History Main / RockIsAuthenticPopIsShallow

->''"LA told me, 'You'll be a pop star.''
->''All you have to change is everything you are.'''
->''Tired of being compared to damn Music/BritneySpears''
->''She's so pretty, that just ain't me."''

* Johnny Atkins from ''Series/TheGoldbergs'' is a big fan of Music/{{Rush}} and considers them superior to the mass-produced pop music the others listen to.

** Eminem has expressed sentiments like this about his own music, due to his Marshall/Eminem/Slim Shady split-personality gimmick allowing him to release earnest stadium RapRock songs like "Lose Yourself", intimate confessional ballads like "Mockingbird", and silly bubblegum pop songs using [[CrossesTheLineTwice offensive]] BlackComedy, like "The Real Slim Shady" - the last of which he found [[ComedyGhetto least valuable]] in middle age, expressing CreatorBacklash to it. In 2010 he justified his switch to an earnest RapRock sound by saying he wanted to make ''meaningful'' songs that could make his fans' lives better. In his 2014 single "Guts Over Fear" he claimed the "playful songs I make for fun" are meaningless, and that he'd rather make a sequel to his uplifting gospel-rap "Not Afraid" than to his impish celebrity-[[InsultComic insult-fest]] retro-pop hit "We Made You". This is all despite many of Eminem's comedy pop songs, particularly the ones on ''Music/TheMarshallMathersLP'', being celebrated by critics for their intellectual depth, beautiful language use and social satire, while his earnest work tends to get received as {{Glurge}}y and boring. However, one of the songs Em cited in 2010 as having a meaning was the funny-accent-driven and [[HomophobicHateCrime hyperoffensive]] [[TurnOfTheMillennium Y2K-era]] pop-rap "Criminal", and he's continued to write funny lyrics and songs, insisting that if you aren't laughing even at his 'serious' songs then you don't get him as an artist. By 2020, he'd relaxed on this point, with ''Music To Be Murdered By: Side B'', an album he put out to cheer up his fans during [[UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic the lockdown]], containing a silly-voices skit, [[HurricaneOfPuns lots of groaner puns]] and the fan-fav nonsense-rap "Discombobulated".

* Music/StockAitkenWaterman were thought of by their detractors as being Shallow Pop embodied, This songwriting, production and management team relied on manufactured and slickly marketed acts, with SAW exerting rigorous control at all steps of the process. People who thought music should be more spontaneous than that, with an unpredictable and uncontrollable element, more RAW than SAW, were turned right off.

Music genre elitism is the tendency to place two or more music genres against each other in the narrative in some way or form. One genre is seen as TrueArt, and the other is seen as manufactured and soulless. The most common and classic way this is presented is {{Rock}} (in all cases, is usually AlternativeRock) versus {{Pop}}.

* The ''Series/BlackMirror'' episode "[[Recap/BlackMirrorRachelJackAndAshleyToo Rachel, Jack, and Ashley Too]]" depicts a teen pop star being appallingly exploited by her family/management, and when she breaks away from them she starts singing indie rock.

** Intense hatred of TeenPop was a major part of Eminem's persona starting from ''Music/TheMarshallMathersLP'', which led to increasing embarrassment as his music crossed over [[NewSoundAlbum more into a pop sound]] starting from 2010. As early as 2002, he was apologetic about insulting pop stars, admitting he only lashed out because his [[SubvertedKidsShow child-friendly sound]][[note]]'''''[[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids NOT LYRICS!!!]]'''''[[/note]] and [[PrettyBoy boyish, heartthrobby appearance]] let to people calling him a "pop-rapper" when he still felt like an underground MC. In an interview in 2017, when asked [[WTHCastingAgency why he was collaborating with]] Music/EdSheeran on ''Revival'' when he was the kind of soft pop star he would have dissed in 2000, he said it was because he respected Sheeran as a real artist who writes his own songs and who was nothing like the manufactured pop stars he'd insulted back in the days of ''TRL''.

