History CondemnedByHistory / Music

* Of all the acts that fell off at the turn of the 2010s, few fell harder than Music/TPain. Despite getting panned by critics for largely abandoning rapping in favor of Auto-Tune-assisted singing, his debut album produced two Top 10 hits and became a staple of clubs and parties around the world. He continued to build on that success with his 2007 album ''Epiphany'', which produced his first #1 hit and became his first chart-topping album. However, the backlash against T-Pain's overexposure, use of Auto-Tune, and less-than-positive lyrics built up over time, and after 2008 each successive album release produced fewer sales and hit singles. As he was the GenrePopularizer of his particular brand of auto-tuned music, he had a hard time escaping from the niche he carved for himself once it fell from popularity. The 2010s saw him mellow out and start to use his popularity and goodwill to make cameos in series like ''WesternAnimation/WeBareBears'', ''Series/TheEricAndreShow'', and ''WebVideo/EpicRapBattlesOfHistory'', along with an acclaimed winning stint on ''Series/TheMaskedSinger'' where he showed his detractors his genuine pipes free of auto-tune, so while T-Pain is still recording and performing today, it appears that he's pretty content that he's unlikely to ever recapture the glory of his early career.

* In 2003, Music/AshleeSimpson piggybacked off of her older sister Music/{{Jessica|Simpson}} to enjoy a meteoric rise with a PopPunk sound akin to Music/AvrilLavigne. Her first album, 2004's ''Autobiography'', went triple platinum. Then came [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWJCfbMw0Yo her disastrous performance]] on ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' in October 2004, where she was [[ThatSyncingFeeling caught lip-syncing]] when her band started playing the wrong song, followed by an embarrassing "hoe-down" when she [[OhCrap realized what was happening]]. While awkward, this ultimately didn't derail her career, as she still had two more top-20 hits with "Boyfriend" and "L.O.V.E." in 2005. However, a disastrous performance at the 2005 Orange Bowl's halftime show -- in which she ''was'' singing live, but [[HollywoodToneDeaf so badly]] that she was booed offstage -- cemented the idea in the public's mind that she couldn't sing without studio help. This awful performance, along with the 2005 BoxOfficeBomb ''Undiscovered'', was where Simpson's career plummeted. Her following album, 2005's ''I Am Me'', sold far less than ''Autobiography'' and didn't even reach the platinum mark. She only released one more album after that, the commercial bomb ''Bittersweet World'' in 2008. She's had a bit more success as an actress, playing Violet Foster on the short-lived ''Series/MelrosePlace'' SequelSeries and Roxie Hart in Broadway and West End productions of ''Theatre/{{Chicago}}''. But Simspon's career as a pop star is over, and it seems unlikely at best that she'll ever regain her pre-2005 fame. When she's brought up today outside the tabloids and reality TV, it's usually in the same breath as Music/MilliVanilli as the punchline of jokes about lip-syncing.

* ShockRock, rock music whose main allure was how shocking and offensive it was to MoralGuardians (such as Music/AliceCooper), has largely died out. The main reason is due to cultural desensitization to such musical flamboyance - mainstream pop singers like Music/LadyGaga, Music/NickiMinaj, Music/AdamLambert, Music/MileyCyrus ([[ContractualPurity post-]]''Series/HannahMontana''), and others have made shock value such a major part of their routines that it's become, well, routine to expect musicians to push the envelope. Secondly, the internet has made far more extreme bands and genres (GangstaRap, DeathMetal, {{horrorcore}}, etc.) accessible to young people wishing to rebel against their parents. Furthermore, the kind of MoralGuardians that once railed against shock rock, and [[NoSuchThingAsBadPublicity gave it much of its allure]] in the process, are nowadays seen as ineffectual jokes. The last true shock rock band to make it big was Music/MarilynManson in the '90s[[note]](who, ironically, wrote a song called "Rock Is Dead" that decried and castrated the Shock Rock genre)[[/note]]. After Manson, the ''next'' [[TheNewRockAndRoll musical moral panic]] starred Manson's occasional collaborator Music/{{Eminem}}, a ''hip-hop'' musician whose sound [[RapRock didn't touch rock]] until he was already an established controversy magnet, and which was more about shock ''[[VulgarHumor comedy]]'' than about shock alone. His cheerful, [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids childish]], MTV-friendly sound and videos made him a huge pop crossover artist, serving as the event that made shock a staple of the mainstream Top 40 pop world and sealing shock rock's obsolescence forever. Since then, this once-controversial style of rock music has turned into joke fodder. \\

