Why doesn't anyone here like 'indie' music anymore?

Buick6

too punk to drunk
You know like bands on K-records, or folk singers from Sweden, or girly-Japanese pop-groups, or shoegazer bands from Norway, or media-studies and architecture drop-outs from Melbourne/Berlin/New York?

I mean 'indie' is the roots of this board, unless two step/grime/three step/hop step/glitch step/steptoe is the modernist evolution of indie, so then I'm wrong?

But what I'm saying is that it seems from the attitudes and interests on this baord that it's roots are dare I say it - 'indie'! :cool:
 
D

droid

Guest
Thats an awful lot of assumptions for one post! ;)

I would have thought that the 'roots' of this board (if they exist at all) are skewed more towards the hardcore/rave/UK early 90s dance scene end of things myself.
 

john eden

male pale and stale
I still like The Fall and the Jesus and Mary Chain.

And Stump and Fuzzbox. :)

And probably a large number of tunes featuring in the NME's "indie" charts from the early to mid 80s.

After this "indie" coalesced into a particular jingly jangly sub-VU sound. I'm sure there is stuff in there which is worth reappraising, but it has given birth to lots of generic shite which can only appeal to people who didn't hear it the first time around, in my aged and cynical dad-like opinion.

Anyway, the resurgence of interest in folk music is all over the blogs at the moment innit.
 
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stelfox

Beast of Burden
droid said:
Thats an awful lot of assumptions for one post! ;)

I would have thought that the 'roots' of this board (if they exist at all) are skewed more towards the hardcore/rave/UK early 90s dance scene end of things myself.

droid, i'd actually say, hands-down, that the general attitude and the roots of this board are overwhelmingly, suffocatingly indie.

the obsession with the obscure, the curatorial guardianship of certain music, the rabid (and mental) anti-pop position of many people, the contrarianism as regards anything popular, the abject failure to grasp the basics of what hip-hop is and means... all indie to the bone, just not applied to jangly guitar bands in this instance.

to qualify this, when i say indie i mean it as much more of a base-level aesthetic/point to approach music from than an actual musical style.

perhaps fittingly, this critical position has been most apparent in the discussion of the arctic monkeys. the reason they're being hated on is, plainly and simply, because they're popular. if they weren't big no one would care, but they are being touted as "real music" (whatever the hell that is) and people here appear to want their "music of substance" to remain obscure, hidden from the masses, the preserve of an in-the-know elite.

of course, indie barely exists any more in this sense and hasn't done post-britpop, oasis pretty much driving the stake through its heart once and for all (see, they were good for one thing, after all), but people who came up as fans of the indie/alternative generally carry a similar approach to popular culture for the rest of their lives, whatever they're listening to.

i know this because it's something i've had to very consciously shake off myself over the past 10 years or so.

obviously this is a sweeping generalisation and dissensus is, in reality, a pretty diverse community containing many different points of view and i'm not even saying that the indie position is devoid of merit, either - some interesting discourse comes from this perspective - but i will say that most of the things that drive me up the wall here are part and parcel of the same thing, too.
 
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droid

Guest
All good points. I was thinking more (and I think B6 was as well) in the musical sense.
 

blunt

shot by both sides
stelfox said:
the reason [arctic monkeys]'re being hated on is, plainly and simply, because they're popular. if they weren't big no one would care, but they are being touted as "real music" (whatever the hell that is) [...]

I don't think that's strictly true; I think you're eliding 2 points here. It seems to me that they're being dissed not because they're popular, but because they're being touted as 'real music'. And, while they're undoubtedly good musicians (and I gather they're great live), their music is just so fucking boring compared to any number of artists that get props on this board.

Not wishing to lump them into the same category as the Ordinary Boys (I think Arctic Monkey's are infinitely more interesting than them) - but I just don't get it. I saw them on TOTP the other week, and it looked like one of their golden oldie clips from 30 years ago. And then, just when I think it can't get any worse, some mixed race guy gets up on stage and starts rapping in some faux Windrush-generation patois. WTF?!

