Grime came of age, a different kind of female pop performer cracked the charts and Chinese video-sharing app TikTok revolutionised the way fans engaged with the stars
![Kitty Empire’s best pop and rock of 2019](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/382c2f1d99f4a85f8f05f9b96f8b9180ee5a9005/0_0_2560_1536/master/2560.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdG8tZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=6fefa64dda683afc1a196d89824c0de8)
Sometimes pop moves glacially slowly. In the early 00s, a new kind of punk emerged in London: fast, angry, uncouth – but made by black Britons, so gatekeepers didn’t recognise it as an asset. Twenty years later, in 2019, grime has come gloriously of age: Stormzy is a national treasure, with a landmark Glastonbury headline slot and great second album, just out. At least half a dozen more outstanding grime LPs were released this year, with a deserved Mercury prize win for Dave, and Kano in particular providing a novelistic, emotional, mature spin on a genre that refused to die.
Sometimes, though, pop moves fast. When Billie Eilish – just 15 at the time – released her debut EP in 2017, few could have predicted that the
Los Angeles teenager would end the decade slouching proprietorially over a seriously disrupted pop landscape. In a year when the sainted
Ariana Grande and a resurgent, LGBTQ+-positive
Taylor Swift both released strong albums – Thank U, Next and Lover, respectively – this entirely different kind of solo female singer scooped the honours.