Adéla “feels like” Nicole Kidman – or so says the rising Slovak pop star’s latest song, named after the iconic actress. In the music video, she reenacts some of Kidman’s most memorable scenes, from drinking milk in Babygirl to performing on a suspended swing in Moulin Rouge!. But she isn’t the only musician turning to cultural icons in 2026. Charli xcx brought together Martin Scorsese, Marc Jacobs and John Cale for the cover of her latest album, Music, Fashion, Film, in honour of “three legends”. Then, this month, Troye Sivan released “Party”, a monotone but extremely catchy new dance track. Not only is the song built around a prominent sample of Madonna’s “Music”, but the music video also features a voiceover from Sir Ian McKellen. (Fun fact: Sivan previously acted alongside McKellen in a production of Waiting for Godot when he was 14.)

Of course, more established and rising artists have always had a symbiotic relationship – just look at Dolly Parton and Miley Cyrus, Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga, or even Elton John and Dua Lipa; the list goes on. These intergenerational pairings might occasionally surface as duets or collaborations, but much of the mentorship traditionally happened behind the scenes. Putting the older icon front and centre of a younger artist’s rollout marks an evolution of that relationship. If cloutbombing, up until this point, has consisted of getting as many internet baddies, scenesters and rising stars in a room as the space allows, then 2026 is the year of “motherbombing”.

Ellis Cashmore, professor of sociology and author of Celebrity Culture, says these collaborations are mutually beneficial. “Celebrity capital isn’t a fixed inheritance: it can flow backwards as well as forward,” he says. “The established star borrows the youngster’s youth, novelty and contemporary relevance. The younger celebrity gets cultural capital; the established figure gets cultural renewal.” Again, this is not exactly new: Cashmore says Marilyn Monroe did it with Jane Russell to a degree, and so did Madonna with Sandra Bernhard. Now, Madonna is collaborating with the likes of Charli and Sabrina Carpenter, continuing that cycle of celebrity clout passing between generations. What has evolved since then, however, is our relationship to fame.

Where once an artist could make a splash by being new and up-and-coming, the culture of virality has shown us in recent years that fame can be far more fleeting than it once seemed. On social media, an artist can reach superstar-level heights one month, only to fade into obscurity the next if they fail to sustain that momentum. The rise of algorithmic influencer culture has made it possible for almost anyone to be famous, even just for a moment. This, combined with dwindling attention spans, has shifted the goalpost from being relevant in the current moment to being timeless. Fame itself is no longer particularly scarce; enduring fame is. In today’s attention economy, being able to command attention across decades has become the ultimate sign of cultural longevity. It’s little wonder, then, that young artists are attempting to align themselves with the likes of Nicole Kidman, Martin Scorsese and Sir Ian McKellen.

Cashmore says there is one type of cultural osmosis that goes strictly one way: alignment with dead celebrities. Think of Kim Kardashian in Marilyn Monroe’s dress or Taylor Swift’s 2025 song, “Elizabeth Taylor”. Or how Lady Gaga called her “whole career” a tribute to David Bowie. There’s even a South Korean R&B artist, DEAN, whose name is inspired by James Dean. Now, I’m not suggesting that all of these artists are purposely drawing clout from a dead celebrity – most of these cases were born out of genuine inspiration – but it doesn’t hurt for a contemporary star to align themselves with someone who has already been cemented in cultural history. By invoking these household names from the past, they are also staking a claim to the kind of longevity those figures came to embody.

“People are trying to establish their relationship with those who they see as having enduring social capital... It’s important for people to be able to gesture towards longevity in a world where more and more people are only getting their 15 minutes”

If fewer celebrities are able to sustain careers with real longevity, aligning yourself with one of the greats could be seen as a form of ‘attention insurance’. “People are trying to establish their relationship with those who they see as having enduring social capital,” says Julian Kevon Glover, assistant professor of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies and Dance and Choreography at Virginia Commonwealth University. “The people with an over 20-year career are becoming fewer and far between, so it’s important for people to be able to gesture towards longevity in a world where more and more people are only getting their 15 minutes.”

In recent years, there’s been much talk about the “death of fame”, at least as we know it, so motherbombing might also reflect a yearning for an era before celebrity became so decentralised. Whether dead or alive, older mega-stars carry with them not just their own legacy, but the memory of a time when fame felt more concentrated – when just the sight of Michael Jackson could cause fans to faint in sold-out arenas, or when you were either a Beatles person or a Rolling Stones person, with far less attention paid to everyone in between. “The nature of fame is rapidly changing,” says Glover. “And it’s making it more challenging for anybody to stay relevant.” Maybe the ultimate status symbol now is not simply becoming famous, but becoming someone whose fame can outlive the moment that created it.