Music of the United Kingdom (2000s and 2010s)

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Popular music of the United Kingdom in the 21st century continued to expand and develop new subgenres and fusions. While talent show contestants were one of the major forces in pop music, British soul maintained and even extended its high-profile with figures like

garage rock and post-punk, which when mixed with electronic music produced new rave
.

Rock

Post-Britpop

Coldplay is considered to be the most commercially successful British Rock act of the 2000s.

Post-Britpop bands such as

multi-platinum and helped make them one of the most popular acts in the world by the time of their second album A Rush of Blood to the Head (2002).[3]

Garage rock revival/post-punk revival

Franz Ferdinand in concert in 2004

Like many American

internet social networking).[6]

Soft rock and singer-songwriter

The decade saw the solo success for British singer-songwriters, including

Amy Macdonald with This Is the Life (2007) enjoyed similar levels of success.[9]

Heavy metal

The term "retro-metal" has been applied to such bands as The Darkness, whose unique mix of glam rock and heavy riffs earned them a string of singles hits and a quintuple platinum album with One Way Ticket to Hell... and Back (2005), which reached number 11.[10] Bullet for My Valentine, from Wales, broke into the top 5 in both the US and UK charts with their melodic dark rock, with Scream Aim Fire (2008).[11] Asking Alexandria's third studio album, From Death to Destiny, also debuted in the top five of the Billboard 200 during the week it was released, while also debuting at number 1 in both the British Rock and Metal charts.

New rave

Klaxons in concert in 2007

With developments in computer technology and

rave music.[15][19]

Pop rock

As

pop punk had become popular in the United States by bands such as Green Day, The Offspring and Blink-182, the UK saw pop-rock bands break into mainstream. The first band to breakthrough would be Busted with their 2002 hit single "What I Go to School For". The band's mainstream success was limited with their break-up on 14 January 2005. McFly have enjoyed commercial success with their 2004 breakthrough album Room on the 3rd Floor
, which went straight to no.1 in the UK.

Punk

A grassroots punk scene has continued in the UK. Since the late 2000s, this has been mainly built around the hub of the annual Rebellion Festival in Blackpool.[20] The 2010s saw a particular profusion of younger female or female-fronted bands affiliated to the punk scene.[21]

Pop

In the 2000s, Westlife were the most successful group and music act at reaching the top spot, with 11 number-one singles and 7 number-one albums. New girl groups managed to enjoy sustained success, including Sugababes[22] and Girls Aloud, the last of these the most successful British product of the many Popstars format programmes, which began to have a major impact in the charts from the beginning of the 2000s.[23] The Saturdays were the next girl group to sustain success in the late 2000s, after being inspired by Girls Aloud and touring with them. The most successful winner Leona Lewis enjoyed a number one album in 2008 and her début single "Bleeding Love" was the first number one single in the U.S. charts by a British solo female artist since Kim Wilde in 1987.[24] The 2000s also saw the reunion of Take That, who went on to achieve new stardom by the end of the decade. In the early 2010s, the British boy and girl bands, The Wanted, One Direction, and Little Mix have experienced worldwide success, charting highly in Britain as well as North America.[25]

Soul and female singer-songwriters

Joss Stone was one of the most successful British soul acts of the decade.

British soul in the 2000s was dominated by female singers, many of them white, including Natasha Bedingfield, Joss Stone, Amy Winehouse,[26] Estelle, Adele and Duffy, all of whom have enjoyed success in the American charts, leading to talk of a "Third British Invasion", "Female Invasion" or "British soul invasion" leading the charts like "American Boy", "No Substitute Love" o "Pretty Please (Love Me)" by Estelle or "Mercy" by Duffy.[27] In 2009, the single "Down" reached the No. 1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 and sold two million copies in the United States,[28] making him "the most successful male UK urban artist in US chart history."[29] Female singer-songwriters of various genres began to dominate the British charts in 2006 with the previously mentioned Winehouse and Lily Allen. In August 2011, the top 5 positions on the album charts were held by both Adele and Amy Winehouse with two albums each, and by American singer Beyoncé holding the other spot.[30] British singer-songwriter Paloma Faith reached No. 2 on the album charts in 2012 with her second album Fall to Grace.

Nu-folk

In the 2000s bands and artists appeared who functioned as cross-over acts between the

Findlay Napier and the Bar Room Mountaineers and Pearl and the Puppets.[32]

Grime and hip hop

Live concert of the Gorillaz, April 2010

At the beginning of the 2000s a new style of

]

Electronic music

Dubstep

Dubstep developed from garage music at the end of the 1990s and in the early 2000s, using elements of drum'n'bass, techno, and dub, to produce a largely instrumental, "dark" sound, based around relatively simple rhythms and often with extended hypnotic mixes.[37] Its origins centred around the London Forward>> club nights and it was disseminated through pirate radio shows.[37] Major artists included Skream, Burial, Kode9, Pinch, Horsepower Productions, Vex'd, Digital Mystikz, Zomby, Shackleton and Benga.[37] Releases like Burial's Untrue (2007) and the mix albums series Dubstep All-Stars helped the subgenre gain critical and some limited commercial success.[37]

Synthpop revival

In the 2000s synthpop began to re-emerge as a new wave of indie artists began to incorporate the sound into their songs. Major British acts to be influenced by this sound include pioneers Goldfrapp,[38] Ladytron[39] and Hot Chip,[40] who were followed by acts including Little Boots,[41] Ellie Goulding[42] and La Roux.[43] The electronic sound and style have arguably influenced many other mainstream pop artists, including Lily Allen's second album It's Not Me, It's You (2009), which abandoned the ska influences of her earlier work.[44] British soul/R&B artists such as Jay Sean and Taio Cruz have also embraced electro-pop sounds.[45]

Mid 2000s-early 2010s

British musical success in the United States was at its lowest point in the early 2000s. Less than 2% of the top 100 United States albums in both 2000 and 2001 were from the United Kingdom. In April 2002, for the first time since October 1963, there were no British acts on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart.[46] This would be reversed in the latter half of the decade when the percentage of albums sold in the US by British acts increased every year from 2005 through 2008. It would increase from 8.5% to 10% of the market between 2007 and 2008.[47]

In 2007

Rock artist for 2010.[61][62]

In 2011 albums by British artists totaled 1 in 8 of all albums sold in North America. This represented a 25% jump from 2010 and according to the

Universal Music UK noted that unlike in the past British artists are not specifically targeting the US but American audiences are noticing their talent through the internet.[72][73][74]

The success of British music in the United States has been seen as part of broader Anglophile trend in the United States that has also seen a noticeable increase in use of British expressions, interest in the royal family, and British television programmes.[75]

See also

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