speaking of "that thing we’re going to have to just agree to call indie rock"

October 6, 2012

speaking of “that thing we’re going to have to just agree to call indie rock”

that line comes from one my favorite essays, let’s (not) get it on (or, fucking to songs about fucking and other uncomfortable developments in the awkward relationship between what we’re going to have to just agree to call indie rock and sexuality in the 1990s), written by one of my favorite Tall Smart Guys, sean nelson (who you might know as the singer of a band called harvey danger, which, by the way, if you ever refer to as a “one hit wonder” in my presence, i will quickly and swiftly light you on fire).

ANYWAYS.

the essay is long, but deeply hilarious and charming, and resonates with me (and, i imagine, most people who have found themselves involved in That Thing We’re Going To Have To Just Agree To Call Indie Rock) in surprising ways.

it’s friday. nobody wants to work. read this essay instead.

the essay is here. it is slightly edited from the version i saw sean read at the 2009 emp pop music conference (the same one where i met the incredible mikki and told a room full of people that a kathleen hanna quote was actually extremely sexist), but it is still great and brilliant.

its woven together so perfectly that i can’t begin to pull teaser quotes from it but this is a gem:

(I’m just going to go ahead and say “indie rock,” with a free-floating asterisk to indicate that I recognize and value the several important microfibers of distinction that will be lost in the assumption that, say, Hüsker Dü and Sugar might be part of the same stratosphere… I hereby stipulate that I understand, if anyone still cares, that punk is not the same as alternative is not the same as indie—to say nothing of good-old college rock. But they are all more like one another than they are like Poison. Plus “punk” is too specific and “indie” sounds better than “alternative,” which, because of the age I was at the time of its ascendance, I always refused to say aloud anyway, like “Generation X” or “Friends.”)