Welcome to This Week in TikTok Music, where we dig into trends, viral songs, and whatever else the algorithm has decided is sticky enough to camp out on your feed. With more people discovering music through TikTok than ever before, and viral clips capable of pulling an obscure ’90s song straight back onto the Billboard Hot 100, it feels worth pausing to ask the simple question: what the hell is going on over there?

Public Works

Something semi-interesting about music that lives and takes off on TikTok is that it isn’t really a new concept. It’s just reimagined and shorter, tailored for our forever-dwindling attention spans.

It’s essentially the slogan jingle. Obviously not everyone on TikTok is selling used cars, but musicians are trying to buy your attention, and they usually have 15 seconds or less to do it. What tends to perform well on TikTok is taking a three- to four-minute song, snipping out the catchiest part, and making multiple videos using that isolated sound. The goal is to flood the algorithm while also hoping the clip gets picked up and reused by others.

Now that I’ve dumbed down TikTok marketing 101, let me ask you this: “Do y’all have cars there? And are there bars there? Is Kurt Cobain there?”

@publicworksnj do yall have cars there? #midwestemo #emomusic #emo ♬ original sound - publicworksnj

Those lines come from Midwest emo act Public Works, who also dabble in fourth-gen emo SoundCloud rap. The single, “Long Island”, off their 2025 EP Pocket Knife, became one of the chosen jingles to represent their work. Public Works has done this a few times now and clearly understands how to work the platform. They did something similar with “White Knuckle”, a song about struggles with drug addiction. Their Spotify bio sums it up bluntly: “I used to smoke crack and now I don’t. I like to make the music I want to make. East Coast emo folk alt indie rock or whatever.”

@publicworksnj you left me in this dark cold place #midwestemo #emomusic #emo video by @Carlos Gautier ♬ original sound - publicworksnj

“White Knuckle” is the soundtrack to their most popular video, currently sitting at 1.5 million views. It opens with them shouting, “You’ll always see me as a junkie,” followed by a clip of their frontman getting cold-clocked in the face and falling headfirst into the snow. It’s visually and lyrically hard-hitting.

@publicworksnj home sweet home #midwestemo #emomusic #emo Video by @Carlos Gautier ♬ original sound - publicworksnj

Sonically, there are equal parts core Midwest emo and SoundCloud emo rap. You get the mathy, twinkly guitar riffs alongside lyrics that move from a melodic, vulnerable, higher-pitched delivery to something closer to straight-up bar-spitting. It strongly brings to mind Lil Peep, especially his earlier material like “the song they played (when I crashed into the wall)”.

To bring it full circle, Public Works doesn’t have a full-length album yet, but with the discography they do have, they’re fully utilizing the art of the jingle. You immediately understand the overall vibe and sound, and it’s just as visually compelling as it is catchy.

@publicworksnj shook the drywall in the house #midwestemo #emomusic #emo ♬ original sound - publicworksnj

Hope you enjoyed this installment of This Week in TikTok Music. Go check out some Public Works clips for yourself. Just a fair warning: once you do, they will live in your feed forever. The algorithm is relentless. Enjoy!