本文翻译并修改自2019年12月21日出版的《Billboard》第68页由Andrew Unterburger撰写的《Back By Popular Demand》，文章有很多观点值得借鉴，读者可以参考。

在2018年，只有两首公告牌的冠单没有说唱歌手的身影（黄老板的 “Perfect” 和A妹的 “Thank U, Next”）。剩下的大家也都知道，卡的一比、马龙、Childish Gambino和创下了新纪录29周的公鸭。然而到了2019年，虽然在榜单的头部仍然会有不少说唱歌手，但是包括傻脸娜、乔纳斯三兄弟、雷霆佳佳以及萌德和卡妹这对（前）狗男女在内的各大歌手让流行音乐又重新回到了榜上的前四十名这个位置（在美国榜单中，Top 40的概念非常重要，比如知名媒体人Ryan Seacrest的播客AT40 ——译者注）。

“我从1983年开始就在干这行了，也一直在关注着流行音乐的大起大落” “I’ve been doing this since 1983, and I watch the pop cycles ebb and flow,” says Tom Poleman, chief programming officer at iHeartMedia. Poleman com­ pares the mainstream’s end-of-decade swing back to pop after the genre’s extended dormancy to a similar shift two decades ago, when the Backstreet Boys and the Spice Girls burst out of what had been a grunge-led ’90s. “We’re coming out of that doldrum phase,” notes Poleman, “and we’re get­ ting back into a really good place for pop — mainstream is cool again.” Poleman says that he first noticed the shift in early spring, when a num­ ber of long-dormant marquee names returned to the top 40 in quick succes­ sion. “I would meet with the labels a few months before the projects were coming out, and they would say, ‘Oh, this is coming out,’ or ‘That’s coming out’ — it was Jonas Brothers, Taylor Swift, Camila Cabello, Ed Sheeran ... one after another. I was like, ‘Oh, my God. All these big pop artists are com­ ing at the same time.’ ” Radio isn’t the only platform where pop music regained ground in 2019. At streaming services, long thought to be the province of hip-hop and dance artists, many of these pop stars were posting their best showings yet. Gomez, the JoBros and Grande all snagged No. 1s on Billboard’s Stream­ ing Songs chart. Apple Music head of pop program­ ming Arjan Timmermans believes that Grande’s reemergence in late 2018 was the beginning of the mainstream’s pop rebound. “Rapidly after [her fourth studio album] Sweetener, she put out [new single] ‘Thank U, Next,’ ” he says. “She was releasing music at the speed of streaming.” The so-called “speed of streaming” has been synonymous with the world of rap, where artists have been much more willing to release new songs at faster, less predictable rates, without lengthy promotional pushes or even accompanying albums. “Hip-hop has understood this for years now,” says Timmermans, “that it’s all about keeping fans engaged by releasing content very quickly, instead of having a six-month setup and then working a radio single for another eight months, which really didn’t help pop during the streaming age.” The poster child for pop thriving in the modern era is 18-year-old Billie Eilish, whose first album, When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?, set streaming records after a three-year trickle of music built anticipation for her full-length debut to a fever pitch. Eight months after the album release, Eilish issued a new single, “Every­ thing I Wanted,” and promptly scored another top 10 hit. “If you take Billie, or [K-pop group] BTS — they’re art­ ists that grew up in the streaming age, so they know how to release music perfectly for their audience,” says Jer­ emy Erlich, head of music strategy/ interim co-head of music at Spotify. To recognize Eilish as a defin­ ing pop star of 2019, however, is to also understand just how much the definition of “pop” has evolved in the last decade. Grande leaned heavily on hip-hop and R&B production on hits like “7 Rings,” while Halsey’s “Night­ mare” is largely indebted to alterna­ tive rock and grunge — yet both still play as “pop” on most radio stations andstreamingplaylists.Thenthere’s Eilish: This year’s biggest mainstream breakout artist is all but unclassifiable. “Billie is the biggest pop star in the world, but it doesn’t sound like tradi­ tional pop — it’s definitely alternative and urban-leaning,” says Erlich. “The younger generation doesn’t really think by genre.” By expanding the definition of the genre, acts that may have tradition­ ally been viewed as hip-hop could now be considered pop. Timmer­ mans cites Lizzo, Post Malone and Lil Nas X as artists who could belong to both. “Part of my job is to under­ stand how pop is moving and how the center of pop is moving, and how we can push pop forward,” he says. “Not just promoting the things that are considered pure pop, but also the things that are the unicorns and the outliers to ensure that pop maintains its strength.” Between the increased variety of music labeled as pop and the resur­ gence of some of the decade’s more traditional mainstream artists, those involved and invested in the genre’s success see only greater things in the decade to come. “It’s going to get even more pop in the 2020s,” says Pole­ man. “But the more variety you get in there, the better.”