That's INDIEtastic!

[Dalton]

Alright, here's what I would like to do. I'd like to compile a list of the top Indie albums from every years since 1998 (10 years ago). So take a look through your media player of choice and post 5 indie albums from every year since then (excluding 2009).

The only qualification is that the album was released by an indie label. It doesn't matter if the band subsequently signed with a major.

We'll let this go until February 25 and then I will compile the master list. If it looks worthwhile we can do a survivor with all the albums.

 

[LJT]

1. Menomena- Friend and Foe (Barsuk Records) 2007
2. The Wrens- Meadowlands (LO-MAX) 2003
3. The Velvet Teen- Out of the Fierce Parade (Slowdance Records) 2002
4. The Open- Silent Hours (Loog Records) 2004
5. Aereogramme- My Heart Has a Wish That You Would Not Go (Chemikal Underground) 2007

 

[Dalton]

1. Menomena- Friend and Foe (Barsuk Records) 2007
2. The Wrens- Meadowlands (LO-MAX) 2003
3. The Velvet Teen- Out of the Fierce Parade (Slowdance Records) 2002
4. The Open- Silent Hours (Loog Records) 2004
5. Aereogramme- My Heart Has a Wish That You Would Not Go (Chemikal Underground) 2007

PHAIL.

Your format should look like this:

1998
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.



1999
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.



2000
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.



2001
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.



2002
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.


etc.

 

[u2popmofo]

I cringe each and every time any of you use that ridiculous word. Please stop, I hatez.

 

[Dalton]

I cringe each and every time any of you use that ridiculous word. Please stop, I hatez.

Ha Scumbo, I used it to piss you off. I also left the title of this thread intentionally vague.

Ulcers, here you come!

 

[zonelistener]

I cringe each and every time any of you use that ridiculous word. Please stop, I hatez.

The indie adolescent sobs. Boo hoo.

 

[impy13]

2008
1. Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes
2. Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago
3. Okkervil River - The Stand-ins
4. Lisa Hannigan - Sea Sew
5. Man Man - Rabbit Habits



All you get for now.

 

[Dalton]

That's fine as long as you fill out the rest over the next week.

 

[UberBeaver]

What makes something "indie"?

 

[No spoken words]

What makes something "indie"?

If Impy jizzes in his pants when he hears it, then it's Indie.

 

[UberBeaver]

If Impy jizzes in his pants when he hears it, then it's Indie.

So me banging your mom = Indie. That's going to make putting a list together real easy.

 

[elevated_u2_fan]

Katy Perry is indie?

 

[u2popmofo]

What makes something "indie"?

Literally, if it's on an "independent label" it's "indie". Some bands still fall into the description even though they're on major labels because of their history, ideals, sound, etc. (for example: Decemberists, Death Cab, Built to Spill, Flaming Lips, Wilco, etc).

It gets more confusing when you have to decide if a label is actually "independent" or just shitty and small.

 

[impy13]

If Impy jizzes in his pants when he hears it, then it's Indie.

Katy Perry is indie?

Passes the test.

 

[LJT]

PHAIL.

I think you'll find I did not PHAIL, 'cocking up' is a more appropriate term.

That's just made it a whole lot less fun...I was only 11 in 1998...not sure I have much from that specific year.

My list making instinct may just get the better of me though...

 

[u2popmofo]

I'm just worried Dalton will immediately illegally download my entire list once I post it just to spite me, that's why I haven't made one.

 

[impy13]

Well, I think we need to establish whether we only want albums released on an indie label or albums featuring the indie aesthetic. It's a shame, for instance, that I couldn't include Dear Science because they're on Interscope.

 

[GirlsAloudFan]

2004
1. Arcade Fire - Funeral
2. Franz Ferdinand - Franz Ferdinand
3. Modest Mouse - Good News For People Who Love Bad News
4. Rilo Kiley - More Adventurous
5. Interpol - Antics

2005
1. Bloc Party - Silent Alarm
2. Sufjan Stevens - Illinois
3. The Decemberists - Picaresque
4. Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
5. The Hold Steady - Separation Sunday

2006
1. Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
2. The Hold Steady - Boys and Girls in America
3. Lily Allen - Alright, Still
4. Belle & Sebastian - The Life Pursuit
5. TV On the Radio - Return to Cookie Mountain

2007
1. Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare
2. Okkervil River - The Stage Names
3. Of Montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?
4. Iron & Wine - The Shepherd's Dog
5. The National - Boxer

I don't want to think of more than a few years off the top of my head right now. Some of those bands you might not immediately think of as being "indie", but I'm pretty sure all of those albums were released on indie labels. Close enough, anyway. Close counts in horseshoes, hand grenades, and Dalton threads.

