. Throw in the return of austere, recession-era fashions, and cultural observers are making hay amid roiling financial markets.
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What is ‘recession pop’?
Recession pop informally refers to the type of “dance floor bangers” popular around the time subprime mortgages caused the U.S. economy to implode. The Great Recession lasted roughly from December 2007 through mid-2009, although recession pop songs straddle a slightly longer period.
Paula Harper, a musicologist at the University of Chicago, said recession pop tunes provided a “counterpoint” to the bleakness of bad economic times.
“These songs are very explicitly about dancing, they’re about partying,” she told Yahoo Entertainment.
Some of these escapist standards from “The Aughts” include Kesha’s “Tik Tok”, Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance”, “Party in the U.S.A” by Miley Cyrus and “Boom Boom Pow” by the Black Eyed Peas.
Of those artists, Kesha recently released the single “Yippee-Ki-Yay” ahead of a full album July 4. Lady Gaga, who rose to fame in 2008, dropped her new album, “Mayhem,” last month. Its first single, “Abracadabra,” has been called a return to form.
The apparent nostalgia for recession pop comes as economists warn the U.S. is on shaky ground because of new tariffs imposed by President Trump on Wednesday.
Markets tumbled Thursday, with the S&P 500 sinking 4.8% for its worst day since 2020. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1,679 points, or 4%, and the Nasdaq composite tumbled 6%.
