What is coworker music when you work at The FADER?

A totally serious investigation into which of the actually good musicians we listen to are the most coworker-y.

So, what is coworker music? For most people it’s the music enjoyed by a coworker whose taste makes you question whether you and this person are of the same species. It’s music that, to quote Peter Griffin, insists upon itself: woefully swaggy white boy rap like “BIG BODY BROTHERS” and “Astronaut In The Ocean,” or stadium pop like Imagine Dragons’ “Thunder,” or the stomp-clap folk pop genre parodied so effectively by Kyle Gordon. It can be any genre of music, hugely popular or tracking hundreds of monthly streams. But what makes it coworker music is its clear corniness that the coworker views as the pinnacle of cool. Worst of all, the coworker is forcing his music on you, either through a JBL speaker in the breakroom or with one earwax-encrusted AirPod. There’s something destabilizing about the coworker’s confidence that everyone will love this music, when in reality listening to it feels like wearing an itchy wool sweater in the dead of summer.

Now, the tricky part: What is coworker music when you work at The FADER? Our jobs hinge on our music tastes. If we were bigging up NF’s latest album on Friday, we’d lose our Slack access by Monday. But because we have coworkers, the laws of relativity demand that there must be coworker music.

Over the last week, The FADER’s editorial team have been pondering what our coworker music is. Who are the artists we most enjoy who 1) are making genuinely good music while 2) being the closest to coworker-core? We each picked an artist and made a case for them as coworker music in a Slack channel with the rest of the team. Then, we gave each artist a rating from 1-10, 10 being the most coworker and 1 the least. An average of the ratings was used to produce a final, official Coworker Music Score for each artist. The winner — and our reasoning behind the pick — may surprise you: read on below for our picks and conversation, lightly edited for time and clarity.

Kendrick Lamar

Jordan: Just like fascists co-opt symbols of love and turn them into logos of human suffering, so too does the coworker take great artists and render them coworker music. Kendrick’s early career was full of unabashed coworker music — collabs with Maroon 5, Taylor Swift, and Robin Thicke, for example — but ironically it was “Not Like Us,” his love letter to LA and diss against rap’s biggest coworker musician, that made him the hot topic of meetings that go on too long and mandatory after work drinks, not to mention the influencers. Also, Pulitzer Prize notwithstanding, if you perform at the Super Bowl, you make coworker music.

Steffanee Wang: 10.

Jordan: Lol, damn.

Steffanee: Conan O’Brien made a Kendrick joke at the Oscars, the biggest coworker conference of all time.

Jordan: Fair.

Vivian Medithi: I’m going to say 8 because aside from Mr. Morale even his early albums were coworker co-optable — think of “Swimming Pools (Drank)” or “Alright.”

Cady Siregar: 9 because of his association with Taylor Swift.

Vivian: “Bad Blood [Remix]” changed lives (derogatory).

Jordan: I’m starting to regret pitching this feature.

Vivian: You sound like Drake right now, Jordan.

Jordan: So long as I don’t dress like him, that’s fine.

David Renshaw: I think Kendrick taps into a vein of coworker music which is when someone likes something good but for bad reasons. For Kendrick, that’s definitely the guy who wants to explain how clever the lyrics are and what a triple entendre is.

Jordan: Yes, he makes music on his terms and not those of the lyrical spiritual cinnamon rap fanbase.

Cady: Also, short king mansplainer representation.

Jordan: David, what’s your score?

David: A solid 7.

Kendrick Lamar’s coworker music score

10 + 8 + 9 +7 = 34 / 4 = 8.5

Playboi Carti

Vivian: If you had told me on December 25, 2020 that Playboi Carti would become a Billboard staple, just a breath away from household name status, I would have laughed. But somewhere between “FEIN” and “Timeless,” something shifted. Certainly the mass exposure to three years of rage music helped, but when his appearance on “Carnival” whisked Kanye West and Rich the Kid all the way up the Billboard charts, his transition from underground icon to A-list mainstay was obvious. Sometimes, this has yielded pleasantly bizarre results, like Camilla Cabello’s “I Luv It” or Future and Metro Boomin’s “Type Shit,” but more often than not these songs just feel overpackaged and overproduced, an attempt to transmute aura into currency rather than art. What’s more coworker core than that?

