|
Unsung Forum » When did indie music go tits up? |
Log In to post a reply
|
|
|
|
| Topic View: Flat | Threaded | |
jb lamptoast-morsley 2447 posts |
May 02, 2013, 22:34
|
||
|
Just been watching The Frank & Walters live @ The Spiegel Tent in Cork DVD. Really great life affirming indie pop. I note that also on Cherry Red Records is a DVD of The Sultans of Ping entitled 'U Talk 2 Much', when they reformed a few years back. Indie music turning into indie landfill music, just seemed to creep up towards the end of last century. It certainly hadn't happened while the above were in their pomp. Was it Brit Pop that did it? It seemed to coincide with the rise of Cold Play and Muse for me (who have done the odd good song here and there). Was it the growth of the MP3 and having easy access to whatever one could want? Why and when exactly did Indie music become the mainstream? Your thoughts please. Obviously this is written from the perspective of someone growing up listening to indie music in the early to mid 90's
|
|||
|
Repossessed 79 posts |
May 02, 2013, 22:54
|
||
In one word: Oasis.
|
|||
|
Popel Vooje 5373 posts |
Edited May 04, 2013, 08:53
May 02, 2013, 23:05
|
||
|
Yep - twas indeed Britpop that caused me to defect to electronica and hip-hop for ten years. Didn't like it's parochialism, its unashamedly retro outlook or the fact that it tried to make a virtue out of sounding lightweight and inconsequential. Having said that, there was plenty of shite indie music around both before and after Britpop. I'd go along with Ian B's point about how the term eventually became synomynous with a narrow musical style as opposed to an alternative means of operating within the music industry.
|
|||
|
Moon Cat 9577 posts |
Edited May 03, 2013, 00:00
May 02, 2013, 23:22
|
||
|
Will definitely get back to you on this 'cos I think there's loads to be said. But for now... When you had the NME sticking stuff like stage school indie dullards The Kooks on the cover with the big sell that "this stuff is good!" The relentless archness and scenesterism; the relentless biting the hand that feeds archness and irony that accompanied the above. "Hey, we know it's shit! You know it's shit! Let's all go to Camden and wallow in our mediocre, crazy shitness!! I'm a DJ!" Pete Doherty - The Patron Saint of Oversold, Hyped, Underachieving, Skag- Deluded, scrotum-tug the middle aged Mojo lickers, absolute nexus of the square root of fuck all, and yet was held as an icon of anything at all?!! And the ridiculous amounts of column inches devoted to gigs HE DIDN'T TURN UP FOR BUT HEY, THAT's CRAZY PETE! And king of Cunt Hats. Squadgy faced, tuneless goon made being not that good actually, sub poet-rock as BLAND selfwank juice, a sellable quality by and for suckers. Never did an audience and their Prince of Relentless Indie-Void (and he treated those suckers like turd) so deserve each other. Was always tempted to nuke a venue he was playing at in the name of pest control but chances are the fuckhole woulda been too busy rolling around in his own snot and mythology to turn up.
|
|||
|
Lawrence 9547 posts |
Edited May 03, 2013, 01:52
May 03, 2013, 01:52
|
||
|
Well I go farther to the 80s, and I can tell you here in America, anyways, it started to go tits up around 1986. For awhile College Radio and the live circuit was a place to see cutting-edge music. But then by '86 REM became super-popular at a time when they were becoming a bit annoying (circa Life's Rich Pageant.) So much so every band sounded like REM. And then there was an onslaught of dopey novelty-rock groups like the Dead Milkmen and They Might Be Giants. And what was coming from England, well sorry but I never really cared for the "C86" sound despite a few exceptions. A few years and there would be Techno, which might have been swell on the dancefloor but headache-inducing on the radio -- not that I'm knocking it, I've seen Techno played live and it's brilliant that way. It just seemed by 1983 alot of good indie groups who were on the serious-side now all of the sudden wanted to play disco, except they didn't know what made 70's disco great, so... Well I could go on. I dunno maybe I'm just bitter and old, and music just changed too fast for me.
|
|||
stray 2057 posts |
May 03, 2013, 06:45
|
||
I dunno really if it did tbh, but I think the indie term got narrowed sometime around 2000 to describe a very small subset of homogenised shit. I mean, theres still some interesting(ish) music being made that I would call Indie. Theres stuff on Bearsuit records, Wichita (still) and Morrmusic off the top off my head thats Indie and at least trying to break new forms. Thing is it just doesn't get the Indie tag, but maybe thats a good thing.
