Why did most non-English music traditions fall into decline after the 70s before recovering in the early 21st century?

Blog post only

In yesterday’s playlist for February 2024, I explored how Brazilian music from the 40s-70s often used natural metaphors to cover changes in life. Of course, this is not a unique Brazilian phenomenon, as some of the best lines in English do that too (“Into Each Life, Some Rain Must Fall” say the Ink Spots, “It’s always darkest before the dawn” says Florence + the Machine). I came to this conclusion after digging deeper into Brazilian music history last month. All of my finds are here in a consolidated chronological playlist (https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2X0jitnq4iupzqM1TfgIJ9), which is supposed to be an introduction to Brazil where you hear music evolve as you move through the songs.

This isn’t the first time I made such a chronological playlist. I have similar playlists for Dutch (https://open.spotify.com/playlist/07e4Q7HaYTxplVyBZhEk2y), German (https://open.spotify.com/playlist/00rid5cAQnGYteW0gSC0ld), French (https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1HhTuFHi6VJyfBxgoZQtk1), Italian (https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5hpdazkVCps2gLCf4iU1Nv) music history and split playlists for Arab (https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4xd8eABBy6oo5cvs8MxEVm https://open.spotify.com/playlist/41pyeESj8MpEAIrCpagRGH) and Afghan (https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6OSvQ4OAvAAuu7UpjuwQ2v https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4Qvv2Zhwv4OnZnIhC0r4DO) music history.

After having gone through all these different music histories, some patterns emerge. It seems most local pop music traditions got steady form in the 50s (though France is a little earlier), flourished in the 60s and 70s, but then tanked in the 80s (unless they successfully adopted new wave, as Germany did), made uncertain recovery in the 90s (often in sounds that don’t age well), but made comebacks in the 21^st century (often coinciding with a rise of local hip hop). Why is that? Cultural changes seem a factor, but I think technological factors may have played a role too, where better recording techniques (perhaps slow to spread outside the US) meant that there was more space to record and explore the own sound. But after a while, the US music industry just became more dominant, until the world become multipolar again, as reduced influence of radio meant subcultures (including local ones) had more opportunity to flourish.

This is just speculation, because I don’t know. But I can’t deny the pattern here.