Did Music Get Tamer After 9/11?

 I've been thinking about something strange when it comes to music.

Did music get... tamer after 9/11?

Now, before anyone misunderstands me, I'm not saying music became clean after September 11, 2001.

Obviously fucking not.

There has been plenty of explicit music since 9/11.

Plenty of profanity.

Plenty of sex.

Plenty of drugs.

Plenty of violence.

Plenty of controversial lyrics.

Plenty of artists trying to piss people off.

There have been songs since 9/11 that are absolutely fucking insane.

So I'm not arguing that music suddenly became wholesome.

What I'm talking about is something harder to quantify.

A feeling.

Compared with a lot of music from previous decades, particularly the 1980s and 1990s, modern mainstream music can sometimes feel strangely tame.

Even when it's supposedly edgy.

Even when it's explicit.

Even when it's controversial.

Even when an artist is trying to shock people.

There often seems to be an invisible ceiling.

Artists can get close to it.

But they don't quite break through it.

And I find that fascinating.

Because if you look at music from before 9/11, especially certain corners of rock, punk, metal, hip-hop, industrial, alternative music, and even mainstream pop, there was sometimes an incredible willingness to be fucking weird.

Not just explicit.

Weird.

Angry.

Disturbing.

Provocative.

Uncomfortable.

Sometimes offensive.

Sometimes completely ridiculous.

Sometimes brilliant.

Sometimes terrible.

But there was often this attitude of:

"Fuck it. Let's make the song."

And I miss that.

There was a certain kind of musical recklessness that feels less common in mainstream music today.

Again, I'm not saying it disappeared.

It didn't.

There are still artists making incredibly weird music.

There are still musicians writing deeply disturbing lyrics.

There are still artists making political music.

There are still people experimenting with genre.

There are still musicians saying things that make people uncomfortable.

But sometimes it feels like the weirdness has become more controlled.

More marketable.

More calculated.

More aware of the audience.

More aware of social media.

More aware of public relations.

More aware of what might get someone "canceled."

And that changes things.

Because music isn't created in a vacuum.

The world changed after 9/11.

And music existed within that world.

Suddenly, certain words and images carried different weight.

War became a much more immediate subject.

Terrorism became a much more immediate subject.

Death and destruction became harder to treat as abstract concepts.

Artists responded to that.

Some became more political.

Some became more patriotic.

Some became more anti-war.

Some became more cynical.

Some simply ignored it.

But the cultural atmosphere had changed.

And then the music industry itself changed dramatically.

The internet exploded.

Napster and file sharing disrupted the industry.

iTunes changed how people bought music.

YouTube changed how people discovered music.

Streaming eventually changed how people consumed music.

Social media transformed how artists interacted with audiences.

And suddenly musicians weren't just musicians.

They were brands.

They were content creators.

They were social media personalities.

They were marketing campaigns.

They were expected to maintain an online presence.

And that can create a different kind of pressure.

Because when you're an artist today, anything you say can potentially become a headline.

A lyric can be screenshotted.

A concert moment can be recorded.

An old interview can resurface.

A joke can go viral.

Something you said ten years ago can suddenly be judged according to today's cultural standards.

And artists know that.

So naturally, some of them become more cautious.

Not necessarily because they're afraid to be artists.

But because there are more consequences to being publicly reckless.

And then there's the economics of the music industry.

Mainstream music is expensive.

Labels want successful singles.

Streaming platforms reward attention.

Algorithms reward certain kinds of engagement.

Artists are competing for playlists.

They're competing for TikTok clips.

They're competing for viral moments.

They're competing for the attention of people who have millions of other songs available at their fingertips.

So there's an incentive to make music that is immediately accessible.

Catchy.

Marketable.

Shareable.

And recognizable.

That doesn't necessarily mean bad music.

Far from it.

There is plenty of incredible modern music.

But it can sometimes feel like the music is being designed around the ecosystem in which it will exist.

And that's where the "tame" feeling comes from for me.

Something can have explicit lyrics while still feeling incredibly safe.

A rapper can say the most outrageous thing imaginable, but if the song itself follows every familiar convention, it doesn't necessarily feel transgressive.

A rock song can have screaming and distorted guitars while still sounding like something that was engineered to fit perfectly into a playlist.

A pop star can cultivate an edgy image while still operating within a very carefully controlled brand.

You can have rebellion that has been professionally packaged.

And that's a strange thing.

Because rebellion is supposed to be unpredictable.

It's supposed to be messy.

It's supposed to surprise people.

It's supposed to make someone say:

"What the fuck is this?"

But sometimes modern music feels like it has already anticipated that reaction.

The controversy is part of the marketing.

The shock is part of the brand.

The "edginess" is part of the aesthetic.

And once rebellion becomes an aesthetic, it can start feeling less rebellious.

That's not unique to music, of course.

It's happening throughout entertainment.

But music has always been one of the places where people could express things they couldn't say elsewhere.

Music could be angry.

Music could be sexual.

Music could be political.

Music could be nihilistic.

Music could be hopeful.

Music could be fucked up.

Music could be ridiculous.

Music could be whatever the artist wanted it to be.

