"Scouting for Girls are like the sound of Satan's scrotum emptying. They're abysmal."

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

Surprised no one posted this yet-

Does the world need another indie band?

The short version of that article is that no one really knows who buys Scouting For Girls records. It is quite marvellously vehement though if you, like me, spend a mystifyingly large amount of your time trying to think of a new way of saying 'this is a shit indie single.' Not sure it goes far enough for me on some aspects (the bit with some bloke talking about the wonder of some kids dancing to 80s/90s indie as though this makes them genii is particular obnoxious) but does contain the quote from this subject line.

Edit: I might add, this isn't a 'HAR LOOK ALL INDIE ARE CRAP' post. I think the article's interesting because we've been talking about how these instantly charting indie bands are the new throwaway boy/girlband for awhile, particularly this week and although this is a smug indie person talking about it from a smug indie perspective, it's surprisingly on-the-money in a lot of places. It might be worth asking, if it's not a totally overwrung question that ultimate ends up with 'THE MAN' as the answer, why you think these particular little trends of throwaway bands/groups start and what you personally think brought on this particular glut of awful?

Also, I really cannot emphasise enough that I have had to review The Enemy three times in the last year.

Comments

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

"[Punk] has become a meaningless term. It just covers guitar bands. But it was never meant to be about a type of music, it wasa spirit and an attitude. When I glance around the bands that are supposedly [punk] today, I don't see any attitude. I don't see any content in their records, any political interest in the band members. They're a terrible generation, unfortunately, but they're becoming famous overnight and selling a lot of records."

DYS?

This guy's argument seems as predictable as the music he's complaining about - or rather there are two arguments here. One is that the kids today listen to conformist crap, the other is about the co-option of treasured symbols and heritage by conformism. Obviously these are old old moves, and seem to me to leave us with two possible responses. One is to say - sure, these things are cyclical, move along nothing to see here but the wheel turning. The other is to ask - sure, but why Indie this time around, or why this and not that. But the answer is probably cycles again. The bigger issues behind this are interesting, but seem equally tired- why are we assuming that non-conformism is good and conformism bad, especially when all the evidence suggests that societies require big doses of both; we're all familiar with non-conformism functioning as small-scale conformism; and then the generational thing whereby non-conformists become taste-makers and gate-keepers, despite their own outlooks and attitudes having shifted, so that they can only recognise the trappings of non-conformism, but which they still pass on.