* In 2003, Music/AshleeSimpson piggybacked off of her older sister Music/{{Jessica|Simpson}} to enjoy a meteoric rise with a PopPunk sound akin to Music/AvrilLavigne. Her first album, 2004's ''Autobiography'', went triple platinum. Then came [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWJCfbMw0Yo her disastrous performance]] on ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' in October 2004, where she was [[ThatSyncingFeeling caught lip-syncing]] when her band started playing the wrong song, followed by an embarrassing "hoe-down" when she [[OhCrap realized what was happening]]. While awkward, this ultimately didn't derail her career, as she still had two more top-20 hits with "Boyfriend" and "L.O.V.E." in 2005. However, a disastrous performance at the 2005 Orange Bowl's halftime show -- in which she ''was'' singing live, ([[HollywoodToneDeaf badly]]) -- saw Simpson get booed offstage. This awful performance, along with the 2005 BoxOfficeBomb ''Film/{{Undiscovered}}'', was where Simpson's career plummeted. Her following album, 2005's ''I Am Me'', sold far less than ''Autobiography'' and didn't even reach the platinum mark. She only released one more album after that, the commercial bomb ''Bittersweet World'' in 2008. She's had a bit more success as an actress, playing Violet Foster on the short-lived ''Series/MelrosePlace'' SequelSeries and Roxie Hart in Broadway and West End productions of ''Theatre/{{Chicago}}''. But Simspon's career as a pop star is over, and it seems unlikely at best that she'll ever regain her pre-2005 fame. When she's brought up today outside the tabloids and reality TV, it's usually in the same breath as Music/MilliVanilli as the punchline of jokes about lip-syncing.

* In 2003, Music/AshleeSimpson piggybacked off of her older sister Music/{{Jessica|Simpson}} to enjoy a meteoric rise with a PopPunk sound akin to Music/AvrilLavigne. Her first album, 2004's ''Autobiography'', went triple platinum. Then came [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWJCfbMw0Yo her disastrous performance]] on ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' in October 2004, where she was [[ThatSyncingFeeling caught lip-syncing]] when her band started playing the wrong song, followed by an embarrassing "hoe-down" when she [[OhCrap realized what was happening]]. While awkward, this ultimately didn't seem to derail her career as she still managed to have two top 20 hits in 2005 with "Boyfriend" and "L.O.V.E."; however, her even more disastrous halftime performance at the 2005 Orange Bowl, in which she ''was'' singing live ([[HollywoodToneDeaf badly]]) and got booed offstage, did damage her career, as did the 2005 BoxOfficeBomb ''Film/{{Undiscovered}}'', which was critically savaged. Her following album, 2005's ''I Am Me'', sold far less than ''Autobiography'' and didn't even reach the platinum mark. She only released one more album after that, the commercial bomb ''Bittersweet World'' in 2008. She's had a bit more success as an actress, playing Violet Foster on the short-lived ''Series/MelrosePlace'' SequelSeries and Roxie Hart in Broadway and West End productions of ''Theatre/{{Chicago}}''. But her music career is all but over, and when she's brought up today outside the tabloids and reality TV, it's usually in the same breath as Music/MilliVanilli as the punchline of jokes about lip-syncing.

* The 1977 easy listening ballad "You Light Up My Life", as covered by Debby Boone[[note]]daughter of the aforementioned Pat Boone[[/note]] (it was written by Joseph Brooks and originally performed by Kasey Cisyk) was the best-selling single of the 1970s and one of the most successful singles overall, charting at Billboard #1 for ten consecutive weeks upon release. It even won both a Grammy for Song of the Year and an Oscar for Best Original Song (due to being a tie-in for the movie of the same name [[note]] A movie that was panned and has largely been forgotten, which would not help the song's later reputation [[/note]]). However, over the years the song's reputation has declined, due to overexposure on the radio, criticism of the song as being bland and chaste for a love song, and suspicions that the song was a [[ChristianRock Christian Pop]] piece that was [[AmbiguouslyChristian slightly secularized]] for a mainstream audience. Nowadays, "You Light Up My Life" is considered one of the worst songs of the 70s, often appearing on "worst songs" lists from the decade, and is played very little on radio stations today, even easy listening ones.

* Music/MasterP and his independent label No Limit Records were quick to pick up the torch after Music/{{Tupac|Shakur}} and Music/TheNotoriousBIG were murdered, along with the implosion of the West Coast GangstaRap movement that followed. By the time his triple-Platinum album ''Ghetto D'' came out in 1997, No Limit was embraced as the last bastion of HardcoreHipHop by those who hated [[GlamRap "shiny suit" hip hop]]. P's rise to prominence solidified UsefulNotes/NewOrleans as the new capital of gangsta rap, paving the way for the [[SouthernRap "Dirty South"]] to dominate the industry in the 2000s. But after only two years, Master P suffered legal issues that would eventually bankrupt his label, and his style came off as a stagnant {{Flanderization}} of what Tupac had been doing. Plus, there were fresh faces emerging from the East Coast like Music/JayZ and Music/{{DMX}}, and fellow New Orleans label Cash Money Records sprung to prominence on the heels of Juvenile's breakout single "Ha", seizing the attention of P's fanbase. P's 1999 album ''Only God Can Judge Me'' got horrible reviews, while Cash Money had explosive success with "Back That Azz Up" and the debut of Music/LilWayne. Throughout the 2000s, No Limit had little to offer aside from P's son Lil' Romeo becoming a family-friendly child star. To this day, Master P is largely written off as a detour in the history of gangsta rap rather than a legend. Meanwhile, Cash Money forged a hip-hop dynasty that is still going strong. ''400 Degreez'' even made the 2020 version of ''Magazine/RollingStone''[='s=] 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, which ''Ghetto D'' missed completely, ensuring Master P's condemnation.