 

[lazarus]

Here's a handy tool:

1998 in music - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Dalton]

I'm just worried Dalton will immediately illegally download my entire list once I post it just to spite me, that's why I haven't made one.

Listen douche, I don't steal music. My people don't believe in individual possessions. We hold everything in common.

We're highly functioning communists.

 

[No spoken words]

Listen douche, I don't steal music. My people don't believe in individual possessions. We hold everything in common.

We're highly functioning communists.

My people don't steal, per se.

 

[Dalton]

Well, I think we need to establish whether we only want albums released on an indie label or albums featuring the indie aesthetic. It's a shame, for instance, that I couldn't include Dear Science because they're on Interscope.

I was thinking only albums that are released on Indie labels, but I'm willing to be flexible. Clearly you know more about this than I do, so I will defer to your thoughts.

 

[elevated_u2_fan]

Listen douche, I don't steal music. My people don't believe in individual possessions. We hold everything in common.

We're highly functioning communists.

I hear your people aren't very good at giving though...

 

[Dalton]

I hear your people aren't very good at giving though...

/thread

 

[onebloodonelife]

Literally, if it's on an "independent label" it's "indie". Some bands still fall into the description even though they're on major labels because of their history, ideals, sound, etc. (for example: Decemberists, Death Cab, Built to Spill, Flaming Lips, Wilco, etc).

It gets more confusing when you have to decide if a label is actually "independent" or just shitty and small.

I'd say that's a pretty good definition. Like impy says below, we do need to decide if we're going to include both aspects of it or not.

Well, I think we need to establish whether we only want albums released on an indie label or albums featuring the indie aesthetic. It's a shame, for instance, that I couldn't include Dear Science because they're on Interscope.

My concern would be that if we do music released on indie labels only, we'll leave out some really great albums that still contain the indie spirit and sound indie, but aren't on an indie label.

 

[LJT]

What does Indie sound like?? Dear Science is a million miles away from say The Wrens Meadowlands.....and The Wrens even have a 'the' name. I debate the existence of an indie sound, a DIY approach to music and a certain aesthetic I can appreciate as being 'indie' but soundwise not really.

 

[onebloodonelife]

There isn't always, but often is a more lo-fi approach to recording, which can give completely different artists a common thread in their sound. But, I guess that would depend on how much you ascribe to that idea too. No matter what, we're not going to figure out a precise definition because there isn't one with indie...it's been debated since the beginning of the whole idea.

 

[LemonMelon]

I'm not sure how much of this is actually indie, but here we go. In no particular order:

1998
1. Neutral Milk Hotel - In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
2. Elliott Smith - XO
3. Boards of Canada - Music Has the Right to Children
4. Silver Jews - American Water
5. Eels - Electro-Shock Blues

1999
1. The Flaming Lips - The Soft Bulletin
2. Bonnie "Prince" Billy - I See a Darkness
3. The Magnetic Fields - 69 Love Songs
4. Built to Spill - Keep It Like a Secret
5. The Dismemberment Plan - Emergency & I

2000
1. Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
2. Modest Mouse - The Moon And Antarctica
3. The Avalanches - Since I Left You
4. Radiohead - Kid A
5. Dove - Lost Souls

2001
1. The Microphones - The Glow Pt. 2
2. Cannibal Ox - The Cold Vein
3. Spoon - Girls Can Tell
4. The Shins - Oh, Inverted World
5. Super Furry Animals - Rings Around the World

2002
1. Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
2. Beck - Sea Change
3. The Mountain Goats - Tallahassee
4. The Streets - Original Pirate Material
5. The Roots - Phrenology

2003
1. Explosions in the Sky - The Earth Is Not a Cold Dead Place
2. Sun Kil Moon - Ghosts of the Great Highway
3. Sufjan Stevens - Michigan
4. Death Cab for Cutie - Transatlanticism
5. The Unicorns - Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone?

