Lady Gaga’s ‘Abracadabra’ Heralds the Return of Recession Pop

The stock market is crashing. Egg prices are skyrocketing. And Lady Gaga has just topped Billboard’s pop dance charts with her latest single, Abracadabra, dropped during last week’s Grammys broadcast.

It’s official: Recession pop is making its grand return, and the world is ready to get back to partying through the pain.

If you’re new to the term recession pop, here’s the rundown: It describes the carefree, get-your-life-together vibe of music that emerged during the Great Recession—yes, the financial crisis that sent the economy into a tailspin between 2007 and 2009. But while the global financial system was unraveling, pop music had an almost defiant response: pure, unadulterated escapism. Enter the anthems of the era: Will.I.Am’s Tonight’s Gonna Be a Good Night, Rihanna’s Don’t Stop the Music, and Lady Gaga’s own Just Dance. It was a time of champagne dreams and credit card debt, where all you could do was dance your way through the chaos.

But just when everyone thought the genre was officially dead, Charlie XCX dropped her iconic dance album Brat, which instantly sparked rumors about its return, even garnering thinkpieces in publications like Vogue Australia, NBC, and Dazed. However, it wasn’t until Lady Gaga released “Abracadabra,” the single from her upcoming Mayhem album, that the return of recession pop became official in the internet’s eyes.

One Reddit user summed it up perfectly: “Recession pop is SO back.”

Another fan, unfazed by the price hikes at the grocery store, chimed in: “Eggs may be 25 dollars, but we’re still eating.”

It’s not just Reddit—it’s TikTok too. Creators are flocking to the app, turning their bedrooms into mini-clubs, dancing to Abracadabra, and expressing their excitement about the genre’s return in their captions.

“Recession pop is so here, and I love it,” wrote TikToker DJ L BEATS (@dj.lbeats) in the caption for their video.

While 2025 may be off to a shaky start, one thing is for sure: If the world is going to crumble, then we at least deserve one hell of a soundtrack to listen to as we watch it all fall to the ground.