* After the death of Music/TupacShakur in late 1996, Ja Rule [[FollowTheLeader tried to capitalize]] on Tupac's image and persona. Starting in 1999 with his single "Holla Holla", Ja Rule released several chart-topping songs through the 2000s, which got him four Grammy nominations along with six top-ten albums. But his hardcore gangsta image was always suspect, since he sang in most of his songs and released several romantic duets (described by WebVideo/TheRapCritic as "thugs need love too" songs). But what really sealed Ja Rule's fate was [[BullyingADragon starting a feud with]] Music/{{Eminem}} (due to his friendship with arch rival Music/FiftyCent) by [[WouldHurtAChild insulting his daughter Hailie]] in the song "Loose Change". Eminem, who is well-known in rap circles for being [[PapaWolf fiercely protective of his daughter]], was so pissed off that he wrote a response track called "Hailie's Revenge" with D12 and Obie Trice, where they tore into Ja Rule for [[TheyCopiedItSoItSucks ripping off]] Tupac and not being a real gangster. Thanks to the backlash, Ja Rule joined the dustbin of flash-in-the-pan 2000s rappers, and his involvement in the infamous [[Horrible/MusicFestivals Fyre Festival fiasco]] has ensured that Ja Rule's music is all but forgotten.

His momentum began to slow in the Show Dog era, however, due to a slew of weak novelty songs and a decision to always release one album per year - meaning he often had to pull singles that were doing well on the radio just to rush out the lead single to the next album. He seemed to bounce back in 2011 with "Red Solo Cup", which became a viral crossover due to its unusual style and quirky, cameo-filled music video, but any momentum brought by that single was killed by his 2015 album ''35 MPH Town'' being his first not to have a Top 20 hit at all, and its follow-up never materializing due to its intended lead single coming nowhere close to the country Top 40. His restaurant chain also sank due to a myriad of construction and leasing issues (including [[https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona-investigations/2020/02/05/ex-mobster-frank-capri-arrested-fraud-charges-tied-toby-keith-rascal-flatts-restaurants-tawny-costa/4674958002/ one of the main developers being a mobster in witness protection]], bizarrely), while Show Dog Records (by then renamed Show Dog-Universal) had shed nearly its entire roster of artists due to poor promotion, poor single choices, and [[DevelopmentHell constant delays or outright cancellations]] in album releases. While Keith released more albums and singles after ''35 MPH Town'', all of them similarly failed to gain any traction on the country charts. Keith is now seen as a punchline for the use of cartoonishly overblown jingoism, over-reliance on TestosteronePoisoning, and [[TheAlcoholic excessive use of booze as a theme in his songs]].

His momentum began to slow in the Show Dog era, however, due to a slew of weak novelty songs and a decision to always release one album per year - meaning he often had to pull singles that were doing well on the radio just to rush out the lead single to the next album. He seemed to bounce back in 2011 with "Red Solo Cup", which became a viral crossover due to its unusual style and quirky, cameo-filled music video, but any momentum brought by that single was killed by his 2015 album ''35 MPH Town'' being his first not to have a Top 20 hit at all, and its follow-up never materializing due to its intended lead single coming nowhere close to the country Top 40. His restaurant chain also sank due to a myriad of construction and leasing issues, while Show Dog Records (by then renamed Show Dog-Universal) had shed nearly its entire roster of artists due to poor promotion, poor single choices, and [[DevelopmentHell constant delays or outright cancellations]] in album releases. While Keith released more albums and singles after ''35 MPH Town'', all of them similarly failed to gain any traction on the country charts. Keith is now seen as a punchline for the use of cartoonishly overblown jingoism, over-reliance on TestosteronePoisoning, and [[TheAlcoholic excessive use of booze as a theme in his songs]].

