They might not be as psychadelic as some of the Shins songs, but Rogue Wave is a good band that sounds pretty similar to the Shins to me. They're debut album, Out of the Shadow came out on Sub Pop last year.

Of Montreal is pretty good if you like that type of psychadelic pop sound. Try the song "Disconnect the Dots." They also have a pretty good cover of "Know Your Onion."

And to answer the thread, Built to Spill, Neutral Milk Hotel, and The Shins are probably the best indie bands.

thanks guys i checked them out they sound great, im posting a new topic just so i can get even more feedback

adding:

Black Mountain - s/t (on scratch recordings)

I really connected with the Arcade Fire, I can see why others who didn't would feel like they're missing something...although a few of their songs are good enough not to require a love of the band ('Tunnels', 'Laika', 'Power Out', 'Crown of Love').

I've never really 'got' Neutral Milk Hotel, 'In The Aeroplane Over The Sea' grabs me, as do a couple of other tracks on that album, but I generally find Mangum's voice really grating. And the music isn't anything to write home about.

The best 'indie rock' album I've heard in the last few years is definitely Broken Social Scene's 'You Forgot It In People'.

i agree wholeheartedly but how bout 7 kettles unbelieavable song but its funny their ep has a diff kindof style than funeral but has the same tone in the lyrics altho funeral is undoubtedly their best and how bout bright eyes from the lists ive seen so few include him hes one of the best out there today

ok. this whole indie scene has totally changed over the years. but here's MY depiction of what indie is.

The Strokes
The White Stripes
The Kings of Leon
The Libertines
The Vines
Interpol

Those are my favorite indie bands. anyone agree or disagree? would you guys say that's indie? because i stopped listening to the radio a while a go and stopped watching mtv too. so i dunno if that's what indie is today.

Indie isn't on radio (unless it's college radio) or mtv. So it doesn't matter if you don't watch or listen anymore. I don't know if I'd consider any of those bands Indie. I guess it depends on your definition of it.

I don't think I would call any of those bands indie, Stranger, for a couple of reasons. One, they are on major labels, and two, while they may be very good, they aren't really pushing the envelope musically. I would still call Radiohead indie because much of their music abandons traditional pop formats, but I don't think I can say that for any of the bands you listed (though I haven't heard half of them).

Hmm..there are some indie bands that push the envelope a whole lot less than some of those bands do.

They are on a mainstream label, which based on a strict definition would bar them from being 'indie', and I guess they've got more of a mainstream sound than what people might call 'indie' except for maybe Interpol. But I think White Stripes, Strokes, and Interpol have unique enough a musical personality to at least group with some of the indie bands.

ok, that makes sense..
The Libertines atleast you gotta say are pretty indie no? like i said... i know a couple of years ago the strokes and the vines and the white stripes were totally indie.. i just don't know what happened.. it's not like they totally abandoned independentness... well, the white stripes, yes.... they're huge now... i dunno where im getting with this..

quote:

Hmm..there are some indie bands that push the envelope a whole lot less than some of those bands do.

Yeah, but they're on indie labels.

quote:

ok, that makes sense..
The Libertines atleast you gotta say are pretty indie no? like i said... i know a couple of years ago the strokes and the vines and the white stripes were totally indie.. i just don't know what happened.. it's not like they totally abandoned independentness... well, the white stripes, yes.... they're huge now... i dunno where im getting with this..

I think you and Bob might be confusing indie music with music that the indie press commends. Indie is not a synonym for good. There can be very good non-indie bands (such as the White Stripes and Strokes), and there can be really shitty indie bands. You don't necessarily have to sell out and change your music to be considered non-indie either, in my mind. If you move to a major label and don't seriously deviate from typical rock or pop fare, you lost indie status to me. You are on a major label with all their resources and marketing at your disposal. That forfeits your indie status.

I also think there are varying degrees of indie-ness even among artists that are on indie labels. Artists on Sub Pop, Merge, or Matador are probably the least indie of all indie artists as those labels are really large and have lost of marketing resources at their disposal. Artists that have their own label or self-release their own releases fall into the indie-as-shit category.

RL, I was specifically responding to your statement that those bands weren't 'indie' because they didn't 'push the envelope' musically.

Because I don't see progressiveness as massively correlated with 'indieness'. And, I think if you're going to use 'indie' as a classification for a type of music, you can't really take into account how an album is being marketted, because I prefer to look at a piece of work as itself outside of the hype.

So, either 'indie' just means 'not on one of the major labels', in which case none of those bands are indie, or it means a certain kind of genre, in which case it doesn't matter if you're progressive or not, and it doesn't matter if you have major label resources or not.

I don't see why it has to be that way, Bob. To me, there are two ways to try to gain the largest audience possible for your music apart from the actual merit of the music: You can use marketing (which is dominated by major labels) or you can write music that is similar to what has already been done and that people are comfortable with. Radiohead is on a major label but they are blazing new musical trails that probably turn off the average person. That, to me, is indie.

An artist like, say, Damien Jurado isn't really doing anything new, but he also isn't availing himself of a major label's marketing resources. I think that's indie too.

