With the economic slowdown in full kick for about a year now, we're still yet to hear any quality songs about the hard times we're in the midst of. They say that creativity thrives in tough conditions, and up until recently this would appear to be true. In the turbulent 60s Randy Newman sang 'Mr. President have pity on the working man', and during the 1980s recession middle America's musical god Bruce Springsteen (whose collar was just as blue as the denim jeans he wore on the iconic 'Born in the USA' album cover, pictured below) reached the pinnacle in his career, with a string of songs about lonely labourers and their troubles with work and women. The punk and grunge genres were famously conceived by angst ridden youth from the wrong side of the track, sick of the injustices they faced in their poverty stricken lower class. But after Kurt killed himself and the Seattle dress code of flannel and Doc Martens made it onto the high-fashion catwalks (it was at this time that grunge was officially declared 'dead'), the musical trail on our economic situations goes cold. In the midst of our financial crisis people still listen to 50 Cent rapping about his millions. If people of the future breezed over the music of today, the only troubles in our world would appear to be ones involving cheating lovers and messy break-ups, as penned by Miley and Beyonce.