Stan

The Bridge: The cassettes and fanbases of yesteryear have all but gone. What’s taken their place? Streaming services… and hordes of merch-clad, Billboard Top 100 quoting, Gen-Z super-fans. Click through for this week’s lingo, brought to you by Eminem. Go figure.

Stanbase

Gen-Z’s aren’t “fans” of their favorite musicians- they’re “stans”. A stan, named after the obsessed fan in Eminem’s Y2K hit (also titled “Stan”), is a dedicated fan that spends much of their time doing artist promotion…for free…online. Every social media platform is teeming with stan-accounts, profiles used to communicate with other fans while promoting.

Music, The Great Equalizer 

Artists are more accessible than ever, and social media has allowed stans to build community around them in ways older generations couldn’t have dreamed of. Hey, just because we don’t understand streaming parties and fan cams, doesn’t mean we can’t appreciate geeking out over our favorite song with friends.

Check out these stanbases, or pet names for an artist’s fanbase, below:

• Beyonce = Beyhive
• Nicki Minaj = Barbz
• BTS = ARMY 
• Ariana Grande = Arianators
• Katy Perry = Katy Kats
• Lady Gaga = Little Monsters
• 1 Direction = Directioners

Maybe your kid has been stanning this whole time and you didn’t know… maybe even you have! Either way, let us know in the comments @thegenbridge