Music in 2004 is the most "lost" medium of the year. It was a screaming match between the last gasp of rock radio and the whisper of the bloghouse.
: Telly searches for proof of her son’s existence, eventually finding an ex-hockey player, Ash Correll (Dominic West), whose daughter was also on the missing plane and who has similarly "forgotten" his child. The Reveal
While Facebook was rewriting the rules of social connection, a gadget that would become an extension of the human hand was making its debut. In 2004, Motorola released the RAZR V3.
Usher. Confessions sold 1.1 million copies in its first week. "Yeah!" featuring Lil Jon and Ludacris was inescapable. Yet, pop historians skip over Usher to talk about 50 Cent or Eminem. We forgot that Usher’s vulnerable, confessional R&B (specifically the track "Confessions Part II") created the template for Drake a decade later.
Sandwiched between the post-9/11 grit of the early 2000s and the social media explosion of the late 2000s, 2004 is often dismissed as a transitional blur. It was the year of Janet Jackson’s "Nipplegate" (a scandal that erased her from radio), the Boston Red Sox breaking the curse, and the rise of Facebook—from a Harvard dorm room.
There was 2004.
So here’s to 2004. The forgotten hinge year. The last breath of analog life before the smartphone swallowed everything.