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Who knew the Moulin Rouge-era ?Lady Marmalade,? which pointed to the past in so many ways, would become such a prescient harbinger of the future? The year was 2001, and to promote his long-awaited followup to Romeo + Juliet, Baz Luhrmann rounded up a pop-star Avengers of sorts to sing a 27-year-old disco hit that had already been recorded several times over. Christina Aguilera, Lil? Kim, Mya, and Pink assembled to wail away over Missy Elliott?s hip-hop-infused production, donning cabaret lingerie and prancing through a video at least as memorable as any scene from the film, and it was enough to send the new ?Lady Marmalade? to #1 for five weeks on the strength of radio airplay alone. The song wasn?t released as a standalone single for purchase, and neither the iTunes store nor commercial streaming services were in the picture yet, but if streaming had been available back then, people would have streamed ?Lady Marmalade? so much ? which brings us to our present situation.

That ?Lady Marmalade? remake is the earliest pop posse cut I can think of and the only notable one I can remember until the last few years. (Before we go any further, let?s define ?posse cut? as song with at least three featured vocalists.) In the rap world, posse cuts are a storied tradition, with a stable of MCs often piling onto a single track and passing the mic for a show of solidarity and/or some friendly competition. The practice hasn?t traditionally translated to the pop sphere aside from massive charity singles such as ?We Are The World,? ?Do They Know It?s Christmas,? and ?Sun City.? There have always been pop groups, of course, and blockbuster duets are a longtime staple of the industry, but rarely have we seen a small army of pop stars ganging up for one song the way rappers do.

I don?t claim to understand all the reasons for that, but I have some ideas. One of them involves the way hip-hop evolved compared to pop. Rap began as a freewheeling, spontaneous exercise with MCs passing the mic at house parties and park jams, and it quickly evolved into a competitive art form playing out on street corners and in recording booths. Thus, it?s completely natural to throw a bunch of rappers on a track; even after decades of corporatization, it?s baked into the genre?s DNA. By comparison, mainstream pop has always been a hyper-controlled form of show business; even the pop stars who seize agency over their careers usually do so with a meticulous eye for detail, and even the boy bands and girl groups who trade verses on pop tunes usually do so with scripted coordination. Whereas every vocalist on, say, A$AP Rocky?s ?1 Train? was racking his brain trying to out-rap the competition, every Backstreet Boy was just trying to hit his cue.

With those contexts in mind, it?s no surprise pop acts have not historically participated in large-scale collaborations. Even a duet involves the cooperation of two empires, so forging a coalition of three or more artists could theoretically become extremely messy business from a creative or brand-management standpoint, even before you consider contractual obligations. Speaking of contracts, at a time when album sales were an extremely important revenue generator, the question of whose album got the big hit song would probably have been extremely sticky. And even though there?s obvious promotional value to cramming a bunch of famous people onto a song together, why would a pop superstar want to split royalties or attention so many ways when they can do just as well releasing songs on their own?

Times have changed, though, and the changes have led us to the dawn of the pop posse cut era. They?ve been popping up more and more in recent years: Think Robin Thicke, Pharrell, and T.I. teaming up for ?Blurred Lines? in 2013 or Jessie J, Ariana Grande, and Nicki Minaj aligning for ?Bang Bang? in 2015. Lately we?ve seen an explosion of such collaborations, including the current #1 song in America, a remix of Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee?s ?Despacito? featuring Justin Bieber. The previous #1 single ? DJ Khaled?s ?I?m The One,? which also features Bieber plus Quavo, Chance The Rapper, and Lil Wayne ? is a rap posse cut in form but a pop song in function, with each rapper delivering his verse in singsong and Bieber cooing a typically translucent hey-girl hook. And tomorrow Scottish hipster DJ-turned-EDM overlord Calvin Harris will unleash a whole album of all-star pop posse cuts called Funk Wav Bounces Vol. 1, which, if advance singles are to be trusted, might go down as an early pinnacle for the form.

