A field of all levels Strategizing music’s attention economy

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20,000 foot view: Over roughly the past decade, each stage in the evolution of the attention economy accelerated the pace of fragmentation and oversaturation in music, unearthing new challenges for each micro-generation of artists. With all these generations now competing in the same playing field, artist strategy depends strongly on the era in which they rose to prominence. On streaming, today’s new artists and releases face two unique challenges: competing with pre-streaming-era cultural moments, and competing with the growing volume of all music in history.
Key insights
- Each stage the attention economy has unearthed entirely new set of circumstances challenges for artists, with the landscape growing increasingly over-saturated and over time
- On streaming, are peaking faster: an annual of songs reached number one Billboard’s Streaming Songs chart between and 2017, and between 2018 November 2022
- Pre-streaming-era cultural moments are lasting longer, and remembered better
- Only of say they listen to more music than newer music
- On streaming, releases compete not only with rapidly growing volume of other music, but also with all that has ever been released
- The artists rose to prominence over roughly past years fall into six each necessitating a unique approach today’s landscape
- The environment which artists first rise to is as important to their plan as the environment we in today
Companies and brands mentioned in this report: American Idol, Beyoncé, Billboard, Billie Eilish, Boiler Room, Britney Spears, Chance the Rapper, Christina Aguilera, Discord, Doja Cat, Drake, Ed Sheeran, Fleetwood Mac, Fred Again…, Glass Animals, Harry Styles, Instagram, Jack Halow, Kate Bush, Kelly Clarkson, Lady Gaga, Latto, Michael Jackson, Mr Beast, Nicki Minaj, Olivia Rodrigo, PewDiePie, Post Malone, Tai Verdes, Taylor Swift, The Kid LAROI, TikTok