Who killed Indie?

sufi

lala
strange how you run into the most unlikely one-time C86/shambling veterans
bonk, oops, scuse me

ecstacy killed indie if i remember rightly...

but it had a nice analog diy ethic somehow, with kids in snorkels putting out fotocopied fanzines & then whacking out bubblegum pop unrecognizable under layers of feedback, i'm thinking primitives, pastels, j&mc... haha fucking flexidiscs!!!
 

Woebot

Well-known member
blissblogger said:
despite loving stereolab i've always been slightly offput/suspicious on acocunt of Tim Gane's extreme scholarly knowledge of music and esoterrorist angle -- with that sort, i tend to think "probably should have gone into writing about music, not making it" (cf recent kieran hebden invis jukebox in the wire). in both cases, fantastic people to talk to about music (well i'm assuming that in hebden's case).
tha must be one thing which separates the true indie band from those that consolidated the scene afterwards (Etienne, PS, Stereolab etc) knowing too much music history. those earlier bands pretty much "went straight at it" with a smattering of vu and the byrds. its really horrible for people who write about music to view music as just and index of influences (i'm atrociously guilty of this), BUT, BUT its even worse when bands are compiling those same indexes themselves. remember when the wire interviewed stereolab and they had a little page afterwards boxed-in of "stereolabs influences" i guess it doesnt necessarily mean the music is going to be weak, but put it this way, i dont imagine you'd hear neu! going into great depth about their influences.
 
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Jim Daze

Well-known member
I always thought that 'grunge' (the mainstream stuff) killed of the secret world of indie, also the whole e-thing. Even the Shamen had a shambling indie past. Oasis came on the scene way after it was dead I agree. I'm only just old enough to have enjoyed the dying embers of c-86 but am still fixated by it's now golden age vibe of nostalgia. I only really discovered Felt, who are the ultimate Sarah band that were never on Sarah, about five years ago.

Also agree about Simple headphone Mind, it's a cover version of some kraut tune I can't remember, of course Stapletons mix takes it to da next level.
 

jenks

thread death
Who killed indie

first posting, excuse slight nervousness.
the two 'lab moments that still remain for me - french disco as heard on evening session when i still listened to radio one (anyone else watch that dreadful self regarding doc. on channel 5?) and the Flouresences ep - them at their locked groove best.
as to what killed indie it could be argued that whole high llamas/ tortoise/ lab axis put the brain back in rock leaving the indie constituency looking for more (amorphous) body music - oasis et al. But what probably really killed it off was record companies buying up indie labels and putting profit margins above wilful experimentation and loopy collectives - if you think the indie pop rough trade thingy is good check out their post punk collection - now that's what i call indie!
 

stelfox

Beast of Burden
those links aren't so surprising, really. i've always pretty much taken it as read that many of the guys like greg davis (carpark) and the animal collective are carrying on this C-86 tradition. i'd be interested to see just how many electronic musicians were big into dc hardcore, though. i'm betting it would be a lot of them and mostly ones i like, too.
 

dannyDMX

Member
"most recently, i was surprised to discover that Tim Goldsworthy of DFA -- and before that, of Mo Wax and UNKLE -- had been heavily into C86"

I'm trying to remember, Tim has an older brother or something who was a real scenester, was in some band. Back when I did Plant Bar on mondays my friend Kevin dj'd happy hour, he's always been a standard bearer of that type of stuff, he put out the Love Is All single recently, anyway, he had Tim's brother DJ once when he was in town, it was all that stuff.

As an aside, regarding all the talk of baggie killing indie, when I think of indie rock in america I think of the 90s and stuff that was post-baggie. When I was in high school/college and stuff like Stereolab, Polvo, Pavement, the whole Louisville/Chicao axis, Bastro, Shellac, K records, Kill Rock Stars etc. Stereolab was always my favorite because they tied into my then also new krautrock obsession(as well as Silver Apples, United States of America etc) and I liked the songs. Most of the rest of "indie-rock" at the time bored me. Except for New Zealand for some reason, anyway.
 

jwd

Well-known member
Oh thanks for 'outing me' Simon ;)

Couple of points:

