10 musicians whose work the 2010s will be remembered for

1. Kanye West

The 2010s kicked off with Kanye West's My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy album. The lyrics of the release are centered around the figure of the artist - a world star in which self-glorification tries to coexist with self-doubt. The album was released alongside Runaway, a film featuring the song of the same name and excerpts from other tracks. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is still considered one of the best hip-hop releases of all time, with 94 out of 100 points on Metacritic.

After this album, Kanye reinvented his music several times, turning to the harsh and minimalist sound in Yeezus and returning to eclectic hip-hop in The Life of Pablo. Along the way, the rapper released joint albums with Jay-Z and Kid Cudi, at the end of the decade he participated with Lil Pump in the comic video I Love It. And no matter what West does, it is listened to, talked about and argued about.

Kanye West is one of those artists who never adapt to the expectations of the audience. Here's a short list of things the musician managed to do in the 2010s: compare himself with Jesus and Mahatma Gandhi, publicly support Donald Trump, hold a worldwide release presentation playing songs from a laptop, and delay the announced release of the album by more than a year. For any other performer, such actions are tantamount to career suicide, but Kanye got away with it. And he will go while he writes this kind of music.

2. Kendrick Lamar

The figure of Kendrick Lamar has appeared in the music field at the turn of the decade. If in the 2000s he was popular only in his native Compton, then in the 2010s the active expansion of his work began and continues to this day. The last three albums are considered especially important. They are found on the first lines of the ratings of the best releases in the history of Metacritic more often than the work of any other artist, and according to reviews of both critics and listeners.

The next disc, To Pimp a Butterfly, finally consolidated Lamar's position as one of the main rappers of our time. This is an experimental and musical hip-hop that has absorbed the influences of soul, funk, avant-garde jazz. Here the themes of racial discrimination and police arbitrariness are raised, and there are also references to the same Compton ghetto, which permeate all the rapper's work. Lamar's work is celebrated by Barack Obama, calling How Much A Dollar Cost his favorite track of 2015. Lines from the song Alright are picked up by participants in anti-Trump demonstrations.

DAMN's next album is a complex conceptual work that includes references to the Scriptures. For this disc Lamar received the Pulitzer Prize for Music. This is an unprecedented case: before him, only academic and jazz musicians were honored.

3. Beyonce

Beyoncé Knowles became Billboard's Most Influential Musician of the 2010s. The reason is not just four commercially successful albums, Barack Obama's inaugural performances or the Super Bowl. The image of the singer and the political and social ideas promoted by her play an important role. In the 2010s, Beyoncé touched upon the themes of feminism and racism. So, album 4 included the strong women's anthem Run the World (Girls).

The image of Beyoncé formed the basis of the educational course taught at the Rutgers University of New Jersey. Through the biography and work of the singer, students study the connection between gender, race and sexuality, as well as explore the personality of Beyoncé as a feminist, an icon of the LGBT community and a political figure.

4. David Bowie

One of the greatest musicians of the 20th century was discussed at least twice in the 2010s. The first mentions were associated with the release in 2013 of The Next Day, an album that critics noted as successful, but not epoch-making. So, in the list of the best albums of the year from NME, it hit the 41st line, and did not enter the similar chart from Rolling Stone at all.

The second time Bowie was remembered in connection with the release of the Blackstar album on January 8, 2016 and the artist's imminent death from liver cancer. The release became one of Bowie's darkest and most desperate works. A significant part of Blackstar is made up of avant-garde jazz inserts, and the title single consists of two parts and is 10 minutes long.

The tragic context gave rise to a new reading of the album's songs, and the release's producer Tony Visconti called it Bowie's farewell gift to his fans.

5. Lana Del Rey

Lana Del Rey appeared on the musical horizon with the single Video Games, and a little later presented the album Born to Die. At the same time, she became one of the first pop stars of the new formation - an independent singer who began her path to fame with the publication of videos on YouTube and did not adapt to the existing standards of popular music.

Lana Del Rey is called a retrodie for her appeal to the aesthetics of the American 50-60s, but her music is distinctive - it is melancholic slow pop. The singer described him as Hollywood sadcore. The derived formula has hardly changed over 10 years and continues to work: released in August 2019, Norman Fucking Rockwell's album received a proud 87 points out of 100 on Metacritic.

6. Taylor Swift

Taylor Swift is an iconic American singer whose popularity has spread far beyond the borders of her native continent this decade. In the 2010s, the performer released five albums, and on each, a new Taylor appears in front of the listener.

The decade began with the country-pop album Speak Now, and the next release, Red, marked the singer's transition into pop. The track I Knew You Were Trouble became one of the main hits of 2012.

Album 1989 is Swift's first pop work. After this release, they began to actively talk and write about the singer in the press, and from such attention they even had to go underground.

