The Rest Is Entertainment - The Gen-Z Trend Killing Pop Music

Episode Date: February 17, 2026

How has Britney made $200m from her back catalog? Can gambling sites save live TV? Is pop music finally dead? Betting sites Kalshi and Polymarkets offer odds on every possible outcome in media and politics - can their enormous pockets reinvigorate live television? Richard Osman reveals conversations with big industry players that think just that. Britney Spears has netted a reported $200 million dollars for the rights to her back catalog, what does this tell us about the music industry, and the worrying trend for Fauxstalgia? Recommendations: Richard: Hitster (Game) Small Prophets (BBC2) Marina: Arcadia at The Old Vic Winter Olympics (BBC) The Rest is Entertainment is brought to you by Octopus Energy, Britain's most awarded energy supplier. Join The Rest Is Entertainment Club: Unlock the full experience of the show – with exclusive bonus content, ad-free listening, early access to Q&A episodes, access to our newsletter archive, discounted book prices with our partners at Coles Books, early ticket access to live events, and access to our chat community. Sign up directly at therestisentertainment.com For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com Video Editor: Joey McCarthy & Adam Thornton Assistant Producer: Imee Marriott Senior Producer: Joey McCarthy Social Producer: Bex Tyrrell Exec Producer: Neil Fearn Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Octopus Energy. Now, it is award season. Everyone is wondering who's going to clean up. And we tend to think awards are about that one big moment, like, oh, my goodness, that one night, that speech, I can't believe I've won. But... The effort that goes into winning an award. Everyone going for one of those big movie awards. It's not a coincidence that academy members or whatever are saying, oh, did you see that I think?

Yeah, I did. It was really good. There is a remorseless, many months campaign. And there are tens of people working on. every single film's awards campaign. I thought you're going to say tens of thousands. No, no. But there are tens.

Yeah, there are tens. But that's quite a lot when you think of like one. And it's a full-time job. We mention this only because we are announcing our presenting partnership with the lovely people at Octopus Energy who have just won the which recommended provider of the year for the ninth time in a row. And that is not something you get just by year. Which is hard to win.

Which is hard to win. Which is hard to win. Which is hard to win. But nine in a row, I would say that. makes Octopus Energy the Merrill Streep of the business. Oh yeah, they're the Merrill. They're the absolute. They're the Merrill. I call them Merrill Energy. That's what I call them. Hello and welcome to this episode of The Rest is Entertainment with me, Marina Hyde.

And me, Richard Osmond. Hello, listen to Hello, Marina. Hello, Richard. How are you? I mean, yeah, not too bad. How are you? I'm very well, thank you. Very well indeed. Have you had a busy week? I only asked because for the last half hour you've been telling me what a busy week you've had. And that's not the first time I've been telling you this week. This week, Richard. I've had a really busy week, Richard. I can't bore a very. everyone else with it. Sorry, that was just for you. Okay. But I'm excited to talk about the subjects we're talking about because they're really interesting. There are two websites that are called

Kalshi and Polymarket and you are going to hear an awful lot more about them in the next 18 months, two years, in the world of television, in the world of entertainment, certainly in the world of content as well. They are both companies which could save our industry or doom humanity. And we're going to talk about why. One of those two things is going to happen. We're also going to talk about Britney Spears, who has sold her music catalogue for an undisclosed sum. And we're going to talk about why she might have done that, why people do it, why people acquire catalogue and much more broadly about catalogue itself. And also we're going to talk about whether that means new music has died in some way. We're spending so much money on old music.

What has happened to new music? Okay, let's begin with calcium polymarket. Let's talk about calcium and polymarket. So these two businesses, they're called predictions. markets. Now, you and I would look at these things and go, hold on, they're betting companies. Because essentially, you can predict anything. You could predict the score of the Super Bowl on Kauci and in Polly Market. You could predict the score on Premier League football. You could predict all sorts of things. So to you and I, that would be...

The viewership of the Super Bowl. Yeah. Yeah. All sorts. The weather in your state. But, you know, that's not a prediction. It's a bet. Okay. But it's called prediction. And that becomes important. financially that becomes important in this story. Now, these two companies, Kalshi and Polymarket, very hard to get official figures of quite how much they turn over, but it looks like last year they're somewhere around $63 billion. And that is almost double.