I honestly don't understand what this can mean to someone in their teens or early 20s. Especially when there's people like Lady Sov out there... she should be fucking huge. It's a crime, I tell you. I know pop was always supposed to eat itself eventually, but...

Sorry, went off on a bit of a tangent there. But you get my meaning (I hope) -
 

big satan

HA-DO-KEN!
i'm certainly more rock/bands & hiphop (not UK hiphop) based than UK dance music (although it was a link from a grime blog that brought me here i think). reading this board though i get the impression that "indie", to a lot of people here refers to crappy chart type stuff (which i wouldn't listen to if it was obscure either, stelfox) like kaiser chiefs or whatever, and as far as they're concerned rock music begins and ends with bands like that.
to be honest the term indie really gets on my nerves, because while it refers to the business side of a band/musician (being independent) it also has come to mean dull rock, so you end up with bands as different as Melt Banana and Franz Ferdinand being lumped under the same term.
 
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stelfox

Beast of Burden
blunt said:
I don't think that's strictly true; I think you're eliding 2 points here. It seems to me that they're being dissed not because they're popular, but because they're being touted as 'real music'. And, while they're undoubtedly good musicians (and I gather they're great live), their music is just so fucking boring compared to any number of artists that get props on this board.

Not wishing to lump them into the same category as the Ordinary Boys (I think Arctic Monkey's are infinitely more interesting than them) - but I just don't get it. I saw them on TOTP the other week, and it looked like one of their golden oldie clips from 30 years ago. And then, just when I think it can't get any worse, some mixed race guy gets up on stage and starts rapping in some faux Windrush-generation patois. WTF?!

I honestly don't understand what this can mean to someone in their teens or early 20s. Especially when there's people like Lady Sov out there... she should be fucking huge. It's a crime, I tell you. I know pop was always supposed to eat itself eventually, but...

Sorry, went off on a bit of a tangent there. But you get my meaning (I hope) -

no one would care if they were not big. there's plenty of crap out there that people aren't getting all steamed about, but they are about this because this band have gained huge exposure and are being pushed as something really special. the classic indie/rockist stance is to walk away from something when it gets popular, to disavow something as soon as it falls out of the hands of the select few. what makes the monkeys interesting is that they've come a long so fast that people are taking the contrary point of view straightaway. as far as i'm concerned, it's always much easier to dismiss pop culture out of hand for not conforming to certain weird 1980s values of authenticity or whatever than it is to think smart about it. the fact that i think they're actually very good has very little bearing on this, but mate, even if it wasn't intentional that stuff about mixed race guys and "faux windrush patois" is pretty fucking dodge.

big satan said:
reading this board though i get the impression that "indie", to a lot of people here refers to crappy chart type stuff (which i wouldn't listen to if it was obscure either, stelfox) like kaiser chiefs or whatever, and as far as they're concerned rock music begins and ends with bands like that.

Are you absolutely sure about this?
Besides, regardless of whether you're right or wrong, you're sort of missing my point that dissensus doesn't have to be listening to music deemed to be indie to still be a very, very indie board.
 
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IdleRich

IdleRich
e·lide (-ld)
tr.v. e·lid·ed, e·lid·ing, e·lides
1.
a. To omit or slur over (a syllable, for example) in pronunciation.
b. To strike out (something written).
2.
a. To eliminate or leave out of consideration.
b. To cut short; abridge.
 

bassnation

the abyss
stelfox said:
Besides, regardless of whether you're right or wrong, you're sort of missing my point that dissensus doesn't have to be listening to music deemed to be indie to still be a very, very indie board.

don't say that, your putting me off! i thought this place was full of dance heads.
 

big satan

HA-DO-KEN!
stelfox said:
Are you absolutely sure about this?
Besides, regardless of whether you're right or wrong, you're sort of missing my point that dissensus doesn't have to be listening to music deemed to be indie to still be a very, very indie board.


well frankly i'm glad that people on this board are more interested in talking about the obscure, i thought that was the point, to share information about stuff and talk about that which doesn't get mentioned in most other places (unlike the arctic monkeys, who i have no opinion of as i have not heard them). being a fan of underground music can be quite a solitary and alienating persuit (i only have 6 or 7 friends who it's even worth talking about music with, and even then our tastes aren't particularly similar).
what iritates me is this underlying implication that bands that are popular get dissed here for being popular rather than for sounding like shit (which to my ear is what most of them tend to sound like), but what particularly surprises me is that people even bother to pay attention to and ramble on about music they dislike.