2004
1. Arcade Fire - Funeral
2. Madvillain - Madvillainy
3. Wilco - A Ghost Is Born
4. Franz Ferdinand - Franz Ferdinand
5. The Go! Team - Thunder, Lightning, Strike

2005
1. Sufjan Stevens - Illinois
2. Sigur Rós - Takk...
3. Andrew Bird - Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs
4. The New Pornographers - Twin Cinema
5. My Morning Jacket - Z

2006
1. Sonic Youth - Rather Ripped
2. The Flaming Lips - At War With The Mystics
3. The Decemberists - The Crane Wife
4. TV on the Radio - Return to Cookie Mountain
5. Grizzly Bear - Yellow House

2007
1. LCD Soundystem - Sound Of Silver
2. Lupe Fiasco - The Cool
3. Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
4. Spoon - GaGaGaGaGa
5. Radiohead - In Rainbows

2008
1. Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes
2. TV On The Radio - Dear Science
3. Cut Copy - In Ghost Colours
4. Deerhunter - Microcastle
5. Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago

Anything in bold is particularly indietastic and awesome.

 

[lazarus]

Here, asshole. Some of these artists are big, but if they were on a an indie label, so be it. A bunch of others that seemed indie were actually on majors or subsidiaries, and disqualified. Some, like Super Furry Animals, were on and off indie labels, so were occasionally eligible.

1998
1. St. Etienne, Good Humour (Sub Pop)
2. Prince, The Truth (self)
3. Rancid, Life Won't Wait (Dischord)
4. The Jesus and Mary Chain, Munki (Sub Pop)
5. Silver Jews, American Water (Drag City)

1999
1. Pavement, Terror Twilight (Matador)
2. The Dismemberment Plan, Emergency & I (DeSoto)
3. Super Furry Animals, Guerilla (Creation)
4. Underworld, Beaucoup Fish (Junior Boy's Own)
5. Frank Black & The Catholics, Pistolero (SpinART)

2000
1. Sleater-Kinney, All Hands on the Bad One (Kill Rock Stars)
2. The White Stripes, De Stijl (Sympathy for the Record Industry)
3. The New Pornographers, Mass Romantic (Mint/Matador)
N/A
N/A

2001
1. Spoon, Girls Can Tell (Merge)
2. Stephen Malkmus, S/T (Matador)
3. The Dismemberment Plan, Change (DeSoto)
4. My Morning Jacket, At Dawn
5. The White Stripes, White Blood Cells (Sympathy for the Record Industry)

2002
1. Sleater-Kinney, One Beat (Kill Rock Stars)
2. Spoon, Kill the Moonlight (Merge)
3. Tom Waits, Alice (ANTI-/Epitaph)
4. Steve Earle, Jerusalem (E-Squared/Artemis)
5. Wilco, Yankee Hotel Foxrtrot (Nonesuch)

2003
1. Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks, Pig Lib (Matador)
2. The Twilight Singers, Blackberry Belle (One Little Indian)
3. The Postal Service, Give Up (Sub Pop)
4. Death Cab For Cutie, Transatlanticism (Barsuk)
5. Paul Westerberg, Come Feel Me Tremble (Vagrant_

2004
1. The Arcade Fire, Funeral (Merge)
2. Wilco, A Ghost is Born (Nonesuch)
3. Rilo Kiley, More Adventurous (Brute/Beaute)
4. Guided By Voices, Half Smiles of the Decomposed (Matador)
5. Brian Wilson, Smile (Nonesuch)

2005
1. Spoon, Gimme Fiction (Merge)
2. M.I.A., Arular (XL)
3. The New Pornographers, Twin Cinema (Mint/Matador)
4. The National, Alligator (Beggar's Banquet)
5. Frank Black, Honeycomb (Back Porch)

2006
1. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, S/T (self)
2. Cat Power, The Greatest (Matador)
3. Man Man, Six Demon Bag (Ace Fu)
4. The Format, Dog Problems (Vanity)
5. Islands, Return to the Sea (Equator/Rough Trade)

2007
1. Radiohead, In Rainbows (self)
2. LCD Soundsystem, Sound of Silver (DFA)
3. The Arcade Fire, Neon Bible (Merge)
4. Super Furry Animals, Hey Venus! (Rough Trade)
5. Spoon, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (Merge)

2008
1. Los Campesinos, Hold on Now, Youngster (Wichita/Arts & Crafts)
2. Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks, Real Emotional Trash (Matador)
3. Los Campesinos!, We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed (Wichita/Arts & Crafts)
4. The Raveonettes, Lust Lust Lust (Fierce Panda/Vice)
5. The Dø, A Mouthful (Cinq7)

 

[LemonMelon]

Sheeeeeeit, Laz and I have 13 of the same albums. Not sure whether or not that's awesome.