Sad Bangers and Emotional Mashups: Catharsis or Emotional Conversion?

A few years ago, Hanif Abdurraqib wrote a tribute to “The Delicious Misery of the Sad Banger.” Per Abdurraqib, sad bangers are, […] songs whose lyrics of grief, anxiety, yearning or some other mild or great darkness are washed over with an upbeat tune, or a chorus so infectious that it can weave its way into your brain without your brain taking stock of whatever emotional damage it carries with it. […] [A]ll of them speak to the frequent misalignment between what the body wants and the mind ­understands. (Abdurraqib 2022) In this paper we focus on sad bangers as discordant songs. Their conflicting components of sad, often heartbreaking, lyrics and upbeat “happy” music pull listeners in opposing directions, creating affective dissonance. This evokes elements of the paradox of tragedy: these songs arouse positive affects even as they sadden us, and we take pleasure in them for that. Unlike tragic literature, however, the paradoxical pull of the sad banger is baked right into the experience of the song: sad lyrics are combined with an upbeat melody that impels us to dance. Indeed, sad bangers are often dance club favorites.1