* Surely the 'index of influences' is just as much a function of access/increased knowledge base/sheer amount of music to draw from/listen to? Not that I'm going to say something like 'you know, now with the internet and downloading'. I thought one of the BEST things about Stereolab was that they pointed to their influences, because it led a lot of us lot, who were getting into music during the same timeframe, down some very interesting paths. Krautrock I knew about before Stereolab but they really pulled me up sharp with NEU! I wouldn't have caught Brazilian pop nearly as much without Stereolab shouting about it. Also their links with film and art (sorry Matt - I know I already sent you an email about this), referencing American underground cinema ("Brakhage", "Off/On"), pre-situationist collectives ("Cobra and Phases Group..."), Japanese cinema ("Emperor Tomato Ketchup") and so on. It's a fantastic web to untangle. Same with St Etienne, I was so happy to see the promo image from the film adaptation of "A Taste of Honey" in the photo on the inner sleev of "Foxbase Alpha". The continued Beach Boys references in 90s St Et album titles. The Pastels naming a song "Thomson Color" after a film processing technique favoured by French new wave film makers (I'm going on memory here.)

* Simon OTM re: Four Tet, bright guy but the music is shite, he's a perfect example of how this kinda thing CAN lead to dross. (Alright, a few nice tracks on "Pause".)

* Indie vs INDEPENDENT. I know that The Pastels would be quite fierce about being INDEPENDENT but don't really see themselves as indie, it being such a sad tag. St Etienne also I assume. One's become a genre identification, one is a mode of engaging with the world.

* Awright Stelfox, how you doing, yeah you know Glenn Donaldson, one of the Jewelled Antler guys, was a big 80s US hardcore fan (we emailed briefly about early Redd Kross and Circle Jerks), I think you'd find a lot of the u/g folks have that as an essential part of their make-up.
 

Diggedy Derek

Stray Dog
Okay, Fourtet aren't quite as impressive as the sum of their influences. But that Thirtysixtwentyfive one (pre- dialogue single that's 36:25 long) was wonderful- Pharaoh Sanders cruising in the back of Neu!'s car.

A Jenny Ondioline for the new millenium, it was.
 

Woebot

Well-known member
jwd said:
* Simon OTM re: Four Tet, bright guy but the music is shite, he's a perfect example of how this kinda thing CAN lead to dross. (Alright, a few nice tracks on "Pause".)
Gonna pile in here. Thanks so much to John "He's Shameless" Eden for making me a tape of his Four Tet CD (didnt you get it for XMas or summat John) but Four Tet are COMPLETE rubbish. Actually, salivating, wrenched the cassette from the deck and wrapped myself up in its spools. The most unbeleivably grating directionless drivel ive ever heard. And that's toning down my true reaction....... which was more like plain dejectedness.
 

Woebot

Well-known member
WOEBOT said:
Thanks so much to John "He's Shameless" Eden for making me a tape of his Four Tet CD (didnt you get it for XMas or summat John) but Four Tet are COMPLETE rubbish.
Yeah sorry John, that was well cheeky of me :-( However, if you hadnt sent it, and i'm glad u did, then i'd never of heard it would i!
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
Very interesting thread, given that I barely listen to 'indie' artists these days (outside certain 'alt-country' stuff that might be conceived of in this way), and wonder why I just have no interest in the whole concept anymore, whereas the Pastels, J+MC, Trembling Blue Stars, Teenage Fanclub etc used to charm me with their shambling.

UK-centric, personal answer: it seems to me to be a conflation of several factors around the early 90s, and most of it has been mentioned upthread. Shoegazing made indie at once nerdy and faceless, and also kind of redundant due to the sonic maximalism of MBV; the commercialism of mid-late grunge kind of stripped off hordes of potential indie converts; and of course, rave culture made indie charms appear a little outdated (tho TB Stars had a house tune, I seem to remember). Then Britpop killed it stone dead when it coopted the very term such that it ceased to be distinguishable fromt he mainstream.
 

jwd

Well-known member
Re: FourTet

WOEBOT said:
The most unbeleivably grating directionless drivel ive ever heard. And that's toning down my true reaction....... which was more like plain dejectedness.

Matt! But what would you do if you saw Kieran Hebden busking 14th century ballads on London Bridge? ;)

Come on now Derek, you praise Four Tet and diss Yo La Tengo? Hmmm. (Both of whom have done their "look mah we can dabble in jazz no hands!" records.)
 

Diggedy Derek

Stray Dog
Well for Four Tet jazz = a good natured, very occasionally succesful attempt to integrate kosmigroove and sampledelia. It's lounge, but it's lush. For Yo La Tengo jazz means nicking Ornette Coleman album covers and not having to learni proper chord shapes. It's indie rock with attractively frayed bits around the edges, like pre-aged jeans.

