As the decade draws to a close I'm sure we'll soon be in for a wave of critical dissection about what has shaped noughties music culture..

piracy, legal downloads, myspace, facebook, combustion of record companies, reconfiguring the charts, audience fragmentation, reality TV, decline in record sales etc etc will inevitably be the talking points, but what about the actual music?

It seems that every decade since popular culture began has introduced the world to brand new trends, brand new musical genres, and with that, epochal cultural shifts. Think of the myriad connotations of the 50's 60's, 70's 80's and 90's, and how embedded those various aesthetics and attitudes are in the nations collective conciousness

But did any new fashion, musical style or attitude really kick off in 2000's? Print media seemed to desperately grab onto any whiff of a trend to make their audiences feel part of a resurgent new generation, but I can barely think of any genre that wasn't prefixed with 'nu-' - an explicit reminder that these aren't uncharted musical waters

Will there ever again be another punk, rave, or rock n roll

is this it?