Why did rock die out in the mainstream?

In retrospect, rock was in a strange state during the Mid-Late 2000s. Emo had given rock a boost in terms of popularity, however there was already pre-existing ridicule directed towards the genre in the form of backlash towards Nickelback and post-grunge in general. Add the stigma associated with the emo label on top of that and that was ultimately one of several factors which contributed to rock's overall decline around the turn of the decade. I don't believe there was anything inherently wrong with emo as an aesthetic or sound. It's just a shame that the sub-genre developed such a toxic image in the minds of the general public, though it's easy to see why. Teenagers committed suicide listening to emo and I can even remember hearing reports on the news about things like "emo cults" on Myspace. 

You're right about indie-rock being a prominent genre in the Early-Mid 2010s, but whether or not you can really consider it as being a part of the overall "rock zeitgeist" is a matter of debate. I'm more inclined to say no, tbh. The indie scene of the 2010s was never recognised or referred to as "rock" by music critics or listeners alike. When "Pumped Up Kicks" became a breakthrough hit in Late 2011, no one defined it as ushering in a new era of rock music. Also, there were no bands or artists who were truly at the forefront of the indie scene and enjoyed a string of Top-40 hits. Gotye, Foster The People and Of Monsters and Men, while all being significant in the popularisation of indie-rock in the mainstream, only managed to follow up their biggest hits with minor Top-40 singles, and they disappeared from the mainstream public eye shortly thereafter. 

I would actually consider post-hardcore as being the natural progression from emo/scene. I'm not sure if you're familiar with the genre, but bands such as Pierce The Veil, A Day To Remember, Sleeping With Sirens and The Amity Affliction borrowed a lot of elements from emo and morphed them into a more metal-driven sound. These bands had pretty sizable fan bases; there were quite a few people in my year group who were into them when I was in high school. It was popular from about 2011- 2016. The genre was probably a little too "heavy" for the mainstream (which is why the majority of those bands never cracked the Top-40), however they performed well on the album charts. If there was ever a genre of rock that was targeted towards people around my age, it would have had to have been post-hardcore:

Yeah, rock was still extremely popular during the '00s. When I was in high school during the early and mid '00s, almost every kid liked some form of rock, whether that be Post-Grunge, or Garage Rock Revival, or even some Emo during the later years. Also, Grunge groups like Pearl Jam and Stone Temple Pilots were either still making new stuff, or were recent enough to still be seen as modern and not classic like they are these days.

Emo did start taking off around 2004, but I don't think that's what killed rock. Even though Emo did get made fun of a lot, many of those bands were still very popular among kids back then, and it's not like rock hasn't had plenty of cheesy types over the years that got ridiculed when they were popular too. Emo was still pretty popular during the late '00s too. I can recall, even like 2009 there were still some younger guys I knew that liked it.

There isn't any clear answer to what made rock become less relevant. To me, rock could have faced a similar decline in the early '90s if it hadn't been for the alternative boom of that era. If you go back to, say, 1990, rock was being dominated by the hair bands, and other genres like pop and hip-hop were on the rise, and there as a perception that rock was declining. Then, of course, alternative rock took off and revived the genre. The fact that there wasn't any new form of rock that took after Emo was pretty much totally irrelevant by, say, 2012 is probably why it's not relevant anymore.

Yep. Rock was always something that was popular when I was in primary school. Post-grunge revival had fallen out of favour by the time I started kindergarten in 2005, but quite a lot of people my age were into songs by emo bands such as Fall Out Boy and Panic at the Disco!. It was actually the genre that introduced a lot of us and got us interested in rock music. I remember bands such as the Foo Fighters, Linkin Park and Nickelback also had their fans as well. 

Looking back, rock was still culturally relevant right until the end of the decade. People like to pinpoint 2008 as having been the year rock began to decline and that's how I remember it myself, but even when you look at the music charts from 2008, rock songs such as "Shake It", "Sex on Fire" and "Pictures of You" were all genuinely big hits. 


I agree. Like I mentioned earlier in the thread, I actually feel as though the emo scene improved the then current state of rock music. Emo not only gave rock a boost in longevity and relevancy, but it also helped to redefine what rock "was" at the time.  It brought back the old "rock 'n roll" spirit to rock music, as many parents couldn't understand the appeal in it and the genre itself was almost exclusively popular with teens. Emo wasn't as easily accessible as a sub-culture as what post-grunge and pop-punk were. It had a sizable community on Myspace, which was basically off limits to parents, as social media was still primarily a teen thing at the time. The fact that there were teens who actually committed suicide from engaging in a rock sub-culture almost sounds like something other-worldy now. 