* Starland Vocal Band's sexually-suggestive "Afternoon Delight" was a huge hit when it was released in 1976, topping the Hot 100 and making #12 on the Year-End List. It even received three Grammy nominations, winning one, and likely contributed to the group's Best New Artist win (unfortunately for them, [[OneHitWonder they never had another hit]]). However, the public eventually turned against the song to the point where if it's brought up today, it's most likely to make fun of it for being a cheesy IntercourseWithYou song that [[FetishRetardant doesn't sound sexy at all]]. It being prominently utilized as a gag in the film ''Film/AnchormanTheLegendOfRonBurgandy'' sealed its fate as the butt of jokes for generations to come. WebVideo/ToddInTheShadows summed it up like this:

* Starland Vocal Band's sexually-suggestive "Afternoon Delight" was a huge hit when it was released in 1976, topping the Hot 100 and making #12 on the Year-End List. It even received three Grammy nominations, winning one, and likely contributed to the group's Best New Artist win (unfortunately for them, [[OneHitWonder they never had another hit]]). However, people eventually turned against the song to the point where if it's brought up today, it's most likely to make fun of it for being a cheesy IntercourseWithYou song that [[FetishRetardant doesn't sound sexy at all]]. WebVideo/ToddInTheShadows summed it up like this:

* In 1992, AlternativeHipHop group Arrested Development became an overnight success with their debut album, ''3 Years, 5 Months and 2 Days in the Life Of...'', which went quadruple platinum and scored three top ten singles. Critical reviews were similarly glowing, and they became the first hip-hop group to win a Grammy for Best New Artist. However, within a couple years, they drew increasing criticism for frontman Speech's perceived self-righteousness and their hostile attitude towards GangstaRap, and their work became increasingly seen as milquetoast and moralistic compared to other acts in their subgenre. The critical and commercial underperformance of the band's 1994 sophomore album ''Zingalamaduni'' finalized their fall from grace and led them to be retroactively written out of hip-hop history, with analysts and retrospectives scarcely touching them except to voice embarrassment at their past fame. Today, Music/{{Outkast}} is instead seen as the group that shifted HipHop to the American south, while the name "Arrested Development" is more widely associated with [[Series/ArrestedDevelopment the TV show]].

By the late 2000s, though, fatigue would set in for a variety of reasons. Firstly, post-grunge built up a reputation for being overly [[StrictlyFormula formulaic]], as its mainstream friendliness made it easily saturate the airwaves. Secondly, numerous acts faced a backlash for writing lyrical content that was either [[{{Wangst}} excessively whiny and self-pitying]], [[SexDrugsAndRockAndRoll childishly hedonistic]] and [[MisogynySong misogynistic]], or [[BreadEggsBreadedEggs all of the above]]. And because post-grunge had become nearly inseparable from rock music as a whole for over a decade, many rock fans felt that once the genre had succumbed to its own fatigue, it did [[GenreKiller lasting damage to rock music's overall reputation]]. Today, post-grunge is held up as a cautionary tale in what happens when you take a genre as unique as grunge and turn it into a [[MoneyDearBoy mass-produced commercial product]]. Besides a small handful of acts that either incorporated elements of other genres into their sound or {{Genre Shift}}ed, the post-grunge scene is now a graveyard full of bands that can't chart to save their lives or have broken up. Nowadays, whenever anyone uses the term [[http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Butt%20Rock "butt rock"]] in a derisive fashion, they're most likely referring to post-grunge.

* 8-track cartridges were introduced in the mid-1960s as a way for motorists to listen to their own music in the car in stereo. Players for the home soon followed, and through the 1970s, they were a serious challenger to the LP record in terms of sales, as they had greater fidelity than cassettes at the time and were easier to use than reel-to-reel tapes. They were mainly successful in North America and the U.K., while the cassette filled this niche almost immediately in Continental Europe and Latin America. While they could store an album, even a complete double album, without having to change sides, record companies would change the running order from the LP to avoid interruptions in the program. Record companies also used cheaper parts, which would make the cartridges tend to break. Cassettes improved in fidelity by the late '70s and could use the same running order as the LP, were more portable, and more easily recordable than 8-tracks. The 8-track's popularity rapidly collapsed, and they disappeared from store shelves in the early '80s, even though record clubs and truck stops sold them until the end of the decade. While the other analog formats of the era -- vinyl records and cassettes -- have had revivals in the 21st century, no one seems to be interested in reviving the 8-track cartridge, which remains a symbol of '70s kitsch. The format has since become a byword for obsolete, dead-end technology, along with Betamax.

[[folder:Other]]
* 8-track cartridges were introduced in the mid-1960s as a way for motorists to listen to their own music in the car in stereo. Players for the home soon followed, and through the 1970s, they were a serious challenger to the LP record in terms of sales, as they had greater fidelity than cassettes at the time and were easier to use than reel-to-reel tapes. They were mainly successful in North America and the U.K., while the cassette filled this niche almost immediately in Continental Europe and Latin America. While they could store an album, even a complete double album, without having to change sides, record companies would change the running order from the LP to avoid interruptions in the program. Record companies also used cheaper parts, which would make the cartridges tend to break. Cassettes improved in fidelity by the late '70s and could use the same running order as the LP, were more portable, and more easily recordable than 8-tracks. The 8-track's popularity rapidly collapsed, and they disappeared from store shelves in the early '80s, even though record clubs and truck stops sold them until the end of the decade. While the other analog formats of the era -- vinyl records and cassettes -- have had revivals in the 21st century, no one seems to be interested in reviving the 8-track cartridge, which remains a symbol of '70s kitsch. The format has since become a byword for obsolete, dead-end technology, along with Betamax.