And some of the music from previous decades really embraced that freedom.

Think about how strange some of the genres and subgenres that emerged during the twentieth century were.

Punk.

Industrial.

Noise.

Alternative rock.

Hardcore.

Death metal.

Black metal.

Experimental hip-hop.

Underground rap.

Weird electronic music.

Artists were constantly finding new ways to make sounds that weren't supposed to sound good.

And sometimes those movements eventually became commercially successful.

That's one of the beautiful contradictions of music.

Something can start as underground rebellion and eventually become mainstream.

But even then, the original spirit can remain.

And I sometimes wonder whether the mainstream music industry today has become too good at absorbing rebellion.

Something strange happens.

An underground sound becomes popular.

A major label notices.

The sound gets polished.

The aesthetic gets packaged.

The artists become influencers.

The rebellion becomes merchandise.

And eventually, what once felt dangerous becomes another genre category on a streaming service.

Again, I'm not saying this is inherently bad.

It's just interesting.

And perhaps 9/11 is only one part of this story.

Maybe the bigger shift was technology.

Maybe it was globalization.

Maybe it was the collapse of the old music business.

Maybe it was social media.

Maybe it was streaming.

Maybe it was all of those things happening simultaneously.

I don't think there's one simple explanation.

But I do think the atmosphere changed.

And sometimes I listen to older music and think:

"Jesus Christ, they actually fucking said that."

Not necessarily because the lyrics are more explicit.

Sometimes they're not.

It's because the artist seems completely unconcerned with whether everyone will like them.

That's the part I miss.

The willingness to be disliked.

The willingness to make something ugly.

The willingness to make something uncomfortable.

The willingness to make something that doesn't fit neatly into a playlist.

The willingness to make something that might alienate half the audience.

Because sometimes the best art comes from that place.

And that doesn't mean every artist needs to become an asshole.

It doesn't mean musicians should deliberately offend people.

It doesn't mean shock value automatically equals artistic value.

It doesn't.

Being offensive isn't inherently creative.

Being explicit isn't inherently rebellious.

Being controversial isn't inherently meaningful.

But taking genuine creative risks?

That matters.

And I think music benefits from musicians who aren't afraid to take those risks.

That's part of why I'm interested in making music myself.

I'm not interested in trying to recreate the past.

I'm not trying to pretend that music was automatically better before 9/11.

There was plenty of garbage back then too.

There were plenty of formulaic songs.

There were plenty of corporate pop stars.

There were plenty of manufactured acts.

There was plenty of boring music.

Nostalgia can distort our memories.

But I do think there was something special about the willingness of certain musicians to simply experiment.

And that's something I want to see more of.

Give me the weird song.

Give me the bizarre genre combination.

Give me the ridiculous concept album.

Give me the song that sounds like it shouldn't work.

Give me the artist who doesn't care whether the song fits neatly into a playlist.

Give me something that makes me stop and say:

"What the fuck did I just hear?"

That's what music is capable of.

And maybe that's the bigger issue.

Music doesn't have to be safe.

It doesn't have to be universally accessible.

It doesn't have to be perfectly polished.

It doesn't have to be algorithmically optimized.

Sometimes it just needs to fucking exist.

A weird idea.

A strange sound.

A bizarre lyric.

A saxophone playing something completely unexpected.

A song that combines genres that probably shouldn't work together.

A musician experimenting simply because they want to see what happens.

That's where some of the most interesting music comes from.

And maybe the weirdness isn't gone.

Maybe it's just harder to find.

Maybe it's living in independent artists.

Bandcamp.

SoundCloud.

YouTube.

Small labels.

Bedroom producers.

Experimental musicians.

People making music with whatever tools they happen to have.

Maybe the mainstream simply isn't where you go anymore when you want to find the truly strange shit.

And honestly, that's okay.

Because music has always found a way to escape the boundaries placed around it.

Someone will always come along and make something weird.

Someone will always make something uncomfortable.

Someone will always make something that doesn't fit.

Someone will always say:

"Fuck it. I'm going to make this."

And I hope that never changes.

Because if there's one thing I don't want music to lose, it's that sense of danger.

Not danger in the literal sense.

Creative danger.

The feeling that an artist might actually surprise you.

The feeling that something might go completely off the rails.

The feeling that you're hearing something that wasn't designed by a committee.

Something that wasn't engineered for an algorithm.

Something that wasn't created solely because the market research said it would work.

Something human.

Something weird.

Something imperfect.

Something alive.

So did music get tamer after 9/11?

Maybe.

Maybe that's partly nostalgia.

Maybe it's the changing music industry.

Maybe it's the internet.

Maybe it's streaming.

Maybe it's social media.

Maybe it's the increased commercialization of everything.

Maybe it's simply that I'm looking at different kinds of music now than I did when I was younger.

But I do think there was a cultural shift.

And whatever caused it, I hope we never completely lose the willingness to make music that feels dangerous, strange, unpredictable, and fucking weird.

Because sometimes the best song isn't the safest song.

Sometimes it's the one that makes you stop what you're doing and say:

"What the fuck was that?"

And then you listen to it again.