How the pandemic changed music

How the pandemic changed music toggle caption Illustration by Jackie Lay. Pollstar reports that the worldwide gross for the top 100 touring artists grew by 71.7% from 2019 to 2024 and has deemed this a "Golden Age" for live music. Sponsor Message toggle caption Staff/Getty Images North America How quarantine reshaped the album release cycle by Hazel Cills It was the weepy Instagram Live heard around the world: Dua Lipa explaining to millions of viewers that she was going to push up the official release of her already leaked, disco-driven sophomore album Future Nostalgia in late March 2020, just weeks after the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic. And Lipa's teary, live-streamed sense of conflict reflected a dilemma many artists faced in the pandemic's dark first year: How should new music exist, exactly, in a time like this? Sponsor Message The pandemic's start also collided with the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, leading to hundreds of protests across the country ignited in their names and others murdered by police, and much of 2020's new music, from Noname's "Song 33" to Lil Baby's "The Bigger Picture," spoke to the cause.