[[AC:Songs]]
* Music/DrowningPool's debut single "Bodies" was a big hit on rock radio, peaking at #6 on Active Rock and #12 on Alternative. The song proved to be hugely memetic, quickly becoming the band's SignatureSong and being featured in countless TV shows, movies, video games, sporting and pro wrestling events, and commercials. However, the song very quickly came to be overused in [=AMVs=], Notepad tutorials, and Windows Movie Maker videos, a result of it being featured as part of Website/YouTube's [=AudioSwap=] library, which also included other singles from Wind-Up Records artists. Even worse, however, was the controversy surrounding the song, with its chorus of "let the bodies hit the floor" and its connection to a number of high-profile crimes. The song was repeatedly played [[EnhancedInterrogationTechniques to torture inmates]] at Guantanamo Bay, in 2003 a teenager shot and murdered his parents while listening to "Bodies", and most infamously, in 2011 a man uploaded a video set to "Bodies" of him burning the American flag before going on [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Tucson_shooting a mass shooting]] in Tucson, Arizona whose casualties included federal judge John Roll (among the six dead) and Representative Gabby Giffords (the intended target of the shooting who was among the fourteen wounded; she had to resign from Congress due to her injuries). The song was also included in Creator/IHeartMedia's (then Clear Channel) list of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001_Clear_Channel_memorandum "lyrically questionable" songs]] that was given out to their radio stations after 9/11. Originally written as a mosh-pit anthem, "Bodies" very quickly came to be viewed as a SpreeKiller [[MurderBallad anthem]] instead, and while Drowning Pool themselves condemned the Tucson shooting, their chart success slid down the drain until their 2016 album ''Hellelujah'' completely missed the ''Billboard'' 200. Today, the song is primarily remembered as either a punchline about 2000's Internet culture [[OvershadowedByControversy or for its links to crimes]].
[[/folder]]

* Music/MilliVanilli was one of the biggest musical acts of the late 1980s, but there was a fatal flaw that would doom them to this status: despite being advertised as the main men, neither Rob Pilatus nor Fab Morvan actually sung a note on their songs, instead resorting to [[ThatSyncingFeeling lip-syncing in public]]. This reached a head in a July 1989 concert, where the backing vocals to the song "Girl You Know It's True" began to skip, exposing the band in public and causing both men to run off the stage. [[https://web.archive.org/web/20190705203237/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-11-21-ca-4670-story.html Pilatus spoke about the moment in an interview with the LA Times]], saying "I knew right then and there, it was the beginning of the end for Milli Vanilli". And he was right -- [[OvershadowedByControversy once the scandal broke]], their fanbase vanished overnight. All of their music was immediately taken out of print, while class action lawsuits allowed listeners to claim refunds on Milli Vanilli recordings and merchandise. Their Grammy Award for Best New Artist was also revoked, the first and only time such a thing has ever happened. Well into the 2000s, the term "Milli Vanilli" was a byword for lip-syncing, and their image was only invoked as a punch line. Their music has quietly reappeared on streaming services in recent years, but has not received any significant airplay in any form of media since the scandal broke. Pilatus and Morvan are now generally viewed more sympathetically, due to later information making it clear they were victims of unscrupulous industry bigwigs rather than willing con artists, and their musical output has gotten a bit more appreciation. But [[NeverLiveItDown lip-syncing jokes about them are still quite common]], and it's clear that Milli Vanilli will never be taken seriously as pop stars ever again.

* Music/BloodOnTheDanceFloor was always a controversial band, but for a long time it was mainly because the music itself fell into divisive territory due to its {{Crunkcore}} stylings (more on that in the Hip-Hop folder), and in the late '00s and early '10s they were among the faces of "scene" culture with a passionate fanbase and a ControversyProofImage. Lurking behind the edgy image, however, were indications that it wasn't all an act - there were a litany of allegations stretching back to 2007 claiming that frontman Dahvie Vanity was a predatory pedophile. What's more, a number of their songs, such as "You Done Goofed" and "Crucified by Your Lies", directly addressed the allegations and saw Dahvie call his accusers liars and {{Attention Whore}}s. For years, he was able to cultivate an impressionable fanbase that believed his every word, but a tipping point came in 2016 when Dahvie's bandmate Jayy von Monroe left on very bad terms with him, corroborating the sexual assault allegations while adding that Dahvie had subjected him to emotional and financial abuse. As other musicians defended Jayy and added their own stories of Dahvie's behavior, the band and its music were retroactively tainted for many former fans. In 2019, Spotify and Google Play both pulled Blood on the Dance Floor's music from their services due to the growing backlash against Dahvie and lyrics that violated guidelines on prohibited content, cementing Dahvie's fall from grace. Now, they're remembered as being among the worst excesses of scene culture in terms of both the music itself and the Warped Tour's late-period reputation as a haven for sexual predators. The only debate regarding them concerns why it took so long for people to believe Dahvie's accusers.