They thought it was $12 billion in December alone. Yeah. I mean, it's absolutely huge. And the way they're doing it, if you go on the front page of Kalshi and Polymarket, which you must do after this, it's very, very interesting. I wouldn't recommend anyone bets because you, will lose, but, you know, it's just interesting sociologically to look. That's the thing I'd always say, not bet responsibly, but just remember that you will definitely lose money. There will be,

as you say, there'll be Oscar bets you can make what's going to win, you know, best movie. There will be bets on how many times is Elon Musk going to tweet next week. Currently, favourite is 360 to 379. Bernie Sanders is about to do a speech in North Carolina. Will he use any of the following words. Will he use the word Minneapolis? You can bet on that. You can bet on when Donald Trump might bomb Iran. You can bet on this awful story of Nancy Guthrie, the mother of Savannah Guthrie,

the US presenter who's been kidnapped. You can bet on whether they're going to arrest someone. I mean, you can bet on anything. You can bet, I'll give you the odds, in fact. You can bet on, will Jesus Christ return before 2027? What sort of chance do you think there is of that happening? Tell me at time of recording. A time of recording 4%.

Wow, that's not a lot. I mean, that's America. You know, you can also get, you know, will the USA reveal the existence of aliens? That's 10% at the moment. So it's a betting thing, but it's not just on, you know. By the way, if they've got anything, they should put it out right now. Yes. It'd be very helpful in many ways.

Well, I presume that's why some people are betting on it. They're thinking that's Trump's last card. Yeah. Isn't it? By the way. Area 51. There was an alien. the key to this.

Yeah, exactly. So, as you say, in the states, for whatever reason, these companies are classed as prediction markets, not betting companies. Because betting was, sports betting is legal to very... It's legal in 20 states betting. Now it is, but until something like 2018, and they had to go to the Supreme Court and over time it all, and then lots of, they've done it at a federal level,

and some people have allowed different versions of it. Which is kind of weird for us, because we don't understand. We can bet on anything. And the two big companies in the betting space are Fangiole and Draft Kings, which are regulated as gambling entities. And you can bet in 20 states and you can't bet in the other 30. Now, all of these companies, why are we talking about it on an entertainment podcast? And the reason is they are all invagling their way into entertainment, especially into live entertainment, which, as we know is, that's the biggest version of entertainment that is left for us. So draft kings and fangio you'll see it all over

If you live in a particular state You know you'll be able to see the progress of your bets on screen As you're watching a you know NFL game We saw it the Golden Globes Polymarket were the company who were providing the odds Saying who's going to win best actor who's going to win They paid a huge amount for that Some people say they paid a hundred million

I know I think that's I don't think they did pay a hundred million But they paid a lot It was really sort of janky I mean it looked really nath and but the hosts mentioned them all and you know I think Hollywood sort of bristled at them being there having spoken to people involved

I think Polly Market themselves understand that what they did at the Golden Globes which is who's about to win this thing that you're going to win which by and large in most of the world ceremonies you sort of know actually rather spoiled it and they should be doing betting on how many people thank their agent

how many people go over their time you know whims are cool things that add a little bit of value to a broadcast you know you're still advertising your company and you're still getting value for money, but you are making the broadcast better. But it is clear that they, Kalsi, who've got deals at CNN, CNBC. Well, that's the weirdest thing at the moment. They've got a ticker running along the bottom on CNN and you can bet on, you know, the news is a market.

You can bet on things happening much as you would be able to see a ticker going across the sports broadcast and bet on those things. Or the stocks, which is the thing that legitimizes it. because Wall Street is essentially gambling, of course, and always has been, there's something kind of heritage and legacy about the idea that, you know, futures markets have always been with us just in different forms. The trick they're playing and the trick they've been allowed to play is they're legislated as a financial services company, as a prediction company,

as a derivatives company, if you want to get completely specific about what they're regulated at. So people are not gambling. They're making informed, you know, decisions on where the future of a market might be. So they find themselves in a situation where they are not regulated in the way that betting companies are. So they can sort of embed themselves in news and they can embed themselves in sport and all of these type of things without any sort of legislation. Can I give you an example of how unregulated they are? Because I found this so funny. Somebody on Caliore opened an account, as in had never traded before, made one trade on the Super Bowl,

about 50K that Gargar would be a kind of guest of bad bunny. then six hours later made eight out of eight correct predictions on people who would not be co-performers and then said yes but Ricky Martin would do. It's like it's just completely un-rowed. Okay, so obviously what I'm saying in case it's not extremely obvious because you're not a betting person, that is obviously a form of insider trading. Obviously that person knows what's happening. And also in the derivatives market, you don't actually get prosecuted for insider trading.

