The story of how “Same Love,” by Seattle rapper/producer duo Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, became one of the top songs of the summer of 2013 is also the story of how the music industry has been completely upended in the last fifteen years.

Macklemore, a relatively older rapper at age thirty, began 2013 with the Billboard No. 1 hit, “Thrift Shop.” The video for the song was posted on YouTube the previous summer, and had generated more than 380 million views a year later. Most interesting about this success is that Macklemore & Ryan Lewis can take credit for it: They don’t have a recording contract. The quirky repeating saxophone line and irreverent lyrics made “Thrift Shop” the first No. 1 hit from an independent group since 1994.¹ They did it again later in 2013, hitting the top spot again with “Can’t Hold Us.”

Their success had already defied the typical when they released the song “Same Love,” written and recorded in 2012 as a way to support Macklemore’s gay uncle, his uncle’s partner, and his gay godfather—and also after he read a report of a bullied teenager who committed suicide.² The song became an anthem for support of Referendum 74, a measure to uphold same-sex marriage in Washington state. It would soon have national resonance.

Although other songs, such as Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way,” have addressed the battle for gay equality, “Same Love” is one of the most politically direct songs to emerge as a hit in decades. (One would have to go back to rock and roll’s protest years in the Vietnam War era to find a major hit as pointed.) Macklemore targets politics in the song (“The right wing conservatives think it’s a decision/And you can be cured with some treatment and religion”) and his own form of music (“If I was gay, I would think hip-hop hates me/Have you read the YouTube comments lately?”). The refrain, by openly gay singer Mary Lambert, laments “I can’t change/Even if I tried/Even if I wanted to.”

Corporate radio was not hot on the trail of this song. But with sixty million YouTube views by the summer of 2013, some radio programmers understood the song’s connection to larger issues in the nation (the U.S. Supreme Court’s decisions that summer upholding California’s gay marriage law, and overturning the Defense of Marriage Act, which had denied federal recognition of same-sex marriage since 1996). Other radio programmers, particularly at reluctant hip-hop stations, eventually responded to listener demand, and the song raced up the music charts.

In today’s sound recording business, industry revenues have leveled out and in 2012, global music sales actually increased for the first time since 1999 (the year of Napster’s arrival).³ But the industry is half its former size, and many artists, like Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, are finding that they can leverage the Internet to reach a fan base without the help of a big music label.

Big stars with enormous recording contracts—like Adele, Beyoncé, and Taylor Swift—still remain. But even their paths have changed: Adele became famous through MySpace, while Beyoncé and Swift have become bigger than their recording contracts, gaining millions in endorsements and sponsorships to chart their own career courses.

Given their new fame and fortune, one might expect Macklemore & Ryan Lewis to entertain major-label offers. Yet they’ve already addressed that scenario in another song titled “Jimmy Iovine,” named after the chairman of Universal Music Group’s hip-hop powerhouse label, Interscope Geffen A&M. In the song, the artists finally make it to their dream, a visit to Iovine’s office. Then they reconsider: “I replied I appreciate the offer, thought that this is what I wanted/Rather be a starving artist than succeed at getting f—ed.”

The digital turn in the music industry has changed the calculus for musical artists. Macklemore proves that it’s possible to shun the big contract and not end up a starving artist.

THE MEDIUM OF SOUND RECORDING has had an immense impact on our culture. The music that helps shape our identities and comforts us during the transition from childhood to adulthood resonates throughout our lives, and it often stirs debate among parents and teenagers, teachers and students, and politicians and performers, many times leading to social change. Throughout its history, popular music has been banned by parents, school officials, and even governments under the guise of protecting young people from corrupting influences. As far back as the late 1700s, authorities in Europe, thinking that it was immoral for young people to dance close together, outlawed waltz music as “savagery.” Between the 1920s and the 1940s, jazz music was criticized for its unbridled and sometimes free-form sound and the unrestrained dance crazes (such as the Charleston and the jitterbug) it inspired. Rock and roll from the 1950s onward and hip-hop from the 1980s to today have also added their own chapters to the age-old musical battle between generations.

In this chapter, we will place the impact of popular music in context and:

As you consider these topics, think about your own relationship with popular music and sound recordings. Who was your first favorite group or singer? How old were you, and what was important to you about this music? How has the way you listen to music changed in the past five years? For more questions to help you think through the role of music in our lives, see “Questioning the Media” in the Chapter Review.