* Of all the acts that fell off at the turn of the 2010s, few fell harder than Music/TPain. Despite getting panned by critics for largely abandoning rapping in favor of Auto-Tune-assisted singing, his debut album produced two Top 10 hits and became a staple of clubs and parties around the world. He continued to build on that success with his 2007 album ''Epiphany'', which produced his first #1 hit and became his first chart-topping album. However, the backlash against T-Pain's overexposure, use of Auto-Tune, and less-than-positive lyrics built up over time, and after 2008 each successive album release produced fewer sales and hit singles. As he was the GenrePopularizer of his particular brand of auto-tuned music, he had a hard time escaping from the niche he carved for himself once it fell from popularity. The 2010s saw him mellow out and start to use his popularity and goodwill to make cameos in series like ''WesternAnimation/WeBareBears'', ''Series/TheEricAndreShow'', and ''WebVideo/EpicRapBattlesOfHistory'', so while T-Pain is still recording and performing today, it appears that he's pretty content that he's unlikely to ever recapture the glory of his early career.

* Music/{{Liberace}}, the flamboyant piano player, was one of the most popular and highest-paid music performers of TheFifties. He was especially popular among teenage girls, who [[{{Squee}} swooned]] over him the way their big sisters used to swoon over the young Music/FrankSinatra. His popularity extended well into TheSixties, as a pleasant alternative to [[RockAndRoll rock 'n' roll]]. Most popular non-rock and non-Creator/{{Motown}} music performers of the '50s and '60s are largely forgotten today, but Liberace is still remembered... for being a ridiculously {{camp}} figure, as well as a joke on the era's cluelessness about his ''[[TransparentCloset obvious]]'' [[TransparentCloset closet homosexuality]] ("I wish my brother George was here" was referenced on ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes''). If a character refers to Liberace (''Film/SupermanII'', ''WebVideo/YuGiOhTheAbridgedSeries''), they're AmbiguouslyGay. What's more, his legacy in [[ValuesDissonance modern times]] suffers on account of the fact that he was, during his life, [[ArmouredClosetGay very adamant]] about [[HaveIMentionedIAmHeterosexualToday denying that he was gay]], giving him detractors in today's LGBT community. Being openly gay back then was tantamount to career suicide, but even after his death in 1987, his estate and personal physician went through great efforts to cover up the fact that he died from AIDS-related complications. His fall from grace appeared complete when his Las Vegas museum closed due to waning popularity in 2010 (with plans to reopen it in 2014 failing to materialize).

* {{Disco}} is no longer an example, given both [[PopularityPolynomial its revitalization and]][[VindicatedByHistory and reevaluation in the 2010s]] as well as the more critical eye taken to the [[DiscoSucks anti-disco backlash]] around the same time. However, it gets a special mention here not only because it is the [[Administrivia/RenamedTropes former]] TropeNamer, but because the backlash was ''that'' heated during TheEighties. A full exploration can be seen on [[Analysis/DiscoSucks the Analysis page for the Disco Sucks trope]], but to summarize: disco skyrocketed in popularity in [[TheSeventies the late '70s]] thanks to the success of ''Film/SaturdayNightFever'', but thanks to a combination of [[WolverinePublicity overexposure]], music critics lavishing praise on Disco artists whilst at the same time giving negative reviews to rock bands like Music/{{KISS}} (who are now held in much higher regard than most Disco artists) and causing a lot of resentment among fans of said rock bands, the genre's association with things like ConspicuousConsumption, [[NoFameNoWealthNoService elitism]], and [[SexDrugsAndRockAndRoll hedonism]], and plain old bigotry against disco's mostly black, Latino, and LGBT+ audience, the American public (though notably [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff not the Europeans]]) turned against it in record speed. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disco_Demolition_Night "Disco Demolition Night"]], a promotion by the [[UsefulNotes/MLBTeams Chicago White Sox]] on July 12, 1979 in which crates full of donated disco records were [[BookBurning blown up]] in the middle of a baseball double-header (sparking a riot), marked the turning point, and by the end of 1980 disco was dead. [[SubvertedTrope Since then, however]], disco has continued to influence dance music, HipHop, and a lot of other genres while experiencing periodic nostalgic revivals, with TheNewTens in particular seeing the backlash mostly die out. The sole exceptions are people who grew up during the 1970s and early 1980s, who are ''still'' likely to respond to the mention of disco with "Disco sucks!", and there's still plenty of jokes to crack about leisure suits. So while it's a bit early to say the backlash against disco has ''completely'' died out, it's certainly nowhere near as bad as it once was, and its subsequent reevaluation has caused disco to subvert this trope.

