According to IFPI, the music industry is currently experiencing a healthy growth rate, led by Latin America (+16.8%) and followed by North America (+14%), Asia and Australasia (+11.7%), and Europe (+0.1%). Brazil (+15.4%) and the US (+14%) have the strongest growth in Latin America and North America, respectively.
Further, Gen Z currently consumes music the most in nearly all markets and is highly exposed to international music artists. Thereby, many assume that Gen Z music fans around the globe may have similar profiles. To demystify this, we aim to explore whether Gen Z music fans differ from one country to another by looking at their core values and music preferences. For this article, we use our cross-cultural data to compare Gen Z (18-24 years old) music fans from Brazil (n = 295) and their counterparts from the US (n = 438).
Socio-Cultural Trends
Source: 2019 Glocalities Data, Social Cultural Trends of young people (18-24 years old) in Brazil (n=438) and USA (n=295).
We first look at socio-cultural trends, which are the values adopted during people’s formative life phase. Community involvement and Family important score relatively high among Brazilian Gen Z music fans. This suggests that they may be interested in group-oriented activities more often. On top of that, they are more into the stories behind a brand. That, in turn, offers opportunities to record labels or artists to showcase their “behind the scene”. In contrast, American Gen Z music fans tend to be short-term oriented and materialistic. Spending over saving and Prefer money over time are good examples. Interestingly, they also value lifelong relationship relatively more.
Turning to their music preferences, Brazilian Gen Z music fans like electronic and gospel music relatively more. They are also more likely to have dancing as their hobby/interest. These aspects are in line with the popularity of group-oriented activities among the Brazilian’s. While their American counterparts find pop and hip-hop music relatively more appeal. It is worth noting that materialism is to a large extent portrayed in the hip-hop music videos. This shows that one’s socio-cultural values are hand in hand with one’s music preferences.
