Saturday, April 19, 2025

The Return of Recession Pop is Causing ‘MAYHEM’

With the announcement of Lady Gaga’s The MAYHEM Ball tour celebrating her sixth solo album, “Recession Pop” has become a viral talking point. Gaga’s latest album, ‘MAYHEM’ immediately hit No.1 in the UK’s Official Album Chart, featuring hit singles ‘Disease’ and ‘Abracadabra’, the latter becoming the sweaty soundtrack to queer clubs across the country. 

Whilst fresh and current, this new music has been described by fans as “giving 2008”, with sonic references to her 2008 album debut, ‘The Fame’.

First emerging during the financial recession of 2007 - 2009 and characterised by feel-good dance-pop and up-tempo releases, “Recession Pop” offered an escape from reality and encouraged a care-free, live in the moment attitude. Now, there is increasing conversation that the recent releases, appearances, and come-backs from artists such as Lady Gaga, LordeMARINA, KESHA, and Charli XCX in this time of chaos and financial insecurity marks a striking return of “Recession Pop”.

This week, Lady Gaga headlined the 2025 Coachella mainstage with an era-spanning twenty song set. With fans dubbing it “Gagachella”, career-defining hits such as ‘Judas’, ‘Alejandro’, and ‘Poker Face’ danced hand-in-hand with all but three tracks from ‘MAYHEM’. Lady Gaga offered an onstage cultural reset, opening with the first live performance of ‘Bloody Mary’ in years and declaring “Monsters never die”, before closing the set with 2009 hit ‘Bad Romance’. Sharing their reactions to the performance, fans have decided “financially we’re cooked but musically we are going to THRIVE.

Whilst Lady Gaga’s dance-pop is synonymous with the late 00s and 2010s, she is not the only artist to signify a return of “Recession Pop”. With a dramatic return to social media and just a 15 second clip of a previously unheard track, ‘WWT’,  Lorde’s return has gone viral on TikTok, with the sound amassing 17.1K videos in four days. Confirming the suspicions and cravings of fans, the creator of 2024’s ‘BRAT Summer’, Charli XCX announced a “Lorde summer 2025” after bringing Lorde onstage at Coachella for a truly iconic performance of ‘Girl, so confusing’. Meanwhile another, often less discussed, icon of “Recession Pop”, MARINA promises “disco-lit electro pop and lyrical declarations of freedom” in her upcoming album ‘PRINCESS OF POWER’.

Perhaps, the return of “Recession Pop” offers an opportunity for escapism; a distraction from the global economy. However, this time around up-tempo pop hits combine the 2008 feel-good energy with deeper emotional messaging and a subversion of the status quo, all soundtracked with a dance-pop beat. Based on her two-hour set at Coachella, Lady Gaga promises far more than escapism in her upcoming tour, with a “theatrical and electrifying experience”. As we discover a new meaning to “Recession Pop” it’s time to dance and embrace the ‘MAYHEM’



Maisy Neale

@maisycreative

Image: Kevin Mazur via Coachella





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