You are allowed to use personal knowledge. that you have, which is what people doing. I mean, even to the extent that there was a bet to place just before Nicholas Maduro was captured by the Americans, a bet that made $400,000 that Maduro would be captured in the next day. Now, I mean, that's someone who knows that Maduro is about to be captured. Bides time on the stakeout? Yeah, exactly.

There was an allegation which has not been proved that Caroline Levitt, Trump's press secretary, she was doing a press briefing. And you can bet on how long the press briefings will take. and they said just before, I think, the 65 minute mark, she looked at her watch and stopped immediately. So there were people saying, oh, I bet that someone's had a bet on Kalshut or Polymarket. So you find yourself in this Wild West over there

where you have these companies that allow you, you don't need to mince your word to bet on pretty much anything. Richard, that is fascinating in a dark way. How will it influence this world that we talk about entertainment? The guy he came up with Polymarket. October last year he became the world's youngest ever self-made billionaire. Okay. And he was 28 years old, 27 years old in fact last year.

It's a self-made billionaire through Polymarket. Now, I suspect that his title has just been taken by someone. We talked about the other week. And I think for the same reason. So we talked about Carbile, the TikTok star, who just signed a billion dollar deal for e-commerce. And what these guys are doing and what they really want to get into is, we talked for years and years about second screen viewing, which is people are always on their phone when your program is on the television. Now, there's two things they can be doing. Looking at someone

else's content, that someone else is monetizing, giving their data to somebody else, or they can be looking at something which you have a part of. E-commerce, of course, is that. So that's why Carbilele is worth a billion dollars, because you can be watching him and you can be buying something at the same time. And Polly Market and Kalshi are worth so much money because you can be betting on the thing you are watching. And in the same way that we all understand that you can bet in match in the football, you can be watching a reality show

and be betting all the way through. So you're double screening, but the people who are funding, the big screen, are also getting money from the small screen as well. Who's going to win traitors? Who's going to go at this round table? That sort of thing. All of that kind of stuff.

I mean, the interesting thing, Calci, you've got huge markets right now on Survivor, on Traders, on Love is Blind, beast games, all of that stuff. So where is this going? Well, I would say this from producers I talk to in the States and for people at those

companies. Television is not overfunded at the moment. We have a funding crisis in television. People are looking for money from everywhere. Movies are as well. That's why they're looking for Saudi Arabia money. You know, if there's money out there, people want it. Polly Market and Kalshi find themselves absolutely

awash with money. I mean, crazily a wash with money and not that many places that they can spend it. Okay? So, you know, they can spend it on Super Bowl. They can spend it on live sports. They can spend it on live events, those sorts of things. But we are going to get to the stage where they start funding events themselves.

So you'll get there in the same way that you can bet on Survivor and traitors and what have you, which is a slightly tricky market for them because some people know already who's won. But if you're a polymarket and you team up with one of the big entertainment producers, which is definitely what they will do, you are producing shows that are live, that are always on, and that have a series of things in them that you can bet on. So you're producing a big, you team up with a big entertainment producer. You come up with a format that's very sticky anyway and it's very exciting anyway,

and you just run it and run it and run it and in it, there are market after market after market. The prize money for that show. The creators are literally just greyhounds. No offence to greyhounds or creators. The entire budget of that show, The entire winnings of that show can be funded by losing bets. Oh, beyond.

I mean, the amount of money. And that is definitely coming down the track. Over here, it would be harder because over here they will be regulated as betting companies. But also one of the things I think about when I think when you talk like that is that I think the culture is already so softened up for it. We've talked about it how often before, even down to the things like buying laboobos. People expect there to be disappointment, something transactional, something transactional, the gamification of actually. absolutely every single tiny thing. And a lot of people always say, you know, when they're trying to be clever about gambling,

it's a form of self-loathing, you're addicted to losing because that's the thing that happens most. And actually that's the thing. It's a form of like whatever. An agent was asked about it. He was saying these newer audiences, exactly that, increasingly accustomed to and addicted to interacting with what's on their screens. And he said, look at what fantasy football has done for the NFL, right? It's increased viewership and increases people's engagement. This agent says, when you gamify things, everything's more interesting.