The backlash towards the emo scene may have contributed to rock's overall decline, but the genre itself wasn't responsible for it. It had simply ran it's course, as all genres do, and nothing unfortunately came along to fill the cultural void that emo had left vacant. 

Just realised that I never actually gave all of the reasons as to what I think caused rock to decline in the mainstream, despite the fact that I created this topic, lol. 

* 2008 was a lacklustre year for new releases. The only significant rock album release from 2008 I can think of would be Kings of Leon's Only By The Night. Otherwise, what iconic albums were released in 2008? The year was a stark contrast to 2007, in which you had the likes of Fall Out Boy's Infinity on High, Linkin Park's Minutes to Midnight, Radiohead's In Rainbows and Paramore's Riot! all come out in the one year. Combine those with new album releases from the Foo Fighters, Avril Lavigne and The Veronicas, rock music was still in a very healthy, competitive state in 2007. 

While it is worth mentioning that rock still performed well on the charts in 2008, it was mostly running off the fumes from previous years. There was nothing truly driving it forward. Emo had already passed it's peak in popularity by that point. Fall Out Boy and Panic at the Disco! both came out with new album releases in 2008, but they weren't as culturally significant as their earlier releases. Radio-rock had become increasingly safe and bland, which can be blamed on songs such as OneRepublic's "Stop and Stare", The Last Goodnight's "Pictures of You" and "I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz becoming some of the biggest hits of that year. The genre was losing it's edge and appeal with younger listeners.

* Electropop was such a huge cultural craze. I can remember people describing Lady Gaga as the "next Madonna" when she first emerged onto the scene in Late 2008. For the most part, electropop was seen as being a huge breath of fresh air compared to what had been popular in the last few years. Every existing Top-40 sub-genre experienced a decline in chart presence shortly after it's breakthrough into the mainstream. Even hip-hop wasn't immune to this, though what set it apart from rock was that it was able to better adapt to the new electropop trend than the latter was. There were several electropop songs during the Early 2010s which featured rapping in it's verses, such as "Where Them Girls At", "Rock Your Body" etc. '00s hip-hop artists such as Eminem and Nelly actually experienced career revivals during the electropop era.

In comparison, rock was in a state of flux during that time. Rather than fully embracing the synth-heavy sound that had swept the pop music landscape, rock music was splintered into different trajectories. There was an "electro-rock" trend between 2008-2011, popularised by Owl City, Neon Trees and Linkin Park's A Thousand Suns album, however it never amounted to an actual sub-culture. Had it become a fleshed-out genre in it's own right, i'm convinced that rock music would have stood a good chance of charting within the Top-40 during the Early-Mid 2010s. Indie-pop had started to gain traction around the same time, but as would prove to be the case in the 2010s, it was never regarded as having been a new wave of rock. Scene couldn't forge ahead as a movement due to it's association with emo. There wasn't a sub-genre of rock that truly led the way and defined the rock music landscape of that time.

Rock was suffering from an image problem. The Emo backlash has already been discussed in this thread, but there was also another huge backlash directed towards rock music due to the continued popularity of Nickelback and post-grunge bands in general. Nickelback were still the biggest band in the world even up until as recently as 2008 and by that point, they were constantly the butt of jokes. In 2011, they were named as the "number one musical turnoff", ahead of Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga. The fact that the "faces" of rock were subject to such huge amounts of ridicule really didn't bode well for rock as a genre. 

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I don't believe rock declined from the mainstream because there was no where else for it to go as a genre. It could have easily continued to achieve success well into the 2010s had it not shot itself in the foot and left a bad impression due to it's inept ability to sort itself out. There were a number of rock songs this decade which genuinely achieved a lot of success on the Top-40 charts (e.g "Shut Up and Dance", "We Are Young") and rock albums continue to perform well on the album charts, so it's clear that there is an audience still out there for guitar-driven music. The evolution of rock music isn't a closed-chapter in my eyes. For instance, I still believe electronic-rock is a sub-genre which has yet to be fully explored. 

What ultimately caused rock to fall out of favour with listeners was an image problem which would eventually become intertwined with the DNA of rock music itself; the perception of it being a safe, bland genre of music that fails to evolve and is no longer the voice of the youth.