Jordan: Gonna say 6.

Steffanee: I’m copying Jordan and voting 6 too.

David: My main objection to labelling Carti as coworker music is that I can’t imagine his fans having jobs. So it’s a 4 from me.

Cady: 6.5.

Steffanee: Yeah, the thought of an old white coworker bringing up Playboi Carti still seems like an impossible fantasy (or nightmare)?

Vivian: Perhaps it’s impending coworker music — just wait until the bros who had “Carnival” in college enter the workforce…

Steffanee: It’s coworker music on Wall Street probably.

Jordan: The singles he’s released in the last two years have been genuinely weird and exciting enough that it mostly feels like he’s challenging himself.

Vivian: I agree, but he’s definitely been balancing it out with some extremely pop music.

Jordan: Yeah, I think it’s coworker music if you’re a professional streamer sponsored by a toxic energy drink.

Steffanee: I don’t think going pop necessarily makes something coworker music though. His Camila Cabello feature was also very weird and disliked by lots of my former coworkers.

David: This is true. We should remember the essence of FADER writer coworker music though. Who is the artist someone would clown us for earnestly discussing at length? It’s probably someone like Carti.

Playboi Carti’s coworker music score

(6+6+6.5+4) / 4 = 5.625

Tate McRae

Steffanee: OK, I know a lot of the Music Criticism Establishment likes to hate on Tate, but I’ll say it: So Close To What is one of the first great pop records of the year! Don’t worry, it’s very obvious to me that the references in her music, her voice (which has been described to me as “perpetual cold” by one of my friends), and her cheesy lyrics are probably what categorize her as “coworker music,” but call me basic cause I like it for all those things. Just like I like fast food cuz it’s good! I think people have problems with her music not because it’s not good — because it objectively isn’t; literally major labels have scientifically engineered this stuff to be addictive — but because pretention is a shield as is the thought that every music is precious and needs to be inspected from every angle. No, sometimes people just wanna have fun!

Jordan: 10. I feel like I’ve been transported to the Peloton dimension.

David: I think Tate McRae is so definitively coworker music that liking it as a salaried music journalist is practically avant-garde. So it’s a 1 for me.

Jordan: Oh yeah, good point.

Cady: I will say 7 because she kinda has bops, but I can’t get into music by blondes.

Vivian: This is tough but I’m gonna give Tate a 7 because when I opened the TikTok account I never use, her album going No. 1 was the first thing on the FYP. Anything that can be served to you by default algorithms has to be coworker music.

Jordan: I’m going to deduct two points because she’s Canadian. [Editor’s Note: Jordan lives in Canada.]

Vivian: Nationalist bias.

Jordan: #ElbowsUp #FauciLied.

Jordan: The music is fine but it has that signature coworker music sheen of impersonality.

David: I rate that she/her label have never leaned into a credibility grab and had, like, The Dare remix “Sports Car.” That would push her more into the FADER coworker music definition, for me

Vivian: Tate McRae Nachos are delicious. Time to wash these down with an Addison Rae Diet Pepsi.

Steffanee: That’s my happy meal.

Tate McCrae’s coworker music score

(8+1+7+ 7) / 4= 5.75

Central Cee

David: In London, where I live, Central Cee is not referred to as a “U.K. rapper.” He’s just a rapper. But, having worked for a U.S.-based publication for many years, I know that the British accent is a hurdle that can trip up even the most open-minded rap fan. Central Cee is comfortably the most popular rapper of the last few years in my city; his songs marry tales of inner-city struggle with viral-bait samples that have propelled him to huge success and got kids from Shepherds Bush to Stockport wearing Nike tech fleeces in homage. I can hear the nuances in his mainstream drill sound, how it speaks to a generation raised on austerity measures and preaches both a hard-boiled reality and an aspirational dream. I suspect my colleagues, however, listen to a song like “Sprinter” and just hear “Oi guvnor, you got any more bangers and mash?” In a world of coworker music, I fear liking Central Cee is the equivalent of bringing in a local delicacy for lunch and stinking up the break room.

