I'm in my early 40s and most people I know around my age have no idea when it comes to modern music. I'm a bit hazy myself, my knowledge started to decline around 2005 and by around 2008/09 I had no idea what was in the charts anymore. It's only when I started blogging in 2016 that I started gaining a bit more knowledge from the modern era.

 

Growing up in the 90s it was generally excepted that anyone over 40 would hate anything modern at the time, and more often than not they did. They wouldn't know the bulk of the music coming out, but there were plenty of big hits they'd all know. It's hard to imagine anyone not knowing "Wannabe" by The Spice Girls for example.

 

It got me thinking, are there any songs from the last 15 years that everyone knows?

 

I looked at the list of number ones for the period I had no idea what was in the charts and there are a small number I've known since they came out, but there's a reason for me knowing them that doesn't translate into everyone knowing them e.g. "Get Lucky" by Daft Punk which took my interest because I listened to them in the 90s.

 

I'm really struggling to think of any. Even with well known modern artists such as Ed Sheeran or Justin Bieber, many will say they've heard of them but couldn't name any of their songs.

I would say Adele’s biggest hits fall into that category tbh…certainly Someone Like You, Rolling in the Deep and even Easy On Me. My parents, who are not pop music fans at all definitely would recognise the big ones.

I’m a mobile DJ on a weekend and I gotta feeling by BEP is definitely I see all age ranges, singing and dancing along to.

 

Think it will be hard to find someone who hasn’t heard it

And Uptown funk is another song I feel majority of people will know or have heard.

Oh Happy by Pharrell ofc

I was just going to say Happy and Uptown Funk. Probably Rolling In The Deep too, and with Ed I think everyone will know Shape Of You.

 

Also, Gangnam Style. And Baby Shark if we can count that?

Someone like You

Thinking Out Loud and Perfect would also be familiar to almost everyone. In the last few years, the biggest example would be Blinding Lights.

‘Shut Up And Dance’ by Walk The Moon is one you see people singing along to in pubs and I would say ‘Wake Me Up’ by Avicii would be quite well known as well.

Edited September 27, 20222 yr by darrens94

Let It Go - people would sing the title in unrelated situations e.g. work, with the assumption that most people would know where it came from.

Pokerface, Shallow

lots of Rihanna (We Found Love, Work)

I Gotta Feeling

On the Floor

Despacito

Call me Maybe

'Valerie' must be up there, everyone seems to know it word-for-word almost.

Uptown Funk, Happy, Get Lucky, Poker Face, Umbrella, Rolling In The Deep, Just The Way You Are, Shut Up And Dance, I Gotta Feeling… i’m thinking of songs my mum who doesn’t really follow new music knows.

 

As well as Gangnam Style I think What Does The Fox Say was a novelty that most people are aware of.

Thinking of my parents and my non-radio-listening friends, I'd say only a few of those mentioned above would be known by everyone. Someone Like You, I Gotta Feeling, Valerie. Umbrella probably. Maybe Paradise by Coldplay. Possibly Uptown Funk. Already running short of ones I'm confident on!

 

Laughed out loud at the suggestion of Work by Rihanna!

I think Uptown Funk, I Gotta Feeling and Someone Like You would definitely be the most ubiquitous

Take That Rule the World from 2007 i think is very widely known but i totally agree about someone like you, uptown funk and unfortunately Happy by Pharrell.

As if no one has mentioned Mr Brightside or Sex On Fire yet!

As if no one has mentioned Mr Brightside or Sex On Fire yet!

Mr. Brightside is 19 years old now!

Mildly leftfield suggestion but surely almost everyone in the UK would have heard Lily Allen's cover of 'Somewhere Only We Know' at least a few times. (And probably other advert songs too but that feels like the most ubiquitous - although tbf confined to just one year)

Take That Rule the World from 2007 i think is very widely known but i totally agree about someone like you, uptown funk and unfortunately Happy by Pharrell.

 

I'd say Shine for Take That as well, helped by it being on the Morrisons ad for yonks.