Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Maybe I Don't Know What I'm Talking About, But I Can Rant With the Best of 'Em

I’m sipping coffee in a Jittery Joe’s coffeeshop right now, and writing this because a) I have nothing else to do, and b) it makes me feel like one of those artsy coffeeshop writers I’ve always wanted to emulate. I’m currently in Athens, Georgia, the hot, sleepy little college town that the University of Georgia calls home. Oh, before you even ask, yes, there is also a Rome, Georgia. And a Cairo (although it’s pronounced KAY-ro, and don’t you forget it, ya damnyankee). We’re not too original with the names here.

Athens also happens to be the town where a lot of indie bands got their start. I’m sure can tell the signs of a fierce indie-kid through my writings. Alas, “indie,” like many rebellious genres gone before it, has mostly been sucked into the mainstream. The ideals still exist, sort of. Fight the system. The more unheard-of is always better. Turn away from the pop culture and refuse to be like “everybody else.” Instead, do things because nobody else is doing them. Problem is, everybody wants to do that sort of thing. Everybody wants to be the cool person not following the crowd. And once you’ve got everybody not following the crowd, guess what! It’s mainstream! Then, of course, the original creators become whores, as the writer of an indie webcomic (Spelling the Vacuum) that died a while ago (the comic, not the writer. I hope) pointed out. Once everyone’s a nonconformist, no one is. That’s why the ‘60’s hippies seem so silly to me for thinking they were countercultural. It’s not countercultural if everyone in the room is doing it. The real countercultural thing to do, in that era, was to wear a tie and be right-wing. Village Green Preservation Society, etc.

Anyway, I’m not saying that “indie” is dying because it took over the world. I don’t think it did that at all. I just think that, as soon as they started having “indie charts” and awards for “best new indie band,” etc., they effectively killed it. You can’t turn away from the system if you’re part of it. The point of indie was that it was underground, the geek thing to do. Revenge of the nerds, and all that. Once geek became cool (just look at how many high school kids were wearing Converse in the last ten years), it stopped being geeky.

Another problem, of course, is that “indie,” as a genre, is almost impossible to define. You could cite the Pixies, Neutral Milk Hotel, Belle & Sebastian, Elliott Smith, the Smiths, Modest Mouse, the Shins, Pavement, The Mountain Goats, or even (God help you) the Arcade Fire or Bright Eyes. The list goes on, and all of them sound wildly different. Well, if they’re good, that is. The Arcade Fire or Bright Eyes mainly sound like suck. Cheap imitations of better bands. Sorry if that offends you, actually, hell no, I’m not sorry if it offends you. I’m sorry that you have shit taste. I never said I wasn’t a music snob. But really, what is “indie rock” or “indie pop?” The latter actually sounds like a contradiction-in-terms, since “pop” is supposed to be what “indie” rejects. Actually, whenever I hear a band referred to as “indie pop,” it generally means that the lead singer has the same, whiny voice, and the band is more emo than My Chemical Reek (which in fact sounds like a better band name than the real one). “Indie rock,” on the other hand, tends to refer to more hardcore bands like the Pixies or Modest Mouse (who really stopped being “indie” after they had a music video on MTV).

I guess that should tell you what indie meant to me. It meant something nobody else knew about, a secret shared between cool friends, a sort of club that the idiotic mainstream people couldn’t take from me. I remember my shock when, walking down the street in a ratty Belle & Sebastian T-shirt a few years ago, a really preppy girl stopped me to shriek, “Omigawd I LOVE that band!” Don’t get me wrong, I want the bands I love to succeed, and I’m always glad to find people who share my taste. It’s just that it’s a bit jarring to find that what you think is so cool and underground is just as above-ground as anything else. While I’m glad for my bands, I’m also a little saddened that the genre is pretty much dead, having been pulled into the light for all to see. Means I have to find something new with which to fight the system.

And I do still hate the system. These new “thrash-metal” bands, the hardxcore stuff, the emo kids, the wannabe goths, and, dear lord, the scenesters. So fucking pretentious, all of them. On the other side, all my college friends ever listen to is Sublime, which gets old after awhile. Oh well, at least they aren’t giving in to the pleas of my other friends to listen to “hard rock.” Seems like if it doesn’t involve the same incredibly loud baseline, and the same, semi-retarded lyrics (but that’s okay, because they’re screamed so you can’t understand them anyway), and the same, head-banging beat, it just doesn’t satisfy the young people of today. Seriously, if you try to piece together the lyrics of most “hardcore” music, it’ll either come out sounding mentally challenged or like a crappy version of Avril Lavigne (I honestly can’t tell the difference between that shallow bitch and Paramore), for whom my hatred cannot even be coherent. But the worst sin, in my book, is that it all sounds the same. I went to a concert a year ago given by Cute Is What We Aim For (But Sucky Is What We Accomplish), opening for Paramore. Except for the genders of the lead singers, I honestly couldn’t tell the difference between the bands. If you tell me that’s because I haven’t listened to them enough, I will smile and say, “Yes, I’ve been lucky that way.”

Well, that was quite a little rant, I must say. My apologies, I don’t think I’ve ever fully introduced you to the extent of my music snobbery. There you have it, another facet of my character revealed. I’m a very difficult person to please when it comes to music. Surprisingly, I’ll almost never criticize someone else’s music in public. That’s because I take my own music to heart, feeling personally insulted if anyone else casts aspersions on it. I feel like your music defines who you are, in a way, and that people judge you by it. Probably just my own self-projection, I know, but I don’t want to hurt anyone else’s feelings in case it’s not. So, unless I know you very well, I’ll usually just smile and say nothing if I haven’t got anything nice to say about your music. Then I’ll come on my blog and JUDGE YOU TO THE WORLD.

Just kidding. I try to be good about not gossiping about people on here. Besides, who the hell cares that Girl A thinks Avril is the shit, clearly indicating that she has neither depth nor musical taste? I certainly shouldn’t. So I’ll try to keep this thing either to Amusing Anecdotes From My Not-Very-Amusing Life, or to Rants Accomplishing Nothing Other Than Making Me Feel Better. Or, occasionally, A Cool Book/Movie I Read/Watched That The World Should Know About.

Speaking of, I’m currently in the midst of the travel writings of Evelyn Waugh. I love Evelyn Waugh. Brideshead Revisited has had a major impact on my life, which I can’t talk about, because I’ve already spewed out an incredibly long post.

By the way, people have an alarming tendency to take me too seriously. Don't make this mistake. Chances are, I'm just blowing off steam. If you disagree with everything I'm saying, that's totally fine. Just don't get all upset and angry about it, like some poor feminist who has to spend all her life being offended.

Honestly, I don't see how hardcore feminists have any fun at all.

Spudge at 3:04 PM

1comments

1 Comments

at July 30, 2009 4:30 PM  Anonymous said...

Lol, you're a fucking douche, man. You really are.

 

Post a Comment