It matters more when there's money on it? I have a lot of sympathy with if you gamify something is more interesting, for sure. And if you're playing fantasy football, I had to give up fantasy football because it got too interesting for me. Because it, you know, every single, everything that happened, you know, had an impact on me. One day at a time. The thing about fantasy football is it doesn't cost you anything. The thing about gambling is it does cost you something. It costs you a lot.

And actually, online gambling is, you know, very available to people. but it sort of is and it sort of isn't. Gambling is not overt in our culture in the way that entertainment is. I know if you watch Sky, there's a million gambling adverts. I absolutely get it. But it's not overt in our culture. Whereas if you take this new generation of people who, as you say, are used to having a transactional relationship with the people they love watching on TV,

if you've got a TV show that you can bet on and it's live and involves creators who we know are on a piece of it, and that's absolutely fine, and sponsored by someone who's on a piece of it, and that's absolutely fine because that's what we've grown up with. That is a situation where you've got to be very careful. You know, we can see the money it brings in and we can see how it's funded, but who is funding it? And, you know, betting companies tend to make a lot of their money

from a small amount of people. So for TV producers, I think it's very interesting, there's this prediction market of ridiculous things. And I think it's certainly interesting that there's a lot of money out there, a lot of money. And I think it's interesting that the people at Polly market and Kalsi are also reaching out and saying what is it that we can do? We're not quite, we haven't stumbled upon these billions, but in a way, they also sort of have

a little bit. It's taking them by surprise quite the pickup they have on some of the most ridiculous markets that they have. So somewhere that is all going to come together. What else I think that we started to see is that young people are saying, oh, at Polly Market, they want to watch the news. They just want to see a needle telling them exactly how likely something is to happen. That's enough news. So again, that sort of slightly worries me that every single tiny thing is being reduced. In the world of, you use...

Tell me, just give me the results. Yeah. There is an argument that says that in the world of news, this is incredibly dangerous because if people start using it as a predictive tool, then, you know, it ends in a very bad place. Personally, I don't think that's an issue. I think people are smart enough about markets. You know, you look at the markets for any political thing.

And you know it's just where the money is gone. That's all it isn't. That, by the way, is the same in prediction markets. It's just it's not really predicting. It's just where has the rest of the money gone? That's all. I just think that it is, while they are legal or quasi-legal in the States, a number of big entertainment propositions are going to crop up in the next 18 months.

Wildly funded. I mean, funded like an entertainment show hasn't been for years and years and years. I remember when we were like, oh my God, who wants to be a million? And that's so clever. They're giving away the million because everyone's ringing in. And they're taking a piece of the phone line. And that was like the most revolution thing, you know, never done. But if you want to do a TV show with a 25 million pound prize, here you go, absolutely doable.

But it would be funded by losing bets. But everyone I speak to is thinking about it. Certainly those companies are thinking about it as well. As I say, over here, you wouldn't necessarily be able to commission it because of the regulatory issues but if you're YouTube or if you're someone like that then of course you could do

in some ways it's hard because the other one other drawback to it even within their like TV market or whatever it is is that shows have to be live at the same time for everyone to be and because of the time differences across the states it's hard to export

you have to create local versions but I'm sure with AI they could find that quite easy but here's the thing with this always on. I mean, you just create something that does that. That's the point if you're an entertainment producer. What do you just do it on YouTube? You go, oh, what's the issue? Oh, the issue is that we can't put it at 9 o'clock Eastern time because that's, you know, the rest of the world don't have that. You think, well, hold on, I've got steps all around the world. I've got

different time zones everywhere in the world that I can schedule different things, different things for different markets. But, you know, the place is the same, that, you know, the platform is the same. It's just you use that fact. So that, that for me, would be a positive rather than a negative. Also, if you're a podcaster, I mean, having, have an always on podcast where, you know, random events are happening, which can be predicted or not predicted. I mean, it's, it's, there's free money right there. But I can assure you that if we have one, you are running it. No, I'm not going to get into it. I'm not going to anywhere near it. Imagine how obsessed you become with it. But it's, it's, you know, these ideas are so simple and they're all out there.