Cady: Greggs core. For that I will say 6.

Vivian: That new Central Cee album has so many over-explanatory lines — it goes past charming “here’s how Yanks can interpret British slang” to J. Cole or Big Sean “you get it?” territory. Gotta give him a solid 8.

Steffanee: I only listen to Central Cee when his Ice Spice feature comes on so I’m saying 7. This might be a me problem, however.

Jordan: I have a soft spot for U.K. rap but their pop turns are almost always disasters. Central Cee has star power but recently he’s been doing too much cheeky boy humor. 6 — 4 if you ignore “Doja.”

David: I can really see him on a Tate McRae song, to be fair.

Vivian: Collab of the decade.

Steffanee: That would make him sooo non coworker music.

Jordan: “I said I could treat you proper / And then you pushed up ya bumpa / I heard it’s cold in Torontah / so you can borrow me jumper.”

David: OK, I didn’t know he had a ghost writer.

Central Cee’s coworker music score

(6+8+7+6) / 4 = 6.75

The 1975

Cady: The 1975 sound like what would happen if Urban Outfitters had a record label that wanted to make a band, Simon Cowell of X Factor style, with a singer that seems vaguely like Morrissey but not really but with the same vibes who also both say sort of fascist things? who made pop-sounding music with depressed music something something. Yes… AND??? The 1975 have bops for days and I am not ashamed to admit it. Accessible enough for the radio and fun enough to sing along to while drunk on a field. Your coworkers will thank you for suggesting them a seemingly edgy band who make catchy, earworm pop. Look, there’s something distinctly David Bowie going on here! Really? No, not really, but if you listen hard enough, sure.

Jordan: 7 because their music plays in budget supermarkets and their frontman is always getting involved with drama that your coworker will insist on keeping you up to date on.

Vivian: I love that Matty Healy’s deep thoughts are kind of like a dumb person’s idea of a philosopher, it really explains his affinity for podcasting.

Steffanee: How does the 1975 being on a FADER cover factor into this…

Jordan: They were on the cover because they’re a good band… The FADER: Look Ahead

Steffanee: I’m going with 5 actually. I feel like Matty’s recent beef with Taylor Swift has made them edgier. And he’s not on good terms with the Music Critic Establishment.

Vivian: I’m giving The 1975 a perfect 10 because ian’s Macklemore-core freestyle this week reminded me of them.

Jordan: Did he beef with Taylor Swift? I thought they were in love for two weeks then dipped amicably.

Cady: Definitely not amicable. All 905 hours of [The Tortured Poets Department] were about their two week situationship.

Jordan: My grade is coming true right now. All of my coworkers are ganging up on me to tell me about Matty Healy’s beefs.

Jordan: This is probably the kind of thing that he would characterize as wokeness gone mad.

David: I think The 1975 are a real Rorschach test of a band: For everyone who sees a genre-defying group that pushes the boundaries of what pop represents in an era of doomscrolling and playlist saturation, there will be someone else that thinks they’re pseudo-intellectual magpies picking from music’s past to create a vague sound of the future — Muse for people with a Criterion subscription. The truth is they’re both right. It’s kind of why I love them, they contradict themselves so much that there is never a clear read on them. The fact that they’re everything to everyone kinda makes them a 10 on the coworker scale in my opinion.

The 1975’s coworker music score

(7+ 5 + 10 + 10) / 4 = 8

The winner with 8.5 on the coworker music scale: Kendrick Lamar

Steffanee: King coworker.

David: Certified coworker

Steffanee: I’m proud of my girl Tate for being almost last. Maybe everyone I know can finally feel comfortable coming out of the woodwork and admitting they like her music.

Jordan: The theme song for Kendrick’s medal ceremony will be his remix of “Radioactive” by Imagine Dragons.

Vivian: Imagine Dragons are so cool I love their coworker music. In college I went to a musical based on The Simpsons and the third act climaxed with a performance of “Radioactive.” It was really moving.

Jordan: I can’t think of a more coworker statement to end on than that one.