The next album was named Reputation and heralded the beginning of Taylor Swift's "dark era". She appeared in a completely different way: now it is brought to the boiling point, offended and angry Taylor.

At the time, her records continued to sell despite the war with streaming services. Earlier, Taylor had withdrawn her music from there due to disagreement with the conditions of their work.

In 2019, Swift released the album Lover. The release marked the return to light pop music, and at the same time the maturation of the singer, who is now simply not interested in entering wars.

Taylor Swift fell into certain standards of the pop scene, while remaining bright and recognizable, released several commercially successful albums, reinvented her music the same number of times and, more importantly, always remained honest with the listener.

7. Billie Eilish

The decade is ending under the sign of Billie Eilish - the most popular new teen icon. Her single Bad Guy peaked at number one on the Billboard Hot 100. This is the first time that a person born in the 21st century became the leader of the American chart.

Eilish's debut album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? held the leading position of the UK Albums Chart for 114 days. This allowed her to enter the Guinness Book of Records as the youngest performer with a release at the first line of the British charts.

The history of Billimania is unprecedented: the singer's album has become the most anticipated debut release in recent years. The key to the hearts of young fans was perfectly matched: it is inventively recorded and mixed music, the image of a depressed teenager in baggy clothes and almost childish ease (just remember the broadcast in "Evening Urgant"). It was not without the contribution of the music media, which created Eilish a reputation as a singer, which is definitely worth listening to and discussing.

The Billie Eilish Phenomenon is a brand new star success story happening right now. The one who records one of the major albums of the year in her room reaches her career as a minor and makes the best pop music for teenagers by accident. How long this fuse will last, we will find out in the 2020s.

8. Oxxxymiron

Miron Fedorov began recording rap back in the 2000s, but popularity came to him later - with his first album and two mixtapes released between 2011 and 2013. Oxxxymiron introduced the word "grime" into the everyday life of domestic hip-hop lovers, popularized texts with literary and historical references, and also became the main face of the new era in Russian music - the time when everyone started talking about rap.

Part of Oxxxymiron's success came from a streak of victories in battles with Johnyboy, Dunya and Creep-a-Creep. Versus has become a platform where the rapper's coolness is equal to the skill of the verses with which he humiliates the opponent.

The fuel of the battles and early releases of Oxxxymiron lasted a long time, but by the mid-2010s it became clear that something else needed to be produced. In 2015, the rapper recorded Gorgorod, a concept album reminiscent of a dystopian audiobook without independent tracks. Miron spent a long time preparing the listener for the release of a more serious work - this is evidenced, for example, by the use of the "Little Tower of Babel" on the cover, and not the large one. But “that” album never came out.

Versus partially spawned the new king of Russian rap, a little later he overthrew him: after the fight with Purulent, it became obvious that Oxxxymiron was not the best battle-MC. At this stage, a long lull ensues in Fedorov's discography, occasionally interrupted by indistinct singles and feats. The new album of yesterday's king of Russian rap is expected much less than five years ago, and there is no certainty that the disc will not dissolve in the countless hip-hop releases coming out today. But this does not prevent any act of Oxxxymiron, whether it be a sudden application for an online battle or going to a rally, from becoming a reason for discussion.

9. Scryptonitis

The first album of Scryptonite "House with normal phenomena" raised the bar in Russian rap. This release showed that a bright flow and talented lines are not enough, and besides them something else can be used. For example, blues guitars and trip-hop beats.

In the second half of the 2010s, Scryptonite released three more albums, after which he announced his retirement from rap. Today, Adil (the real name of the musician) is no longer the ward of the Gazgolder label, but the founder of his own community Musica36, as well as the frontman of the Gruppa Skryptonite project.

The style of Scryptonite is difficult to imitate: it simply does not exist without Asian charm and characteristic "drunken" flow. But there is still a certain continuity, for example, in the music of the Kazakh rapper Black Cumin Oil. We will most likely hear about him in the 2020s. As well as about Scryptonite, who will again do something new.

10. Ivan Dorn

For Ivan Dorn, the decade began with the departure from the group "Pair of Normal" (perhaps the most correct step in the career of an artist). In 2011, the first popular singles were released: "Northern Lights", "I Hate" and "Stytsamen" - the very hit in which the singer urges people not to be shy.

Dorn is one of those artists who do not like to repeat themselves. He now has a jazz-funk program, an experimental English-language album and, more recently, a song with sampled bird chirps. In terms of popularity, new works cannot be compared with "Stytsamen", but the artist regularly releases seasonal hits and interesting videos.

Ivan Dorn's activities are not limited to music: he opened the Masterskaya label, which has already released releases of such artists as SOYUZ and Cream Soda.