There’s a powerful imperative in life and culture now to “get back to normal” – and it’s understandable: after all the chaos and unpredictability of the last couple of years, everyone wants stability.

But it’s not happening. Even disregarding the fact that Covid isn’t gone, and the technological and political turmoil of the current era shows no sign of decelerating, certain changes in music and culture are taking place that can’t be undone. There is no “new normal” – tipping points have been reached, and in many cases that is for the best.

If 2020 was a year of change, for many 2021 has been a year of cementing that change. This hasn’t generally been in the form of huge movements – with the notable exception of the explosion of the wonderful amapiano sound coming out of South Africa to influence pop and underground scenes globally. But there have been milestones, flags planted in the ground, key records and events that have been symbolic of much larger shifts. Some of them we’ve touched on here on Sound of Life, and some we haven’t, but here are a few of the musical moments from the past year which have given us pause for thought – or even made us feel better about the way things are going.

Rave Regained Hope

Way back in the mists of time, rave music’s more utopian rhetoric was rooted in more than just intoxicated enthusiasm. In the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, the breaking down of boundaries based on race, class and sexuality on the dancefloor was very real. There was a very powerful feeling that – in the slogan of this foundational 1990 mixtape – “together, the future is ours”. It was this hopeful message that was later codified by North American ravers as “PLUR” (peace, love, unity and respect). Ultimately, though, despite gains made, the power in dance culture resided with men, and particularly white, heterosexual men – something that has become even starker with the global rise of commercial EDM with in the last decade.

But in recent years battles have been fought at the grassroots level, with women and LGBTQI+ people pushing hard for recognition and representation. In conjunction with the Black Lives Matter movement resounding through the music, this has forced shakeups in dance music culture, pushing against the whitewashing of sounds that relied on innovations from Black and other PoC communities. Some, naturally, have just been cosmetic, but there is real change taking place too. London DJ Sherelle has been a vital part of it. We’ve already mentioned her as part of the resurgence of 90s jungle sounds which has been an invigorating part of the dance landscape lately, but one of her greatest achievements this year has been launching the Beautiful label, starting with a mammoth compilation of Black artists, mainly women and/or LGBTQI+ people. It covers a huge range stylistically, and artists like Karen KG Nyame – one of our favourite interviewees of the year – are expressly political in their tracks. At the heart of it, though, is the heady euphoria of vintage rave. That feeling of “the future is ours” is spine-tinglingly present from the start, but this time that “ours” is defined very differently indeed.

We (Re)Built Community 

With venues closing temporarily – and all too often permanently – there was a fear this would irreparably damage musical networks and communities. In fact, in many cases the opposite was true: the isolation, fragmentation and unpredictability of the COVID era has accelerated the formation of links online. With DJ touring stifled, dance culture was reminded powerfully of the value of locality as we found in our interviews with Southeast London’s FYI Chris, and Manchester’s Space Afrika. In the jazz world, Emma Jean Thackray’s sunshine infused ‘Yellow’ album reminded us that “Our communities are bound by words, by listening / By lending an ear, a shoulder, an hour...” and she expanded on this in a fantastically articulate and funny interview for Mixtape.

Over on the KEF Culture Hub, every week we’ve been documenting not just innovative live concerts, but participative online festivals and other digital-IRL hybrids that will undoubtably change the way we connect to music and arts for a long time to come. But perhaps our favourite example of how structures can change came this year in our interview and video exclusive from Kristina Moore, aka koleżanka. The Arizona-via-NYC musician talked with clear-eyed precision about how she maintains two geographically disparate but overlapping lineups of her band, how she maintained its identity and recorded in lockdown, and how wonderful it was to be able to reconnect to her roots in recording the performance video. The video itself radiates the warmth of musicians deeply connected via a grassroots community, working in a physical space that also shares that community’s values.

The World Became Ever More Decentred

The shift away from the cultural dominance of pop culture from the English-speaking world has been steady throughout this century. Reggaetón and other Latin styles, K-pop and Afrobeats have all made their mark across the world, and just in the last two years the unique and gorgeous South African house sound of amapiano has exploded across underground and mainstream alike. It’s telling that one of this year’s best hip-hop/funk albums was by a Ghanaian-Australian artist: Genesis Owusu. In the world of ambient and modular synth music, the Indian born Arushi Jain created an extraordinary sound by combining her own Hindustani classical training with influence from US synth artists like Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith and Suzanne Ciani, who in turn channelled yogic teachings via the New Age movement. Most extraordinarily, a true tipping point was found in the incredible album Birdy Island by Shanghai resident Howie Lee. He has experimented with electronic styles for some time – frequently including Chinese music in the mix – but this album was a quantum leap in terms of innovation and individuality, and crucially bringing his Chinese musical identity to the fore. That’s not to say it left behind his other influences: everything from grime to easy listening jazz is woven into his subtly complex sci-fi narratives. But it is not beholden to them, and it wholly reflects his own unique identity and place in the world, making it one of the greatest albums of the year.

We Came to Terms With the Past

This is a theme we’ve touched on a few times on Sound of Life. Whether it’s the influence of classical, folk, rave, or New Age music, or even the history of art movements like Dada and Surrealism, musicians are finding ever more ways of making the past relevant to today. It feels like a possible coming-to-terms with the glut of available culture given to us by the Information Age. In the early days of the internet, especially when file-sharing kicked off around the turn of the millennium, the sudden and ready availability of the entirety of the history of recorded music was overwhelming, and resulted for many a form of creative paralysis or overly reverent retro-ism. More recently, though, the development of tools and strategies for navigating an ocean of information has met with a drive to reassess history – even where that is painful – to lead to a radically new remaking of the past. Whether that’s Sherelle reclaiming rave’s values in a more inclusive way, Jason Isbell confronting country music’s prejudices, or more speculative exercises like Om Unit’s beautiful hybridising of acid house and dub reggae from first principles, this isn’t about reliving the past, but seeing what we can take and use from it. One of the most beautiful illustrations of this, and one of the best records of the year, was John Grant’s Boy From Michigan. As we noted on its release, its use of 1980s pop tropes was done with extraordinary musical depth, interwoven with narratives of growing up queer and troubled in the conservative Midwest of that era. It’s a glorious record; one for the ages in fact, and its re-examination of a previous generation’s sound will affect generations to come.

Writer | Joe Muggs

Joe Muggs is a writer, DJ and curator of many years standing, covering both mainstream and underground. His book 'Bass, Mids, Tops', covering decades of UK bass music, is out now via Strange Attractor / MIT Press, and you can subscribe to his newsletter at tinyletter.com/joemuggs.