More on Harris momentarily, but first: How did we get here? For one thing, we must consider hip-hop?s resurgent influence on pop thanks to streaming and stylistic evolution, a subject I wrote about at length earlier this year. You may notice that all of these pop posse cuts, even ?Lady Marmalade,? feature at least one rapper. Rap was overlapping with pop in a big way at the turn of the millennium when Moulin Rouge came out, and now that it?s happening again, we shouldn?t be surprised to see some of its tropes trickling into the pop mainstream. Nor should we be surprised that posse cuts in particular are becoming more common in pop ? not with Khaled, the reigning king of funneling umpteen MCs onto one beat in search of a hit, enjoying an ever broader profile outside the rap world and wrangling pop monoliths like Beyonc?, Rihanna, and Bieber for his new album.

In addition to its role in blurring the boundaries between rap and pop, streaming?s financial impact probably has something to do with pop stars? sudden willingness to team up Ocean?s 11-style. This New Yorker feature on royalties is complicated, but long story short, songwriters used to make decent money off album sales and radio spins, but now make a paltry fraction of that from streaming royalties. Thus, it?s no longer as much of a financial hit to add extra artists ? who?ll almost always expect a songwriting credit for their contribution ? to your big pop single. If you?re a producer-as-lead-artist looking to pad out your aspiring chart-topper with one more household name for insurance purposes, the potential gained exposure from added star power probably outweighs the potential financial cost. And if you?re a bunch of industry-backed B-listers like Nick Jonas, Anne-Marie, and Mike Posner, you might as well merge your powers like so:

Meanwhile, if you?re Calvin Harris, you apparently decide the time is right to deliver the lite-funk beach party version of a DJ Khaled album. Whereas Harris singles have historically featured one vocalist only, almost every song on Funk Wav Bounces includes two or three guests. Many of his A-list DJ-producer peers have been moving this direction ? one prime example is Major Lazer?s propulsive new ?Know No Better? with Travis Scott, Camila Cabello, and Quavo ? but Harris is taking it further than any of them. At a time when the biggest names of the EDM explosion have adapted to softer, smoother, easy listening sounds without losing the electronic pulse at the heart of their music, Harris has undergone a full-scale reinvention, completely abandoning the aesthetic that made him famous in favor of classic party music fit for tropical vacations and backyard barbecues. (I can also report from experience that they sound fantastic while inflating a kiddie pool for a two-year-old?s birthday party.)

Part of the reason these new Harris songs feel so festive is the presence of so many vocalists. It?s as if you?ve stumbled into an invite-only celebrity bash ? an effect straight out of the Khaled playbook. Admittedly, Khaled?s tracks often feature a more conventional number of performers. The exquisite new ?Wild Thoughts,? for instance, is more like a Rihanna single with a Bryson Tiller feature. Similarly, no one would would describe ?Rollin,? a sun-baked chillwave-funk groove on which Harris matches Future with ascendent R&B crooner Khalid, as a posse cut; it?s merely a better-than-average boilerplate rapper-singer collab. But the other three singles from Funk Wav Bounces have been master classes in melding disparate talents.

?Slide? paired Frank Ocean with Migos rappers Quavo and Offset with such weightless transcendence that I haven?t been able to stop listening to it (nor writing about it) since the it dropped back in February. ?Heatstroke? was another stroke of genius, casting Young Thug as a howling ATLien James Brown and letting him run wild through an ebullient Motown-disco excursion that plays to the strengths of costars Pharrell and Ariana Grande. Pharrell returned for ?Feels,? a contagious reggae-inflected bop accented by Katy Perry?s effective Gwen Stefani impression and Big Sean rapping his usual corny one-liners with such poise and conviction that they almost begin to sound clever.

None of the Funk Wav Bounces singles have come anywhere near the top 10, which is baffling to me given their high-wattage star power and brilliant execution. Thus far Harris has pieced together seemingly incongruent parts so skillfully that I cannot wait to hear what the rest of the album has in store. This time last year I would not have believed that a Calvin Harris album featuring 21 guest vocalists would have the potential to go down as one of 2017?s most compelling creative statements, partially because Harris has long been a singles artist and partially because Khaled?s star-studded albums are always so painfully bloated. Yet all evidence suggests Funk Wav Bounces will be a blast, and its 10-song tracklist promises that it won?t wear out its welcome. And if it really is that good, we may look back on it as a significant landmark in the trajectory of modern pop: The first great album of the pop posse cut era.

Lengthy but a good read. Do you see more artists coming together?

[United Nations Barbie 🇺🇳]

Not reading all of this shit, what does it say?