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What does it mean to “break” an artist? It’s a question that has plagued the music industry in recent months. If a singer has billions of streams but walks down the street unrecognized, have they broken? Is a lone billion-stream single enough, or is a second hit required as proof of staying power? And what if an artist racks up multiple hits but can’t pull off a major headlining tour?

The consensus among label executives is that the last pop artist to break big was Olivia Rodrigo, who had four top 10 Billboard Hot 100 hits during 2021 and debuted at No. 1 on the chart with “Vampire” in July 2023. It’s a track record, they say, that today makes her seem like a unicorn.

“Nobody knows how to break music right now,” one senior executive laments. “I think they’re all lost.”

“There is a need and a desire for new artists that have real substance — artists that are more than just a song, that we can really lean into, buy concert tickets, buy [merchandise],” says J. Erving, a manager and founder of the artist services and distribution company Human Re Sources.

“Each person I talk to in the industry is more depressed [about this] than the person I talked to before them,” says another manager.

This melancholy flies in the face of some bright spots. As of July 1, 14 artists had cracked the Hot 100’s top 10 for the first time, a varied group that includes the Nigerian singer Rema, the American rapper Coi Leray, the country powerhouse Bailey Zimmerman, and the regional Mexican star Peso Pluma. That number is already more than double the six newcomers (plus the Encanto cast) who entered the top 10 over the same six-month period last year — seemingly a sign that the industry can still catapult young talent into the popular consciousness.

Genrewise, country is buzzing, and Pluma is at the forefront of a regional Mexican boom. “There are artists breaking. It’s just that they’re in different genres, not typical pop,” one major-label A&R executive says. Pop’s current genre share dropped from 12.87% at the start of the year to 10.69% at the mid-point, according to Luminate.

Still, many music executives remain worried about stagnation beyond a single musical style. They scan the landscape and see “moments,” as one put it, that can fade, rather than genuine breakthroughs that endure. “A lot of people have this bleak mindset,” a second major-label A&R executive says. Even pop radio is seeing “historic lows” in consensus hits, according to radio veteran Guy Zapoleon, which has led to “a bear market for new music.”

Dylan Bourne, who manages rapper JELEEL!, among others, expresses a common industry sentiment: “I see one act that has broken through this year, and that’s Ice Spice.” He adds, “The fears and concerns that people were having last year have only increased.”

Some blame the meager number of big breakthroughs on label decisions. According to the first A&R executive, “Labels signed more and signed worse than ever before in the decade-plus I’ve been at a major.”

Some cite the precipitous decline of mass media like radio and the maddening unpredictability of TikTok. And some attribute the feeling of industry inertia to the exhausting intensity of competing for attention in a world where gamers and influencers wield as much clout as music artists, if not more.

“Every issue that we’re facing right now comes down to oversaturation,” Bourne says. “People are just buried in content.”

“You know when you go camping and someone pulls out a guitar, and you’re like, ‘Oh, my God. Can you please stop?’ ” grouses a third A&R. “That guy is on [digital service providers] now.”

In addition to those factors, executives say, a hit doesn’t mean what it used to. It’s common to hear grumbles about young acts who have hundreds of millions of plays of a single but can’t fill a small room for a live performance. “It’s easier [today] for folks to be passive fans,” Erving says. “For you to consider yourself really broken, people need to care about you beyond the song. Where is the connectivity? Are people really dialed in in a deeper way?”

As a result of these shifts, some executives argue that the industry needs to change the way it thinks about breaking artists. As one A&R executive puts it: “Maybe there aren’t as many players slugging home runs, but there are more producing a steady stream of singles and doubles.”

Talya Elitzer, co-founder of label and management company Godmode, works with rapper JPEGMafia, who she says “hasn’t had a traditional hit in a commercial sense.” Even so, “his business is enormous,” she adds. “We sold 15,000 vinyl records from his web store in 24 hours. He sells seven figures in merch.”

Another act climbing into this camp is Laufey, a Berklee-trained jazz singer and multi-instrumentalist who has amassed fans with swooning bossa nova and a lively TikTok presence. 18-ish months after Laufey released her debut EP, she was the number-one selling artist in terms of merch in small-cap rooms in 2022, according to Atvenu, the payment processing system which handles transactions at 125,000 shows a year. She sold out a fall tour where the average room fit 1,500 fans. “Some fans show up dressed like her,” says her manager, Max Gredinger.

Bourne believes that “if you’re an artist earning well into seven figures a year repeatedly on an annual basis, you’ve broken to a certain degree.” But he acknowledges “that is a different recognition of what breaking means” relative to the one that much of the industry still relies on.

That’s partially because ticket and merch numbers don’t matter as much to most labels. Unless an artist signs a 360 deal — which are increasingly out of favor with managers and lawyers — record companies are not getting a cut of those revenue streams. Labels tend to earn the bulk of their money from streams, downloads and old-fashioned sales.

The industry is “slowly moving” toward a different concept of breaking, one entertainment attorney says. “People are celebrating the mid-level breaks as if it’s the biggest thing in the world, because that’s what you get these days.”

Steve Cooper, former CEO of Warner Music Group, said last year that the company had taken steps to lessen its “dependency on superstars.” One way the major labels have done that is step up signings, with the goal of spreading growth across a larger number of artists rather than relying on a few tent-pole acts. In 2022, Hartwig Masuch, CEO of BMG, noted that his company’s business model “is designed to be robust enough not to need hits in order to survive.”

In addition, both major labels and streaming services are increasingly focused on identifying “superfans” and finding new ways to extract money from them. If these efforts are effective, the industry will be unable to avoid the reality that artists with small but passionate followings may generate more business than those with wide, shallow fan bases.

A study released by Spotify in July concluded that artists’ most dedicated followers — presumably the ones that might come to a show dressed like the performer — make up just 2% of their monthly listeners but generate 18% of their streams. Even more important: Those devotees account for 52% of merch sales.

For now, the uneasiness felt around the music industry is likely to persist. “The doomsday thing is comforting for people that don’t know what’s going to happen next,” says Kayode Badmus-Wellington, an A&R consultant for Def Jam. But he prefers to “revel in” the uncertainty. “I don’t know what’s going to happen next,” he adds. “But I want to be a part of it.”