|
|||
Stevo 6664 posts |
Edited May 03, 2013, 07:50
May 03, 2013, 07:25
|
||
|
depends on your perspective really, I'm reminded that the Birthday Party went to London in about 1980 expecting there to be a great creative scene going on where every band was as good as The Pop Group and instead found nothing to their taste. Said they went to Echo & The bunnymen at the Lyceum and were revolted. So could go back even further than you think, but there were at least some creative underground artists at the time. Does seem to go in waves of something becoming big and then everythng else following it so becoming carbon copies while original bands get ignored. I think there were interesting bands going on at the same time as Britpop etc but not sure what focus the media had at the time. I do remember the NME coming up with a genre they called stool at some point around there. I'm really hoping to find out taht that was satirical cos they'd be pretty dumb to not know taht indicated any bands involved were shit. But the way things were going at the time I wouldn't be surprised to find out they had no idea about the 2nd meaning of teh word. The definition of indie changed a few times over the years too. There was a period where there were a lot of supposed Indie labels that actually had money coming from major label support and then a backlash against taht excluding any label with any major connection. Not sure if that took out a lot of promising bands as sell outs. Would think that diminsihing amounts of venues might mean that bands had to cohere to more defined tropes re prevailing trends in order to actually get gigs. Which if it is the case would probably take out a lot of originality. (might come back and re-edit this later cos I don't think I'm transferring a thought properly) Stevo
|
|||
|
machineryelf 3681 posts |
May 03, 2013, 07:30
|
||
When people started believing the Frank & Walters were great life affirmimg pop, this is said only slightly tongue in cheek, when bands like them ,Neds Atomic Dustbin,Senseless Things et al were promoted as being more than the 2nd tier 3rd on the bill bands that they were. If Carter USM are the pinnacle of what you are striving for it's time to give up. so about 92 i'd say
|
|||
IanB 6761 posts |
Edited May 03, 2013, 08:36
May 03, 2013, 08:13
|
||
|
jb lamptoast-morsley wrote: Just been watching The Frank & Walters live @ The Spiegel Tent in Cork DVD. Really great life affirming indie pop. I note that also on Cherry Red Records is a DVD of The Sultans of Ping entitled 'U Talk 2 Much', when they reformed a few years back. Indie music turning into indie landfill music, just seemed to creep up towards the end of last century. It certainly hadn't happened while the above were in their pomp. Was it Brit Pop that did it? It seemed to coincide with the rise of Cold Play and Muse for me (who have done the odd good song here and there). Was it the growth of the MP3 and having easy access to whatever one could want? Why and when exactly did Indie music become the mainstream? Your thoughts please. A style of music becoming mainstream for me is about when the art becomes codified with its own style points and the artists get commodified. It all started to go downhill when indie became a genre with the same kind of rule book as Metal or Northern Soul or Prog rather than being way of doing business and a state of mind. I would like to say that it crossed that divide with "Love Will Tear Us Apart" but I think the key date is actually 1983/84 that period book ended by "Blue Monday" / "Power Corruption Lies" and "The Smiths". By the time C86 came out indie was ossified into a fashion and a sub-culture as unforgiving as Teds or Mods. Revolt into style etc. Just compare that era and what followed over the next decade with the sheer range, vitality and purpose of the C81 music. That had a "we can do anything we damn well please" spirit to it. It was still Punk Rock in spirit and no one had much of a career plan. Five years later it was full of serious young careerists who insisted on their being "right about music" (the majors being always in the wrong*) avoiding all things in their work that might suggest they were actually trying at all. The irony is that this just denied the major labels the kind of talent pool they had in the late 60s and early 70s. * funny how British indie acts and labels thought UK majors were always in the wrong but they would happily condone signing a US license deal with a major. I guess they thought no one would notice them taking the money over there or perhaps they believed that US majors were less venal. I am going with option 1.
|
|||
|
IanB 6761 posts |
Edited May 03, 2013, 08:16
May 03, 2013, 08:15
|
||
|
Lawrence wrote: Well I go farther to the 80s, and I can tell you here in America, anyways, it started to go tits up around 1986. For awhile College Radio and the live circuit was a place to see cutting-edge music. But then by '86 REM became super-popular at a time when they were becoming a bit annoying (circa Life's Rich Pageant.) So much so every band sounded like REM. Agreed! Your REM was our The Smiths
|
| Pages: 9 – [ 1 2 3 4 5 6 | Next ] | Add a reply to this topic |
|
|
|
| Unsung Forum Index | |