* {{Disco}} is no longer an example, given both [[VindicatedByHistory its reevaluation in the 2010s]] and the more critical eye taken to the [[DiscoSucks anti-disco backlash]] around the same time. However, it gets a special mention here not only because it is the [[Administrivia/RenamedTropes former]] TropeNamer, but because the backlash was ''that'' heated during TheEighties. A full exploration can be seen on [[Analysis/DiscoSucks the Analysis page for the Disco Sucks trope]], but to summarize: disco skyrocketed in popularity in [[TheSeventies the late '70s]] thanks to the success of ''Film/SaturdayNightFever'', but thanks to a combination of [[WolverinePublicity overexposure]], music critics lavishing praise on Disco artists whilst at the same time giving negative reviews to rock bands like Music/{{KISS}} (who are now held in much higher regard than most Disco artists) and causing a lot of resentment among fans of said rock bands, the genre's association with things like ConspicuousConsumption, [[NoFameNoWealthNoService elitism]], and [[SexDrugsAndRockAndRoll hedonism]], and plain old bigotry against disco's mostly black, Latino, and LGBT+ audience, the American public (though notably [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff not the Europeans]]) turned against it in record speed. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disco_Demolition_Night "Disco Demolition Night"]], a promotion by the [[UsefulNotes/MLBTeams Chicago White Sox]] on July 12, 1979 in which crates full of donated disco records were [[BookBurning blown up]] in the middle of a baseball double-header (sparking a riot), marked the turning point, and by the end of 1980 disco was dead. [[SubvertedTrope Since then, however]], disco has continued to influence dance music, HipHop, and a lot of other genres while experiencing periodic nostalgic revivals, with TheNewTens in particular seeing the backlash mostly die out. The sole exceptions are people who grew up during the 1970s and early 1980s, who are ''still'' likely to respond to the mention of disco with "Disco sucks!", and there's still plenty of jokes to crack about leisure suits. So while it's a bit early to say the backlash against disco has ''completely'' died out, it's certainly nowhere near as bad as it once was, and its subsequent reevaluation has caused disco to subvert this trope.

* Music/{{Starship}}'s "We Built This City" topped the charts in 1985, but in hindsight, like "Afternoon Delight" and "You Light Up My Life," it's been retroactively deemed one of the worst songs ever made, if not ''the'' worst. Most critics point to the overly synthesized, corporate sound that belies the lyrics criticizing corporate domination of popular music as well as [[WordSaladLyrics nonsensical lines]] like "Marconi played the mamba." As a band that was formed out of the remnants of Music/JeffersonAirplane and Music/JeffersonStarship, the song and its music video came across aging has-beens trying to stay relevant. The new band had nothing in common with the classic PsychedelicRock of Jefferson Airplane, despite featuring the iconic frontwoman Grace Slick. The band would score further hits with "Sara" and "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now," but Slick's departure due to her dissatisfaction with the overly commercial sound led to the band dropping off the charts.

* Music/MilliVanilli was one of the biggest musical acts of the late 1980s, but there was a fatal flaw that would doom them to this status: despite being advertised as the main men, neither Rob Pilatus nor Fab Morvan actually sung a note on their songs, instead resorting to [[ThatSyncingFeeling lip-syncing in public]]. This reached a head in a July 1989 concert, where the backing vocals to the song "Girl You Know It's True" began to skip, exposing the band in public and causing both men to run off the stage. [[https://web.archive.org/web/20190705203237/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-11-21-ca-4670-story.html Pilatus spoke about the moment in an interview with the LA Times]], saying "I knew right then and there, it was the beginning of the end for Milli Vanilli". And he was right -- [[OvershadowedByControversy once the scandal broke]], their fanbase vanished overnight. All of their music was immediately taken out of print, while class action lawsuits allowed listeners to claim refunds on Milli Vanilli recordings and merchandise. Their Grammy Award for Best New Artist was also revoked, the first and only time such a thing has ever happened. Well into the 2000s, the term "Milli Vanilli" was a byword for lip-syncing, and their image was only invoked as a punch line. Their music has quietly reappeared on streaming services in recent years, but has not received any significant airplay in any form of media since the scandal broke. Pilatus and Morvan are now generally viewed more sympathetically, due to later information making it clear they were victims of unscrupulous industry bigwigs rather than willing con artists, and their musical output has gotten a bit more appreciation. But lip-syncing jokes about them are still quite common, and it's clear that Milli Vanilli will never be taken seriously as pop stars ever again.

