[Kiki]

I'm very unfamiliar with what is called "Indie". It isn't somewhere I have delved a lot beyond the Kaiser Cheifs and Franz Ferdinand (two of the very first artists I heard called "Indie", my brother got a DAB radio in 2005 so Kerrang radio was on all the time that year).

What artists are essential in "indie" and what are the main albums. Also what exactaly does it all mean to you? The word is thrown around a lot so people would put different meanings on it. What do "indie" fans do?

I hope you will be able to educate me as I don't know a lot about this. What is this "indie" music? 😜

[thejoj96]

Indie just means on an independent record label. It shouldn't refer to a genre of music and I don't know why it became a music genre.

[Hayden]

[Kiki]

So is there a sound of being on a independent label? Or is there a big umbrella encompassing many? Are "indie" and "pop" things which should never be uttered in the same sentance? Although you did say it was a "classification" so I guess it isn't really a sound at all.

What "Indie" albums are the most popular ones? Which are the ones I should be looking out for? 😜

What makes "indie" ? 😁

[Guest]

Indie is not a style. You can make pop music under an independent label. The music affecting thing of being under an independent label may be the level of artistic freedom given to the artists, although they are more likely given less world-wide exposure.

[Hayden]

[pearljammer13]

Hipsters!!! I've always hated the people that love indie and only indie simply for the sake of being different and avoiding the mainstream. But that isn't what this thread is about.

My favorite indie bands: The Shins, Manchester Orchestra, Modest Mouse, Iron & Wine, Metric, Neutral Milk Hotel.

Like a couple have already said, it's technically only the label that classifies it, although it somehow got turned into a genre of music. Usually it tends to be more on the low-fi side, but depending on the band or album it's often interchangeable with alternative/rock. It really doesn't have a specific "sound" that I can come up with. I often wonder why it's considered a type of music now.

[Mr. Shankly]

It's hard to say anymore. Yes, it literally means bands on an independent label. But what about indie labels that have distribution deals with major labels now? That's getting to be commonplace. For instance, Sub Pop and Matador both fall into that category. An interesting phenomenon happened in the late 90's, early 2000's: Indie rock started to become mainstream. That is, more and more of the mainstream public became interested in it. Why? Either because indie rock has gotten very safe and accessible, meaning too close to adult alternative or because there are more choices available for people with the advent of the internet, or is typical pop radio mainstream just so terrible, people are looking for alternatives? I don't know. It could be combination of all of those.

Hayden had a great list, but he left out the 1980's, and that's really when indie rock, as a genre, began. Basically it grew out of hard core punk and post punk. Indie rock, at its core, was a more melodic, slightly more accessible form of mostly guitar dominated music that was still outside the mainstream. The important indie bands of the 80's included:

Sonic Youth (up through Daydream Nation. Goo was released on Geffen), The Pixies, Dinosaur Jr, The Replacements (up through Let it Be or Tim), Husker Du (up through Flip Your Wig), Black Flag, The Dead Kennedys, and believe it or not, R.E.M. for five albums (although I.R.S. might have been distributed by a major--They had The English Beat and The Go-Go's, as well). In England, there was The Smiths, The Fall, The Stone Roses, Joy Division?...(Manc Soul Sister could probably add a lot to this list)

Two books you should read about the rise of indie rock in America:

1) Our Band Could be Your Life- Michael Azzerad
2) Route 666: On the Road to Nirvana (Gina Arnold's hypothesis is that the success of Nirvana and the alternative music explosion of the early was the culmination of everything that had happened before in the 80's)

[Mr. Shankly]

What about Green Day?...

"No way, dude... Those guys are like the most lame mainstream pop band ever."


Actually, are you ready for a mindblower?

For their first ep's and album, Green Day was on Lookout Records, a really small Berkeley label. It doesn't get any more indie than Lookout Records!.. Just saying...

My point: A lot of bands that build a big audience or have the potential to do so, almost always make the jump to a major. It happened in the late 80's, the mid-late 90's and it's still happening now.

Death Cab for Cutie (formerly Barsuk) and Modest Mouse (formerly Up Records) are two more indie bands that made the leap in the early 2000's. Both had built sizeable audiences by touring and consistently putting out decent records.

Just some food for thought. 😄

[Romanelli]