Related to DiscoSucks and RapIsCrap. Also see TrueArtIsAngsty, ItsPopularNowItSucks, SlobsVersusSnobs and TechnicianVersusPerformer. Contrast RottenRockAndRoll.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Jem}}'' [[Pun toys]] [[PlayingWithATrope around with this]]. The pop stars are the heroes and the {{New Wave|Music}} "[[MusicGenreDissonance rock]]" stars are the villainous [[TheRival rivals]]. However, Jem and the Holograms use a carefully constructed image based upon holograms, with their lead singer using an alias and holographic imagery to camouflage her true self. In contrast, The Misfits are predominantly self-made (with some help from Pizzazz's millionaire father) and down-to-earth.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Jem}}'' toys around with this. The pop stars are the heroes and the {{New Wave|Music}} "[[MusicGenreDissonance rock]]" stars are the villainous [[TheRival rivals]]. However, Jem and the Holograms use a carefully constructed image based upon holograms, with their lead singer using an alias and holographic imagery to camouflage her true self. In contrast, The Misfits are predominantly self-made (with some help from Pizzazz's millionaire father) and down-to-earth.

* Mark Grondon, the host of the music review show ''WebVideo/SpectrumPulse'', is an unabashed poptimist who's not a fan of this attitude. In [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPyqtbsuA2c his video]] on Music/FallOutBoy's 2013 comeback album ''Save Rock and Roll'', he said that making a great pop song can be just as difficult as making a great rock song if not moreso, in large part ''because'' of the [[CreativityLeash constraints]] placed on musicians that force them to get creative in subverting or working around them, and that it's a talent that's too often dismissed. He feels that rock, by contrast, is frequently placed on a pedestal of musical complexity and depth that it often doesn't deserve, especially not by the 2010s when the genre was entering one of its lowest ebbs of both mainstream success and critical respect. He castigated the 2000s music press (especially ''Pitchfork'') for having fully bought into this trope with regards to their dismissal of PopPunk and EmoMusic, and believes that ''Save Rock and Roll'' was fueled in large part by Fall Out Boy's desire to prove themselves as "real" musicians after having been treated for so long as a glorified BoyBand.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/SonicBoom'' episode "Battle of the Boy Bands", Amy and Sticks are taken in by an {{Expy}} of Music/JustinBieber named "Justin Beaver". However, Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles remain unaffected, and eventually learn that it's because [[MindControlMusic Justin Beaver is unintenionally brainwashing all of the island's female residents]], thanks to a scheme from a CorruptCorporateExecutive behind Justin's music. In order to break the brainwashing, Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles get onstage at Justin Beaver's concert, singing a song that insults pop music with lyrics like "You should expect the expected, and nothing more, 'cause you've all heard this song and dance before". The trio of boys then takes out instruments and changes it to a rock tune, which breaks the spell.

* In ''WesternAnimation/SonicBoom'', Amy and Sticks are taken in by an {{Expy}} of Music/JustinBieber named "Justin Beaver". However, Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles remain unaffected, and eventually learn that it's because [[MindControlMusic Justin Beaver is unintenionally brainwashing all of the island's female residents]], thanks to a scheme from a CorruptCorporateExecutive behind Justin's music. In order to break the brainwashing, Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles get onstage at Justin Beaver's concert, singing a song that insults pop music with lyrics like "You should expect the expected, and nothing more, 'cause you've all heard this song and dance before". The trio of boys then takes out instruments and changes it to a rock tune, which breaks the spell.

[[Administrivia/TropesAreFlexible This can also apply to other music genres]] in the battle between authenticity and artifice. It can be a clash between Rock and {{Disco}}, much like in TheSeventies (with guitar-based Rock winning and electronic, synthesizer-filled Disco [[DiscoSucks losing and being a pariah]] for [[TheEighties a good part of a decade]]), HipHop versus RhythmAndBlues, PunkRock versus GlamMetal, PunkRock versus ProgressiveRock, PunkRock versus NewWaveMusic, PunkRock versus PopPunk, PunkRock versus SkaPunk, PunkRock versus [[RunningGag any other non-punk music genre]], PostPunk versus NewWaveMusic, GangstaRap versus GlamRap, ThrashMetal versus HairMetal (and more recently ExtremeMetal versus PowerMetal), TraditionalHeavyMetal versus NuMetal, {{Grunge}} versus HairMetal (and {{Grunge}} versus SynthPop, {{Grunge}} versus TeenPop, {{Grunge}} versus PostGrunge, {{Grunge}} versus {{Britpop}}, {{Grunge}} versus [[RunningGag any other music genre]]), Indie versus Pop music, or the clash between "real" instruments versus ElectronicMusic, or traditional {{jazz}} versus the {{jazz fusion}} which emerged in the 1970s, and used electric guitar amd bass, synths and elements of rock and pop.