and to answer your question, i am absolutely sure about this.
when listening to skepta i don't secretly pine for jentina.
 

alo

Well-known member
perhaps fittingly, this critical position has been most apparent in the discussion of the arctic monkeys. the reason they're being hated on is, plainly and simply, because they're popular. if they weren't big no one would care, but they are being touted as "real music" (whatever the hell that is) and people here appear to want their "music of substance" to remain obscure, hidden from the masses, the preserve of an in-the-know elite
.

It seems to me that they're being dissed not because they're popular, but because they're being touted as 'real music'. And, while they're undoubtedly good musicians (and I gather they're great live), their music is just so fucking boring compared to any number of artists that get props on this board.

Absolutely. People aren't getting 'steamed' up over AM's because they are precious clasp-to-the-bosum Dissensus faves grabbed away and made shallow stars of by the evil unwashed hordes. They are talking about them because: [
I]plainly and simply...they're popular. if they weren't big no one would care, but they are being touted as "real music" [/I]
Eg -fucking-zactly. They are an interesting proposition on those terms, because of the legacy of Indie, and what they mean to the music industry/pop culture. Nothing to do with hording secrets, or hating Pop music.
 

petergunn

plywood violin
believe it or not, i never listened to any indie music... i grew up on classic rock, made the jump to punk and hardcore, but never made the jump to indie... like, i listened to black flag and minor threat, but never got into Fugazi or Sonic Youth... it's weird, b/c i love the Kinks and Leonard Cohen and Syd Barrett, but i could never stand PJ Harvey... i dunno, there's just something lacking in almost all recent rock, and generally indie music is so fucking whiney!
 

gumdrops

Well-known member
i dunno about this post. it seems everyone here actually LOVES indie, deep down. i mean, the arctic monkeys are considered 'ok' now since certain high ranking bloggers have given them the thumbs up and overall, as stelfox said, indie is pretty much the prism through which everything else is refracted here (and even ilx to an equal degree it seems).
 

henry s

Street Fighting Man
gumdrops said:
i mean, the arctic monkeys are considered 'ok' now since certain high ranking bloggers have given them the thumbs up and overall.
this is a pretty good point...I'm all for politeness and r-e-s-p-e-c-t and all, but it seems to me there's a bit too much reverence in the ol' blogosphere...why is the "kill yr idols" impulse (which drives rock music) in such short supply here?...(again, I use this term respectfully)...
 

mms

sometimes
indie used to mean independent - which mean't lots of irregular things topped the indie charts, stuff crossed over and lines were broken, then it started to mean vaguley guitarish set ups in the early nintees as a general term, but with space for more left field set ups, now it means pretty much identikit young men with guitars singing retro rock guitar music with regional accents and lyrics as if sweeny extras had tried to form an in house band.
i tried to like some 90s indie stuff as good friends who liked it recommended stuff to me, i liked some of it and loved some of the stuff that crossed over into techno, equally they liked some of my stuff and enjoyed clubbing and reggae etc, but now with the stuff labeled indie i feel total hostility to it, as it seems in alot of ways its totally sold out that more fluid culture, and gone for something that just sounds older than the kids who make it and redundant culturally and musically, empty and revisioneering.
as far as d.i.y is concerned my personal roots and the roots of alot of this board are i suspect very d.i.y, id thats what you mean?
 

shykitten

peek-a-boo
hi, i picked up this thread and i hope you all don't mind some rambling thoughts...

stelfox said:
when i say indie i mean it as much more of a base-level aesthetic/point to approach music from than an actual musical style.
yes, indie as a genre or as an attitude, with some blurring of boundaries. the definition of the indie chart used to be clear, not sure about now: is there one, are Arctic Monkeys / Franz Ferdinand (Domino records) in it? but then some groups (like J&MC, Cure, Banshees, sometimes The Fall) were famously on major labels or pseudo-indie subsidiaries but still contributed to wider conceptions (positive or negative) of 'indie'.