And people will do them. I do not need a cut. But it's, it's all, it's, it's all there. live and unpredictable that can be funded by a company making money off people betting on unpredictable things is an absolute shoe in in the next 18 months, two years. We're going to have big entertainment propositions, which are live, which are funded entirely by prediction markets. Over here, they will be gambling companies. But I just thought it's an interesting thing for people to keep an eye on when something like this crops up. This is where it's come from and this is why it's come about as well. But everybody I speak to now in the world of live events

and the world of entertainment is having conversations about this and about this extraordinary source of money. I think for the movie industry, I don't see there's anything in this. I don't see it. I don't see how that works particularly. For micro dramas, yes. Yeah, 100%.

If I am Kalshry or Polymarket, I would put so much money into microdramas because I have 20, 30, 40 different cliffhangers which I can release, I have absolute control on when they get released. I absolutely can have an either-or thing that happens at the end of every single one of those things. So 100% it will go into microdramas, but also the world of game, reality, creator, influencer economy, stuff that has any sort of challenge, stuff that has any sort of A or B option to it. All of that can be paid for by this and it would be a market which they would massively exploit.

Imagine how many more people you need trying to work out whether people are, inside trading or do you just not have any? I don't think they're fast, you know, because they're, so long as they're making money, you know, they always say you never see a broke bookie. Not that these people are bookies, their prediction marketeers. Right, after this break, we're going to be talking to you about Britney Spears and her selling her music catalogue and what it all means. Or are we?

You can bet right now on pottymarket.com. See you after the break. Welcome back, everybody. Now, Brittany. Our old friend. It's Brittany, bitch, as they, in the parlance of Brittany. Britney Spears has just sold her catalogue to Primary Way, which is a fund that buys up lots of these sorts of things. Now, what does this all mean?

Okay, Bruce Springsteen told this catalogue. Half a billion dollars. Yeah, exactly. I mean, it's extraordinary the money. Queen sold for over a billion. Yeah. Half of Michael Jackson was 600 million. It's not exactly clear what she's sold.

Sony still own and control the masters of her recordings. Any publishing stream she has, in her case, not a lot because she didn't write her own hits mostly. So it's more likely artist royalties, which is her share of recorded performance royalties. And we don't know how much she sold for. People are suggesting $200 million, as I say, I've seen that figure quoted, but I don't know.

And people in the music business don't really know apart from the people who've done this deal. It won't be insanely different to that. Digging into the numbers briefly at the start, She earns about $1.5 million off Spotify annually. We can see that. Now, if you add in all the other music streamers and YouTube and film and TV licensing, she probably gets $7 or $8 million a year.

So why sell? The end of her conservatorship, remember she was in this very, very restrictive relationship where parents were essentially legal guardians and she wasn't able to do anything. When that came to an end, when Brittany was freed, as it were, they think she had about 60 million. now they think she's down to 40 million.

It's insane spending private jets. I mean, it's, bless her, she makes very bad decisions. And there's a sense that there's possibly a cash crisis. If this is what she sold it for, there won't be any more problems in that department for now. In terms of why acquire catalogs? Can I also say it's incredibly boring, but incredibly tax-efficient to sell your back catalogue?

If she can make $7 to $8 million a year in royalties, she is paying what we would consider income tax on that. If she can sell to a company and there's various ways that you can kind of package that up, she will pay essentially what we would call capital gains tax. So I know that's boring, but it just means that suddenly she's probably paying about half the tax. It makes sense for her to have it now. If you are primary wave, that's the interesting question, because if she is making $8 million a year, it takes you 25 years to pay that back, which is of no interest to any financial company ever, so they must have bigger plans for it.

Why do people acquire a catalogue? First of all, it's got this huge long-term value. I would say that in the case of Brittany's catalogue, John M2, who did Wicked, is doing the Britney biopic. That will be very, very big. 90s music is on a tear. I'm going to get to that a lot in a minute. Other markets like Asia, Latin America are kind of growing.

