What Comes After Folk Music? This Mainstream Is All Fished out

We thought we were so emo and angsty.

I’ve laughed sheepishly with friends about the middle school and early high school years when we listened pop punk bands like Fall Out Boy, All Time Low, Blink 182, and Boys Like Girls. Some of us sported the helmet-like color-streaked scene haircuts, excessive bracelets, second-skin jeans, spiky belts, and raccoon eye makeup. I didn’t bother with this look, but I did listen to the music, and something about the “screw everything” attitude residual in these popified remnants of the 80s punk movement resonated with my 14-year-old self.

Then in 2009, the broadly-defined “rock” category bred chart-toppers of a new stripe, probably epitomized in Mumford and Sons. Folk and hipster-ism began to flow up the mainstream, and pop punk fast became a relic. People still listen to it, of course, but the angry-yet-apathetic attitude of emo and scene bands no longer accurately reflects current youth sentiment. We’ve traded angst for nostalgia, and rebellion for localism and tradition. We’ve traded sweeping emo bangs for beards. So has been the folk movement.

But when a cultural item trickles down to popular culture, it’s already on its deathbed. Sure, hipsters will probably still influence the next year or so of fashion, and folk has been reintroduced into the repertoire of pop hits, a feat not commonly seen since the ’70s. Love ’em or hate ’em, Mumford and Sons remade banjo-strumming into its unique version of “nu-folk” that may sway the course of music for decades.

But that’s all old news.

So what’s next for music? Admittedly I haven’t attempted to analyze other popular and relatively new musical movements, like dubstep. I know nothing about that genre.

But I’m personally more interested in seeing whether the banjo becomes the new electric guitar for years to come.

Mostly I’m interested in discovering the next cultural attitude. What do you think? Is folk here to stay for a while yet? Have you heard of a new music style?