South Korean artist Jung Kuk Reached an astonishing one billion streams with the track Seven, locking in a spot as the second most streamed song of 2023. Flowers connected to Miley Cyrus captures the drum and bass energy filtered through UK Garage, tracing back to a sound born in the early 2000s. American artist Oliver Tree has helped push hyper-electronic music back into the spotlight, a high-octane style sometimes labeled as hard style, paired with German DJ Robin Schulz whose movements around the billion-reams mark echo across the scene. Staccato rhythms drive Boy Liar Part 2, a track rooted in British hyperpop that leans into rapid syncope and fast beats, accumulating hundreds of millions of streams.
HOuse-inspired Balearic vibes resonate in tracks like Going Like Nanana by Peggy Gou from South Korea, which has reached around 300 million plays. English artist Charlie Moss bends the universe with a speed-driven melody in Speed Driving, a tune that would slot neatly into 1990s Spanish suburban clubs, boasting around 200 million streams. Artists from various countries push back against genre borders, with Elizabeth Rose offering a nostalgic homage to dance music of the decade that TikTok helped propel to a projected 300 million streams. Olivia Rodrigo’s objectionable pop-punk energy, as well as youth anthems like Flashing and bursts of power, echo Weezer influences on some of the best tracks from their second album. Romy Madley-Croft reveals a similar approach, weaving trance sensibilities into her first solo project.
What’s going on? By excluding commercial pop phenoms of Latin origin like Rosalía, Peso Pluma, Bizarrap, Karol G or Myke Towers, the list still finds its roots in tracks that trace back to the nineties. That era feels omnipresent in the most listened-to songs across platforms this year, a period when the internet and social networks were still gaining traction, when the world enjoyed relative calm and economic momentum, and media sensationalism was only beginning to stir. Many of the artists mentioned here weren’t even born then.
Reasons for revival
The revival is visible in recordings, on screen in television series, and in movies and books that celebrate the nineties. From Alcasser and Pioneer to American Crime Story: People v. O. J. Simpson or Friends reruns, the decade’s imprint reappears. Veronica and Girls, and the book era around the nineties highlighted by Chuck Klosterman, signal a cultural return. The decade resurfaces in fashion, festival culture, and the hybrid energy of modern nostalgia. The question remains: is the eighties truly being edged out, or is this a selective revival? Nostalgia for the nineties is being curated by contemporary tastes, with millennial audiences driving the movement into new contexts.
Musically, the echoes span European rhythm and indie rock, drum and bass, forest melodies, fast-paced beats, trance, and post-pop electronic sounds that surged after cultural shifts. A recent interview with veteran British producers Trevor Horn and Mike Barson reveals praise for modern productions while noting that hip hop’s recent direction diverges from their traditional expectations. Can this be called a cyclical effect of popular culture, where languages of expression re-emerge roughly every twenty years?
“Just like many people in the nineties looked at the seventies and two thousand looked at the eighties, today there’s a clear focus on the nineties because that was the soundtrack of many listeners’ youth,” comments music journalist Joan S. Luna. He notes the resurgence of European rhythm and forgotten pop electronics in contemporary scenes (Luna, Mondosonoro).
There is a cyclical factor, amplified by internet filters and social networks, yet there’s a deeper reason: the era emerged from a time when diverse origins converged. Recent music successes were not only about dance hits; the need for danceable choruses was a defining feature of the eighties and nineties. After the pandemic and the challenges people endured, hedonism found new life, and songs designed to make listeners move regained prominence, even as Arctic Monkeys later tracks diverged from those early energizing ambitions (Luna, Mondosonoro).
Jessie Ware and Beyoncé, for example, illustrate a return to danceable, direct pop and house-infused anthems that also influenced fashion and club subcultures worldwide. Madonna’s late twentieth-century releases and sustained vitality show how rhythmic sway can age with grace, while a final tour in Barcelona’s Palau Sant Jordi reflected the enduring appeal of these sounds.
Nostalgia for what never happened
Joan S. Luna adds a nuanced point: post-punk never truly vanished, and history moves in action and reaction. Modern acts like the Valencian trio Broken Daisy mine the same wells, drawing from the dark guitar textures of early eighties while updating with soundscapes from the nineties and even the two thousands. Drums and bass, along with UK Garage and witch house, have found revival corners in the work of Rojuu, La Plata, Dani, Kae Tempest, Shygirl, and artists like Rauw Alejandro experimenting with cross-genre echoes (Luna).
Broken Daisy’s latest work and Margarita Quebrada’s members, aged between twenty-five and twenty-nine, highlight how electronic music of the nineties and two thousands remains potent. The band describes nostalgia as a mood that translates into melancholy rather than a mere retro affectation, aiming for a timeless resonance across audiences. The modern landscape facilitates cross-era sampling, enabling artists to mix reggaeton, drum and bass, and other club sounds within single projects.
Joan S. Luna notes a broad remix culture in Spain, where even the hardest electronic subgenres like hard style gain mainstream legibility while preserving avant-garde lanes. The movement shows that hard style can be both mainstream and subversive, a duality driving ongoing experimentation in clubs and festivals.
The last decade of original styles?
If trap and reggaeton are momentous but hard to ignore, they are still rooted in the nineties dynamics of mixing genres and creating subgenres. The sense remains that the last decade with a truly wide range of crossovers might be the nineties, where many foundational influences emerged. The fragmentation of later years invites questions about future crossovers. Margarita Quebrada argues that the nineties were a time when creative risk reached a peak, with projects across electronic, guitar, and other planes offering benchmarks for today.
Joan S. Luna also considers the nineties as perhaps the last period where such expansive stylistic proliferation occurred. He suggests that while trap and reggaeton affect many languages now, their future ability to mutate and fuse with other genres might not replicate the same scale. The takeaway: the nineties remain a touchstone for energetic, danceable, and boundary-pushing music that continues to influence artists and listeners alike.
For now, the nineties provide a powerful reference point for soundtracks that move people, energize crowds, and invite everyone to dance.