They're betting she's going to have years where she's making 25, 30 million. Yeah, because I tell you, because she is iconic. And I know that sounds like a word you would use. to describe like an outfit someone wore on a reality TV show that you loved. But actually what I mean about Britney Spears is she has been on a journey, she endures,

new people discover her, and her story, maybe it will end happily, maybe it won't. But above all, she is a story. And there is something about that type of artist and that type of catalogue

that makes it a very, very interesting investment. And this, again, this is... And as I say, a lot of artists have cashed out. Yeah, well, this is a financial note, the reason why this market has become so huge, sort of is due to Spotify, because the one thing financial institutions need is they need data as to how well whatever they're buying has performed and how they might be able to ramp that up. And what Spotify has given them sort of for the first time is a yearly indication of you are definitely getting this much money

each year because I can show you for the last 10 years how much she streamed, how much that made her, if that's gone up, if that's gone down. And so they have a base level of going, OK, we understand this is an asset that will bring us in $2 million a year. Whatever happens, that's going absolutely nowhere. And we can see a way of ramping that up. So the fact that there was a dependability in the figures means that people have started buying catalogue. If, for example... But it's become like an institutional level asset.

Yeah, exactly. Which is a really weird way to think about creativity. And yet, here we all are. But now we understand how much the legacy of a band can make each year. Absolutely. You can see that number on a spreadsheet. And so we can work out. okay we can give you 200 million pound for that in a way they wouldn't have been able to do 15 years ago

absolutely and what's interesting if you look at the artists who've sold and you say okay Springsteen dillon whatever you're now looking at people it wasn't that long ago that Justin Bieber remember when he did it but Justin Bieber sold his for 200 million Katie Perry sold now Britney there is a sense among people in the music industry that people these the sellers are getting younger and it might start a wave of people doing this so catalog is not front line new music not all the new things. The theory was that in lockdown, catalogue took over from new music, the first lockdown. Something like 67% of playlist had nostalgia in it. Gen Z now listens to more catalogue music than they do new music. That says something about the cultural moment we find

ourselves in. Rock music is turning into classical music. You would think it's insane if a new classical composer sold more than Mozart. In the same way, you would now think it's insane if Fontaine's DC were selling more than Queen. Exactly. That's what you're going to think. where we've got to. And they come to it via various routes. The roots are they come to it, they come to it via TikTok, it's a background tracks, things like that, and nostalgia is just like a monster tag on

TikTok. But they also, what's interesting is, there's this, they have this idea of sort of like an idyll, like there was this pre-digital time when culture wasn't splintered and it wasn't siloed, and they sort of want to go back there. And it's interesting, there are club nights

where Gem Zet will listen to all this type of music, faux-stalgia, It's not nostalgia. They weren't there in the first place. It's not like school disco when people used to go and listen to the sort of hits that were around when they were kids. It's almost like a false memory. Kind of in that way that boomers think that there are,

some boomers think that they were in World War II. When famously guys, you weren't. But much less annoying than that. Yeah. So you're saying there's a lot of 25-year-olds who think they saw Nirvana at the Brighton escape rooms. Well, they didn't, I don't know, they wish they had. It was the escape club. I just called it the escape rooms.

That's terrible. 16-year-old me, it would be... Bright in escape rooms, it's something very different. But it's yearning, again, that we talk about. I don't know if you've heard this word that's like a big sort of trend word of 2026, friction maxing. The idea to kind of shun digital convenience and go back to things like vinyl, but the music that comes from these times,

they have such a suspicion, a deep suspicion and cynicism, Jen said, about music from now. Because people understand so much of what machines and computers are capable of. And so even manufactured bands from the past, you know, obviously people who have put together on a TV show are more authentic than artists now who have come up in a non-manufactured way. Well, the site I've talked before about AI is there's a time before it and a time after it. And the time before we know it was made by human beings. And that starts to become a premium. And it's already happening.

You're so right. They just feel like it sounds more authentic. And the sounds have become so computerized or so overproduced. Or maybe that they know when it was made and therefore they're just suspicious of it. And there is another thing that's interesting with Gen A below them. 70% of Gen A have millennial parents

and they have a kind of shared culture. They listen to the same things. They are totally timeblind. They literally don't care when the music came from. They're not like, you know, we were where we wanted to be listening to the things that came out now and like some stuff are, you know,

obviously you get older and you think, oh, actually, you know, whatever things my parents like, work all. But there's none of it. that sort of sense that you have to reject everything that came before you. Artists that create kind of whole worlds, their music is particularly conducive to being caught again by these new, think of someone like Abba. They're so their own world. What does it matter where they came from?

