It all started with a click. The 2000s witnessed a dramatic transformation in how music was consumed, primarily thanks to ever-improving digital technology. The widespread availability of rise the Internet and the proliferation of digital music formats, particularly the MP3, revolutionized the music industry — but not always for the better.
Napster, launched in 1999, allowed users to share all manner of music files from their personal collections for free, challenging traditional distribution methods and sparking numerous legal battles around copyright infringement. Helping counter this suddenly omnipresent gray market was Apple’s iTunes Store, launched in 2003, and the iPod, which revolutionized music consumption by making it easy to purchase online and be available on demand as part of a large digital music library. By the end of the decade, streaming services such as Spotify (launched in 2008) began to take hold, setting the stage for an even more drastic change in worldwide music consumption habits.
Hip-hop and R&B continued to dominate the charts in the 2000s, with artists such as Eminem, Jay-Z and Beyoncé leading the way. Eminem’s provocative lyrics and storytelling prowess were showcased on albums such as The Marshall Mathers LP (2000) and The Eminem Show (2002), which achieved massive commercial success. Jay-Z solidified his status as one of the greatest rappers of his time with albums such as The Blueprint (2001) and The Black Album (2003), and he also spent two years as the president of legendary urban label Def Jam Recordings.
After initially gaining fame in the late ‘90s as part of Destiny’s Child, Beyoncé launched a successful solo career with her 2003 album Dangerously in Love, quickly becoming an iconic figure in pop and R&B. She and Jay-Z became the biggest couple in popular music when they married in 2008.
Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera continued their hot streak from the end of the prior decade to dominate the pop music of the early 2000s with classic hits such as the former’s “Toxic” (2004) and the latter’s “Beautiful” (2002). Having left *NSYNC to begin a solo career, Justin Timberlake enjoyed monumental success with his first two solo albums (2002’s Justified and 2006’s FutureSex/LoveSounds), while Avril Lavigne emerged as a pop/punk sensation with her 2002 debut album Let Go, which enthralled younger audiences who may have been dabbling in rock’n’roll for the first time.
Building on a decade of elevated visibility in the ‘90s, the indie and alternative scenes continued to flourish worldwide. Radiohead raised the bar again with the innovative Kid A (2000), while Detroit’s the White Stripes brought garage rock to mainstream attention with White Blood Cells (2001) and Elephant (2003). Arcade Fire’s Funeral (2004) and the Strokes’ Is This It (2001) were critical and commercial successes, with the latter band emerging as the figurehead of a rejuvenated New York rock scene also featuring Interpol, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, TV on the Radio and LCD Soundsystem.
Initially maligned by critics, Daft Punk’s 2001 album Discovery served as the catalyst for the French electronic duo’s first proper tours later in the decade, their spectacular production and visceral soundscapes rewriting the rule book on how this music could be presented in a concert environment. The rise of electronic dance music (EDM) festivals such as Ultra and Electric Daisy Carnival reflected the genre’s growing popularity, while Coachella, launched in 1999 on a polo field in the desert outside Palm Springs, Ca., became a perpetual must-attend for techno lovers.
In Music City, there was another revolution brewing. Reared on the Beatles, the Dixie Chicks, Joni Mitchell and James Taylor, a Nashville-by-way-of-Pennsylvania teenager named Taylor Swift released her self-titled debut in 2006, bridging the gap between country and pop music in a way that would eventually lead to her becoming the most popular and commercially successful artist on the planet.
