Indie, what?

Going through my old MySpace list, I realized how different my taste in music has become through the years. I started off with Miley Cyrus and The Jonas Brothers, and now listen to a whole new brand of music known as “indie”.  It seems to be the choice of a new generation- A generation which I come from. I slowly found myself moving away from the sugar pop music and more towards the “alternative/alt-rock” bands, which were still pretty mainstream but had a sort of electric weirdness to them covered in noisy out-of-tune synthesizers. Coldplay, for example. Their songs like “Charlie Brown” and “Violet Hill” are examples of somewhat unconventional music coming from a popular band.

Earlier before, “indie rock” was the proud successor of “punk rock”. It was defined to oppose the music that was made to appeal to the masses. It was for people who were fed up with  what they heard on their TV and radio. However soon enough, we saw bands like Sonic Youth and Joy Division go commercial. Many of these underground bands started signing with major record labels. Indie had expanded its territory and somewhat dropped its image of ‘weird’ and became more common.  The definition of "indie" remains constantly in flux. Are bands on independent labels the only ones righteous enough to have a illicit claim to the "indie" spirit? Or is indie an aesthetic that belongs to any artist who is willing to be creative or showcase their idiosyncrasies, without caring about the commercial success?

I feel as though anything that can be described as ‘quirky’ or ‘quaint’ now comes under the indie umbrella, and there are more things under it than it can actually take. As indie enters the second decade of the 21st century, its definition has never been less clear. Hipsters that see their favorite bands appearing on popular late night shows and treacherous label signings experience a lot of hurt. On various social networks (i.e Tumblr) I see them lashing out and talking about the good old days of a band before it became mainstream.  It seems hard for people to digest that there can be an in-between. I love listening to Ariel Pink, John Maus, Mac DeMarco and other such not so popular indie artists. But I can’t like listening to Beyonce or Adele without being judged for crossing the other side, even if it is for a little while.

 There seems to be a sense of betrayal in all of this; the movement that had begun to defy conventional pop/rock now seems to become it.

By: Sana Ahmad