You look at the top 20 album charts at the moment, which is physical sales of albums, which is where you would expect the newer, younger bands to be because you actually have to, you know, actually have to buy these things. In the top 20, you have got Queen, you have got Elton John, you've got Fleetwood Mac, you've got Oasis, you've got Aba, you've got Lincoln Park, for heaven's sake. You know, all of these legacy acts just stick around those, you know, there are albums there that have been in the chance for 20 years. They're rediscovered by, they're being rediscovered by young people. Aba is massive with under 21s.

I would say are massive. Yeah, you're right. We're not Americans. Abba are massive with under 21st. That's like when you watch the World Cup and they say England is playing great here. You think, no, England are playing great. And actually, they're playing badly. but it's our

well get used to it for the summer but a third of Beatles listeners are under 28 there's certain bands just like you were sort of laughing about Lincoln Park Arctic monkeys always have young fans

because a lot of artists want to move forward they're kind of propulsive and you live through this you tour it and then you want to make something new and you don't want to go back and the ones who are doing the best

now are the ones who are not sort of afraid or precious about the decontextualisation of their music you know not saying oh there's a moment in time It's a new moment in time and you better let new people discover it.

They also discover it via sync. Sink is obviously the licensing of music to be used in film, TV, soundtracks. And it is an absolutely huge window of discovery now. There's so many retro TV shows say there's things like Derry Girls, Stranger Things, obviously, the behemoth, where people are finding tracks because of that and then they're doing a catalogue dive because of that. So sometimes those moments are just like a flash in the pan for the industry and they can't really do anything with it. There are plenty of other occasions where they can kind of build it into a campaign for an artist. And if you look at someone like Kate Boucho who's running up the hill, wasn't just used, though.

I mean, that's the dream for an artist. It's not just used in season four of Stranger Things. It's an actually really significant plot point and part of the whole emotional arc of it all and is intimately bound up with the story. And she, I think, at the last count, had got something like 10.8 million so far from that. That's a great person for it to go to, but. You couldn't be happier and that people are discovering her. I mean, she, again, she is iconic in that way that I said about Brittany. She is there and it's such a created world and you can discover.

And when you discover it, you go on a deep dive into it and you understand it. And it doesn't matter that she wasn't on your top of the pops and that you don't even know what top of the pops is. It doesn't matter because it's just a, it's a whole world and you want to lose yourself in it. We have definitely reached a tipping point where new music is no longer the thing. And, you know, if you go back, if you want to watch an old Top of the Pops on BBC 4, it was all new stuff, new stuff, new bands coming along all the time, you know, new, you know, new eras, so much stuff happening. And now, of course, you know, you'll get Taylor Swift brings out a new album, you know, Bruno

Miles will bring something out, bad money, or bring something out. Now, of course you can go back. There's a reason why this generation finds the Beatles, because they listen to it, and it turns out it was the best music of that era, and it's better than almost all the music since that era. Definitely a tipping point, right? it's definitely the tipping point happened four years ago, five years ago. I remember in that when we were talking to Adam Curtis about Shifty, and we were talking about the birth of remixing and just that.

And he said, I really feel that there was a sense that we kept pushing culture through the same thing and just finding different ways to look at it. I definitely feel this now that we're almost stuck and lots of people, including in the music industry, feel it's strange. you know, a new thing's really, a fewer and fewer new things going to be created because people are just finding different ways to rediscover the past. Well, Agatha Christie still sells 20 million books a year and we'll do forever now. That was going to happen to pop music at some point.

You know, we still, if you're, I'm 55, and there was still the sense in the 70s and certainly the 80s that music was still stretching its legs, was still finding out what it was, still reacting against the previous generation, you know, then you had punk and you had, you know, the new romantics and this idea that the story was still being written. There are lots of amazing young, new bands now releasing great records, and I've always seek out new music. But it feels like the story, such as it is, has been written. But so much of that music was a comment specifically on its times. And as I said, that's what you're having to persuade artists of, that, no, yeah, it doesn't matter if this was a sort of