I'm cursed with a myopia where Yo La Tengo are concerned, where everything they do makes me hate them more.
 

blissblogger

Well-known member
so is "kosmigroove" now an official genre name? who came up with it? i stumbled across the site while in my prog-roaming phase last year. it's a good name, cos it has a slightly vomitous quality. Suits the slightly comic, can't-quite-take-it-seriously quality of the music it designates, or a lot of it.

C86 veterans -- i'm looking for confirmation that Rob Young was actually in the Field Mice.

i'm coming around to the idea that, at least in the UK, Ecstasy killed indie
-- tim goldsworthy said he went from being into the Bodines 'n shit to dancing in fields off his tits
-- a guy i know who was majorly into the cutie anorak scene (in fact he was photo-ed for a piece i did on Cutie fashion) went totally nuts for house, all of sudden he was giving me tapes with Landlord and 808 State on them
-- shamen as was said upthread (i must have seen them about four times in their pre-acid house phase, playing alongside mighty lemon drops and such. even then they were into acid, though --Op art slide projections, Electric Prunes type guitar sounds)
-- all that cockiness in Madchester that then led into Britpop, the Stone Roses>>Oasis thing, part of it is imbibed from the water supply up there , but a lot of it came from E. Noel Gallagher had a whole phase when he was trying to make acid house didn't he. i think of the whole Oasis phenom as an attempt to have the massiveness and anthemness and unity vibe of rave without any of the actual sonic radicalism of rave muzik. in that Live Forever doc Gallagher said something about the E wearing off and suddenly you realised the acid house and techno was tuneless din and then rediscovering songs and "proper music".
-- Primal scream was actually the conduit for so many ex-indie types into rave. in fact the friend who dragged me off to my first rave, she'd started going to them cos of Primal scream gigs when they had djs like weatherall as support instead of bands.
 

Woebot

Well-known member
blissblogger said:
so is "kosmigroove" now an official genre name? who came up with it? i stumbled across the site while in my prog-roaming phase last year. it's a good name, cos it has a slightly vomitous quality. Suits the slightly comic, can't-quite-take-it-seriously quality of the music it designates, or a lot of it.
that came up here:
http://www.dissensus.com/showthread.php?t=117&highlight=meditative

and one of the original architects of it showed up. weird that you use the word "vomitous" that was precisely my word for it.
 

Woebot

Well-known member
jwd said:
Re: FourTet

Matt! But what would you do if you saw Kieran Hebden busking 14th century ballads on London Bridge? ;)
knowing my luck heb***'ll show up and whup my sorry ass. john on the other hand will wait till my guards down and murk me. maybe a few months down the line.
 

Diggedy Derek

Stray Dog
Kosmigroove is just above "braindance" in the vomit stakes. Mind you, I do find it a useful word to use for that jazz/not-jazz stuff like Pharoah Sanders, Alice Coltrane etc.

It's amazingly not jazzy, that stuff, isn't it? The whole notion of interogating the chords, of playing the scales as an artistic technique, is gone. Instead they just swim around the same chord sequences, waiting for nuggets of poetry to happen naturally. A totally different mindset.
 

Woebot

Well-known member
blissblogger said:
-- shamen as was said upthread (i must have seen them about four times in their pre-acid house phase, playing alongside mighty lemon drops and such. even then they were into acid, though --Op art slide projections, Electric Prunes type guitar sounds)
dissensus member iueke dj-ed techno with mixmaster morris to the indie hordes on one of their uk tours.
 

xero

was minusone
blissblogger said:
-- Primal scream was actually the conduit for so many ex-indie types into rave. in fact the friend who dragged me off to my first rave, she'd started going to them cos of Primal scream gigs when they had djs like weatherall as support instead of bands.

I think this is bang on the money and Brighton was the ground zero of this phenomenon I reckon. It was probably the first place the London acid house scene spread to. I remember weirdos in brightly coloured dungarees & bandanas running amok around the town drawn by Boys Own all-dayers and the like. Primal Scream were living there at the time and rather than hanging out in indie gigs & nights (like the afore-mentioned 14 iced bears, Brighton's indie heros of the time) they were regulars at the zap club's early house nights & beach after-parties.
 
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