* The 1977 easy listening ballad "You Light Up My Life", as covered by Debby Boone[[note]]daughter of the aforementioned Pat Boone[[/note]] (it was originally by Kasey Cisyk and written by Joseph Brooks) was the best-selling single of the 1970s and one of the most successful singles overall, charting for ten consecutive weeks upon release. It even won both a Grammy for Song of the Year and an Oscar for Best Original Song (due to being a tie-in for the movie of the same name [[note]]A Movie that was panned and has largely been forgotten, which would not help the song's later reputation [[/note]]). However, over the years the song's reputation has declined, due to overexposure on the radio, criticism of the song as being bland and chaste for a love song, and suspicions that the song was a [[ChristianRock Christian Pop]] piece that was [[AmbiguouslyChristian slightly secularized]] for a mainstream audience. Nowadays, "You Light Up My Life" is considered one of the worst songs of the 70s, often appearing on "worst songs" lists from the decade, and is played very little on radio stations today, even easy listening ones.

* ShockRock, rock music whose main allure was how shocking and offensive it was to MoralGuardians (such as Music/AliceCooper and Music/{{GWAR}}), has largely died out. The main reason is due to cultural desensitization to such musical flamboyance - mainstream pop singers like Music/LadyGaga, Music/NickiMinaj, Music/AdamLambert, Music/MileyCyrus ([[ContractualPurity post-]]''Series/HannahMontana''), and others have made shock value such a major part of their routines that it's become, well, routine to expect musicians to push the envelope. Secondly, the internet has made far more extreme bands and genres (GangstaRap, DeathMetal, {{horrorcore}}, etc.) accessible to young people wishing to rebel against their parents. Furthermore, the kind of MoralGuardians that once railed against shock rock, and [[NoSuchThingAsBadPublicity gave it much of its allure]] in the process, are nowadays seen as ineffectual jokes. The last true shock rock band to make it big was Music/MarilynManson in the '90s[[note]](who, ironically, wrote a song called "Rock Is Dead" that decried and castrated the Shock Rock genre)[[/note]]. After Manson, the ''next'' [[TheNewRockAndRoll musical moral panic]] starred Manson's occasional collaborator Music/{{Eminem}}, a ''hip-hop'' musician whose sound [[RapRock didn't touch rock]] until he was already an established controversy magnet, and which was more about shock ''[[VulgarHumor comedy]]'' than about shock alone. His cheerful, [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids childish]], MTV-friendly sound and videos made him a huge pop crossover artist, serving as the event that made shock a staple of the mainstream Top 40 pop world and sealing shock rock's obsolescence forever. Since then, this once-controversial style of rock music has turned into joke fodder. \\

* Music/{{Starship}}'s "We Built This City" topped the charts in 1985, but in hindsight, like "Afternoon Delight" and "You Light Up My Life," it's been retroactively deemed one of the worst songs ever made. Most critics point to the overly synthesized, corporate sound that belies the lyrics criticizing corporate domination of popular music as well as [[WordSaladLyrics nonsensical lines]] like "Marconi played the mamba." As a band that was formed out of the remnants of Music/JeffersonAirplane and Music/JeffersonStarship, the song and its music video came across aging has-beens trying to stay relevant. The new band had nothing in common with the classic PsychedelicRock of Jefferson Airplane, despite featuring the iconic frontwoman Grace Slick. The band would score further hits with "Sara" and "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now," but Slick's departure due to her dissatisfaction with the overly commercial sound led to the band dropping off the charts.

* Music/{{Starship}}'s "We Built This City" topped the charts in 1985, but in hindsight, like "Afternoon Delight" and "You Light Up My Life," it's been retroactively deemed one of the worst songs ever made. Most critics point to the overly synthesized, corporate sound that belies the lyrics criticizing corporate domination of popular music. As a band that was formed out of the remnants of Music/JeffersonAirplane and Music/JeffersonStarship, the song and its music video came across aging has-beens trying to stay relevant. The new band had nothing in common with the classic PsychedelicRock of Jefferson Airplane, despite featuring the iconic frontwoman Grace Slick. The band would score further hits with "Sara" and "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now," but Slick's departure due to her dissatisfaction with the overly commercial sound led to the band dropping off the charts.

* Music/{{Starship}}'s "We Built This City" topped the charts in 1985, but in hindsight, like "Afternoon Delight" and "You Light Up My Life," it's been retroactively deemed one of the worst songs ever made. Most critics point to the overly synthesized, corporate sound that belies the lyrics criticizing corporate domination of popular music. As a band that was formed out of the remnants of Music/JeffersonAirplane and Music/JeffersonStarship, the song and its music video came across aging has-beens trying to stay relevant. The new band had nothing in common with the classic PsychedelicRock of Jefferson Airplane, despite featuring the iconic frontwoman Grace Slick. The band would score further hits with "Sara" and "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now," but Slick's departure due to her dissatisfaction with the overly commercial sound led to the band dropping off the popularity chart.