punk thing. Now people like it for some completely different reason. And it's well, whether you think there's enough of contemporary engagement, a frontline music engagement with its own times, or whether we're just being narcotized by this kind of nostalgic journey into a place that many of us never even were in the first place. Yeah, it feels like what I call catalogue is taking over from the sort of, that kind of raw fury of new music. Yeah, the big huge decade at the moment that is master of all it surveys is the noughties,

which is strange because it's a 20 year cycle. lost. The 80s I know, the 90s I'm pretty much on top of. The naughties for me, I couldn't tell you anything that came out. Oh, you could. There's a lot of Brittany, but it's the particularly toxic. It's such a toxic era. Literally toxic. Well, it's, yeah, it's celebrity culture that decade, particularly, I think. I think it's, yeah, I said before, celebrity culture and Islamic fundamentalism. Oh, wow. But actually, the financial crash. Stealing in in 2008. Yeah. Oh, I remember that. Are we played that amazing game?

Hittster, have you played that? No. It's a really, really cool game that's on your phone, and you play music and you've got a series of cards, and you have to put them in order of the years that they happen. You play it in teams. And honestly, anything, if it's 70s, 80s, I can tell you the exact year.

I can almost tell you the month. As soon as it gets to, you know, I would say the Timberlake era, I'm like, oh, I don't, yeah, I know the song. Once he decouples from NSYN. Yeah, exactly. That's, yeah, Justinberlake leaving NSYNC is my, that's pretty much when.

That's it. Yeah, for music. Any recommendations this week? Live winter sport. I have been loving. I meant to say this actually last week. Absolutely not understanding anything in the commentary on some really obscure snowboarding event. I've loved the Winter Olympics.

BBC are doing it brilliantly as a couple of snowboarding commentators. Tim Warwood and Ed Lee, who've done an answer for us on our Q&A before? Yes, they have. Lovely boys. Absolutely hilarious. I enjoy that. I saw our. Arcadia, Tom Star Pards Arcadia, which has been revived, and I saw it at The Old Vic, which I absolutely loved. But for me, the play is beyond a masterpiece. It's absolutely extraordinary. It is the absolute star. And it was absolutely wonderful to see that. And I'm also very much enjoying Mackenzie Crook's small profits. I knew it. If I can, I have absolutely, you know, McKenzie Crook is such an interesting guy. It's such a great writer and he has got such a particular world view. That show is brilliant. It's almost impossible to.

explain what it's about because it's about something very unusual. But what it's really about is about human beings. And it's got Pierce Quigley playing a guy who's working in a DIY store, his life, a sort of collapses, all sorts of mysteries going on. Definitely going to be a huge cult sitcom because it's great. I think it really has a chance to be a big mainstream sitcom. And one of the reasons, first is McKenzie Crook's, you know, his whole vibe is very mainstream. But it's got Michael Palin right in the middle of it, playing Pierce Quigley's dad and playing him brilliantly. And it's on BBC 2 and very little it's on BBC 2 now. And I know they're trying to put a little bit more on and that idea of BBC have got less money,

but they're spending it on, you know, pure and fewer things. But, you know, the quality of control has to be very high. And certainly the quality of control on that, I would say, is absolutely through the reef. Small profits, it's called, with a pH. That, I think, wraps us up. But we'll be back on Thursday, as always, with a Q&A, some of which will be a bit of an awards season special. We've got some really interesting answers from some awards season people. Yes, we did lots of questions about awards.

So we put into people who know more than us. And also on Friday, for the first time, I'm going to start doing a thing where I interview people about books. It's the national year of reading this year. And, you know, part of, I'm an ambassador for it. And so part of my job is to make more people read more things. And so I'm going to interview a few people, ask them about books, book recommendations and so on. So we're piloting it on Friday. And we're piloting it with me talking to you about your favourite books.

You just made me sound like a fake guest. No, you're not a fake guest. No, because imagine if you didn't do this podcast, you've been amazing. guest. They'd be like, Marina Hyder said yes. I'd be like, oh my God, you never hear her, do you? You see, like she writes all that stuff and she's really funny, but you never actually hear her on something. I'd be amazed to hear what her voice

sounds like. So yeah, I look forward to talking to you about books. She'd have some book recommendations and yeah, we'll see if that works as a format and then I'll do it with other people. Oh, I'll make it work. Oh, I don't doubt that for a second. I don't doubt that for one second.

Right, everybody. See you on Thursday. See you on Thursday.