perhaps the key is in an alternative network of distribution (of records, ideas, resources) outside the mainstream establishment (so, there was an indie 'establishment' (Factory, Rough Trade, Creation etc.), which was then hegemonized into the mainstream). blogs are resolutely indie in relation to, say, newspapers, the NME etc. (but note the mainstream media rushing to incorporate blog culture into their products to give them an indie sheen/grubbiness)

musically 'indie' can get chucked in as a term of abuse for anything considered twee or boyguitarist, which i find a shame, and i know i use the term positively at risk of putting people off but it suits my thoughts about centre/margin, strategy/tactics.

stelfox said:
the rabid (and mental) anti-pop position of many people
i'm not sure that indie = anti-pop = this board (to over-simplify!), historically the indie attitude has a messianic element of caring enough about pop to try to infiltrate it and (however misguidedly) save it from dark corporate forces.
 

Buick6

too punk to drunk
Buick6 said:
You know like bands on K-records, or folk singers from Sweden, or girly-Japanese pop-groups, or shoegazer bands from Norway, or media-studies and architecture drop-outs from Melbourne/Berlin/New York?

I mean 'indie' is the roots of this board, unless two step/grime/three step/hop step/glitch step/steptoe is the modernist evolution of indie, so then I'm wrong?

But what I'm saying is that it seems from the attitudes and interests on this baord that it's roots are dare I say it - 'indie'! :cool:

I was going for a broader term, as underlined.

Look I have no shame that I found this board via Simon Reynolds personal BlissOut/Blog site, and I come here as some form Internerd interaction with a rockstar journo, but also keeping my pulse on whats hipngroovy and at the edge of the gulcha web or whatever. I might sound harsh, but Reynolds appeals to a particular intellectual inner-city elitist audience, but thats's what I generally like coz most other shit is so fucking pathetic and un-informed and I'm a fucking elitist wanker-snob. I used to like reading the Melody Maker, until I realised half the stuff they would have raptures about was fucking shit (especially when these 'amazing' bands would come to play in Australia and you'd realise how unbelievably shithouse they *really* were - you see isolation is good!) Also half the writers were fucking terrible and had NO BROAD TASTES. Perfect example : Everett True - sure he's the ultimate indie-purist, but his writing never evolved beyond the gushing 19-year-old virgin, and his book 'Live through this' is one of the most retarded bedsit-boy journals about music that has ever been printed (I picked it up as an ultra cheap remainder and STILL FELT RIPPED OFF!)

But by the same token this intellectual group blanks out/denies stuff because of it's popularity, rather than it's core SOUND. I never liked the term 'indie', I never really liked the people involved (too much over-education, passive-aggresiveness and ennui), my own personal criteria are DOES IT SOUND GOOD (or HOW PSYCHADELIC IS IT?, coz I'm a tripper), is there a SONG there (for non-body-without organs soniques) and is it UNDERGROUND (more on an art/anarchist/humaist level, where there are no queues or dogmas) and also I read alot of rock writers (all three or four of them) but especially like writers who are more widely read/life experienced than the Matador records catalogue...

Does it hit me in the kishkes or guts, but fundamentally DOES IT HAVE ENERGY?

Ultimately I like to be as open minded as possible about music, and part of the problem I have with obscuranist musics is, sure you read about how cool and 'important' (how I hate that term) all this stuff is, BUT WHERE THE FUCK CAN YOU HEAR IT (enter SoulSeek..)

The nice thing about 'indie' is it's unpredicatable nature (but that can apply to ANY genre/subculture whatever), and despite other reservations and diminshed love, still keeps me interested.
 
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blunt

shot by both sides
stelfox said:
[...] but mate, even if it wasn't intentional that stuff about mixed race guys and "faux windrush patois" is pretty fucking dodge.

Ummmm... Dodge how?

My point is: people just don't speak like that anymore - at least not like this guy was. Doesn't matter if they're white/black/mixed race/whatever. Sorry if this observation offends anyone.
 
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