According to BBC’s Newsbeat website, Coventry band, The Enemy are taking time off and this is seen as one sign of the apocalypse of indie guitar bands.
The article quotes failing sales, indie bands laying low and only 3 are in the UK top 20.
I heard a news report on BBC 1 on my return home from work today when the announcer quoted a listener saying that the indie guitar genre is not failing, it is merely going back underground.
If that listener meant underground in terms of only being able to get local gigs in seedy bars…yeah sure it’s underground.
I don’t mean to be controversial or drag down indie guitar bands. But as a casual observer of my own local music scene, I have started to notice an increase in otherwise little traversed genres from young artists like blues, funk, rockabilly, thrash, and mod rock.
Theres a heck of a lot of open mics and acoustic gigs popping up all over the place. And the dub and dance industry is really pushing through some impressive acts in the mainstream.
I guess there are two potential lessons that independent bands can learn from this revelation in the media…
1) Be prepared for limited success if you are mediocre in a failing and increasingly underground genre.
2) Innovate, innovate, innovate…the acts that sustain themselves in the charts have strived continually to always be on top of their game and rather than following trends…they start them. Yeah, sure, record labels do try and find cookie-cutter acts that will, fingers crossed, give them success…but it’s historically documented as fleeting. I suppose you have to ask yourself which you prefer…
