Back in March, my (very, very Gen Z) team and I were brainstorming which TikTok audio to use for our International Women’s Day content. “How about Shania Twain’s ‘Man I Feel Like A Woman‘?” I suggested. I was met with a room of incredulous faces. “What’s a Shania Twain?” they responded
Like pretty much everyone else on the platform, we wanted our videos to go viral. Virality on TikTok is powerful yet unpredictable. Behind these uploads, you’ll find dance challenges and lip-synced duets in the millions – all promoted by TikTok via hashtags.
“Good songs with a good sentiment don’t age,” I tried to argue. But it was anarchy against the Millennials in the meeting room and my decision was overthrown. Gen Z can make anything cool again. Their social media superiority not stopping at the ability to turn butterfly clips and fluffy bucket hats into 2022’s answer to a Tumblr aesthetic. They account for 44% of users on TikTok and, somehow, have the ability to bring artists from Fleetwood Mac to Kate Bush crashing back into the mainstream just by instigating a new 15-second video trend.
Like it or not, this demographic’s aptitude to control TikTok trends has become one of the
most powerful promotional tools in the business. Between them, they have the ability to launch, cancel, and, in some cases, relaunch music careers; they are the new cohort of social media marketers.
As for Shania Twain? That still don’t impress them much. Yet.
Top & trousers by Nadine Marebi. Shoes by Yoox
And so, when we started putting together The Music Issue, we couldn’t ignore the micro-video app and its role in catapulting certain artists into superstardom. From Issam AlNajjar to cover star Elyanna, we meet the breakout stars who owe their chart success to serendipitously being discovered on the “For You” page.
@cosmopolitanme GRWM ‼️Elyanna is giving us noughties 90s Arab glam, and we’re not ready. Nancy and Haifa who?تجهزوا معي – اليانا تعتمد على لوك العرب في التسعينات واحنا مو مستعدين. نانسي وهيفاء مين؟ 🤩🤩@elyanna ♬ original sound – Cosmopolitan ME
The now-ubiquitous social media platform has become the most fertile source for birthing the nouveau celebrity. But in a digital sphere where attention spans are ever-shortening and mass opinions change in seconds, this issue also explores the future of fame in music, and how having a smartphone instantly makes everyone a stakeholder in the influencer sausage factory.
Photography by Mohammad Adel Rashid at Cosmotel 2022
Via @millimidwood on Instagram
And it’s not just through a score or written word where sound is amplified. Musicians have officially taken over the beauty space, too. So much so that your Sephora and your Spotify cart are starting to look a lot alike…
As for Shania Twain? That still don’t impress them much. Yet.
Click here to read Cosmo ME’s Summer Issue online.
Illustration by Johanna Goodman.