# Do they no longer make pop music for/about the poor working classes? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 29, 2016, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392 "2016-08-29T13:50:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/1 "2016-08-29T13:50:37Z")
Growing up in the 70s and 80s and 90s, there was a lot of music that dealt with the plight of the working man and disenfranchised classes. Some of it was political. Some of it was just artists singing about their life experiences. Some was just about normal people just doing normal stuff. Some examples off the top of my head: Bob Dylan George Thorogood Billy Joel Tom Petty Bruce Springsteen Bon Jovi John Mellencamp Kid Rock Green Day U2 Classic punk is an entire genre about the poor and working classes raging against the establishment. And let’s not exclude the early works of rap artists like NWA, Public Enemy, Dr Dre, Ice Cube, Notorious BIG and other artists describing life in the ghetto. Correct me if I’m wrong, but you don’t really hear music like that any more. Rap and hip hop is mostly about posturing and complaining about life as a millionaire. Most pop music is just disposable, inoffensive dance music suitable as background noise at the beach. Have we entered a new age where pop music no longer speaks to regular folk? Are the days of songs like Working Class Hero, Jack and Diane, Living On A Prayer, Anarchy in The UK, and Straight Outa Compton gone forever? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/2 "2016-08-29T14:36:03Z")
Music is cyclical. In the space of a few years, we went from folk/rock/protest to… disco, the music of the (largely faux) ruling elite. Then punk and post-punk pushed the proles back to the center… and then we got the glitter divas, who seem to have gone on forever. Rap/hip-hop can’t seem to make up its mind whether it’s about street homies or posse leaders who take an Escalade everywhere because their bling is so heavy they can’t walk. Me, I think it’s time for Phil Ochs, young Bobby Dylan and a Guthrie to make their way center stage. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/3 "2016-08-29T14:39:34Z")
[Kamaiyah - How Does It Feel](https://youtu.be/42t0ij0wj-U) ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/4 "2016-08-29T14:53:26Z")
Hmm, what about \*\*Sia and Sean Paul \*\*singing “ **Cheap Thrils** ” - the song is about having no money but experiencing the pure joy of dancing, music and friends. ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/5 "2016-08-29T15:03:09Z")
There’s a new wave of folk-esque music out there (I’ll pin Fleet Foxes as the poster child), but they don’t get so much radio play, and honestly, they’re mostly rich hipsters who’ve read John Muir. ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/6 "2016-08-29T15:21:15Z")
Kendrick Lamar usually tends to rap about poor African-American life (though more on “Good Kid, M.A.A.D City” than on “To Pimp a Butterfly”). And Kanye West used to rap about being a poor black guy back on “College Dropout” (not much since then, though he does uncork a great song about racism every now and then). So it’s out there a bit. But it may just be cyclical as mentioned above - a lot of pop music appears to be channeling 80s dance these days. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/7 "2016-08-29T15:29:08Z")
Poor/working class songs still show up in the country and western genre. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/8 "2016-08-29T15:35:21Z")
Sting did a lot of it through his career, but at this point, it always strike me as odd listening to him singing about murder, prostitutes, theft, etc. ---
**Author:** ![xizor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xizor/32/102_2.png) [@xizor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xizor)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/9 "2016-08-29T16:33:45Z")
[Macklemore](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macklemore) sings songs about shopping at thrift stores (Thrift Shop) or buying an $800 moped (Downtown). Even his ode to old school Cadillacs (White Walls) sounds like a working class perspective. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/10 "2016-08-29T16:40:48Z")
A couple years back you couldn’t get away from Lorde’s “Royals”. ---
**Author:** ![NAF1138](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naf1138/32/3245_2.png) [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/11 "2016-08-29T17:15:47Z")
Hip hop does a lot of this. Kendrick Lamar was mentioned, Run the Jewels have a very punk rock style working class anti authoritarian streak too. A lot of modern hip hop is Sullivan’s Travels style fantasy though, as is much of non hip hop pop music. Kendrick Lamar’s song Backseat Freestyle is more or less about how hip hop has turned into wealth/power fantasy music (and makes this statement without judgment). His album To Pimp a Butterfly deals with this too, but there is a whole lot going on in that album. County Western makes singing about poverty into a weird fetish. Mainstream pop is in a disco style “let’s just forget everything and dance” phase. Nothing wrong with that. Alternative/indie music has been the realm of the upper middle class for a while, so it’s unlikely that it would come from there. The pendulum will swing the other way eventually. The signs are already starting to point in that direction. But make no mistake these are for the working class. They are just not about the working class. Right now what the working class seems to want is fantasy. Even the poverty fetish music in country western is a fantasy. It’s just a different fantasy. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/12 "2016-08-29T17:22:57Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > Poor/working class songs still show up in the country and western genre. Indeed, one of the better examples from the last few years is Jason Boland & The Stragglers’ [Electric Bill](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kFXHHXpVVc) ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/13 "2016-08-29T17:26:49Z")
[21 Pilots](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXRviuL6vMY) is pretty working class…rock? ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2016, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/14 "2016-08-29T23:59:35Z")
> [@xizor](#): > > [Macklemore](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macklemore) sings songs about shopping at thrift stores (Thrift Shop) or buying an $800 moped (Downtown). Even his ode to old school Cadillacs (White Walls) sounds like a working class perspective. I’ll accept it. I’ll also accept The Killers. In fact, many critics often accuse them of channeling Bruce Springsteen. ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2016, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/15 "2016-08-30T00:05:34Z")
Steve Earle? ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2016, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/16 "2016-08-30T00:58:41Z")
I don’t know if Good Charlotte are big outside DC/Baltimore, but they might qualify. ---
**Author:** ![LC\_Strawhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@LC\_Strawhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LC_Strawhouse)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2016, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/17 "2016-08-30T01:18:46Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > Poor/working class songs still show up in the country and western genre. Exactly. Just turn your radio dial a little bit and you can spend all day listening to songs like [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9HO_vP-SeU). ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2016, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/18 "2016-08-30T01:41:19Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Music is cyclical. In the space of a few years, we went from folk/rock/protest to… disco, the music of the (largely faux) ruling elite. Disco…the music of the ruling elite? I remember disco as being a three-way cross between _Saturday Night Fever_ working class machismo, and flamboyant pimp funkiness, and barely concealed gay pride just beginning to burst out of the closet. Unless you count rampant cocaine abuse as being of the ruling elite, I’m hard pressed to see anything elitist about disco at all. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2016, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/19 "2016-08-30T07:33:06Z")
Chamber, opera and orchestral music is the music of the ruling elite, IMO. Maybe I’m watching too much _Mozart in the Jungle_ 🙂 Lots of working class music in World Music as an overall genre. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2016, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392/20 "2016-08-30T12:25:08Z")
> [@P-man](#): > > I don’t know if Good Charlotte are big outside DC/Baltimore, but they might qualify. I thought they were on hiatus. In fact, I kind of feel like since around 2011 there has been a complete lack of rock bands. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-they-no-longer-make-pop-music-for-about-the-poor-working-classes/764392.md?page=2)