I guess indie doesn't specify a certain type of music to me, but rather a kind of spirit. If a guy's writing songs in his living room just to play for his kids, that's indie, no matter what kind of music he's writing. And I think if someone's tearing down musical barriers and opening people's minds to a new kind of music, then I think that's indie too, no matter what label he's on.

quote:

Because I don't see progressiveness as massively correlated with 'indieness'.

You really think major labels have as much progressive-type music as indie labels?

Well, you actually do have a point there RavingLunatic, and I think that's a good distinction to make, but it seems a bit subjective to define 'indie' that way. I like your approach, but I would call it something other than 'indie'.

But, I wouldn't exactly call White Stripes, Strokes, and Interpol incredibly mainstream. The Stripes and Strokes became mainstream after the fact, but I wouldn't blame them for mainstream tastes adjusting to them, rather than the other way around. And Interpol...well, if they're copying anybody, it's a band that never achieved any mainstream popularity.

There's less progressive stuff on major labels than on indie labels, but I think that's because it's easier for less progressive stuff to become popular enough to be signed to a major label.

Although I enjoy reading the debate of musical semantics and labels (regarding misnomers and not actual record labels, i.e. indie, alt rock, etc.) here is my list of favorite "indie" bands:

1. Arcade Fire
2. The Decemberists
3. Futureheads
4. Modest Mouse
5. Interpol
6. Sigur Ros
7. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
8. Walkmen
9. The Wilderness
10. Yo La Tengo

These aren't my favorite bands but my favorite Indie bands. Not sure if Indie fits with them all but I'd like to think so...as far as sound, labels, pushing the musical envelope, etc.
What do you guys think? questions, concerns, bitches and gripes.

All great suggestions so far.....I'll make a contribution I surpose (sorry if I duplicate, I havnt read all the replys )

22-20s
A.C Newman
A Northern Chorus
Ambulance LTD.
Andrew Bird
Animal Collective
Antony & The Johnsons
Aqualung
Arcade Fire
Architecture In Helsinki
Arctic Monkeys
Babyshambles
Badly Drawn Boy
The Bandits
Beck
The Bees
Bell X1
Belle & Sebastian
Ben Folds
Ben Folds Five
Ben Kweller
Ben Lee
The Bens (Folds, Kweller, Lee)
The Beta Band
Bloc Party
Brendan Benson
Bright Eyes
British Sea Power
Broken Social Scene
Camera Obscura
The Chalets
The Charlatans
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Clor
Coldplay
The Coral
Cosmic Rough Riders
The Cribs
Crimea
The Crocketts
Damien Jurado
Damien Rice
David Berkeley
The Dead 60s
The Dears
The Decemberists
The Delays
The Departure
Devendra Banhart
Do Me Bad Things
Doves
Ed Harcourt
Editors
Elbow
The Elected
Elliot Smith
Embrace
The Fiery Furnaces
The Flaming Lips
The Futureheads
Gomez
Hal
Head Of Femur
Hope Of The States
Hot Hot Heat
I Am Kloot
Idlewild
Interpol
Iron & Wine
Jack Johnson
Jason Falkner
Jeff Buckley
Jonathan Rice
Jose González
Joseph Arthur
Josh Rouse
Kaiser Chiefs
Kasabian
Keane
Kent
The Killers
Kings Of Convenience
Kings Of Leon
The Kooks
KT Tunstall
Little Barrie
The Lucksmiths
M. Ward
The Magic Numbers
Math & Physics Club
Matt Nathanson
Matt Pond PA
Maximo Park
Metric
Neutral Milk Hotel
The New Pornographers
New Rhodes
Okkervil River
The Ordinary Boys
Owen
The Paddingtons
Patrick Wolf
Pavement
Radiohead
The Rails
The Rakes
Razorlight
The Reindeer Section
Rogue Wave
Rufus Wainwright
Ryan Adams
Shearwater
The Sights
Snow Patrol
Spoon
Stars
Stephen Fretwell
Stephen Malkmus
The Strokes
Sufjan Stevens
Teenage Fanclub
Tenderfoot
Thee Unstrung
The Thrills
Travis
Tullycraft
The Veils
We Are Scientists
The Weakerthans
Wilco
Willy Mason
Xiu Xiu
Zumpano
The Zutons

Sorry about the long list, I tried my best to cut it down....

quote:

Head Of Femur

Huh. Big surprise there.

quote:

Ambulance LTD.

What are they like? I don't know why, but for some reason, I made a note to myself to look into them.

Despite the fact that 80% of the new music I listen to falls into the "Indie Rock" category, I would have to say that it is the most annoying classification of music there is. The term "indie" by definition means that it is music that is released by an independent label. The movement began in the late 70's- early 80's when independent labels, (SST, Homestead, Dischord, etc.) began popping up all over the country.

Raving Lunatic is right. Too many people tend to associate "indie-ness" with quality. Radiohead is not an indie band. The Flaming Lips are not an indie band. Modest Mouse ceased to be an indie band the minute they signed with Sony. Does that make them worse? Of course not, but if you're using the term in the proper way, that's the way it is. With that said, I find that all of these sub-genres can be quite annoying in general. But defining music not by how it sounds, but by the manner in which it finds it's way to the consumer, is particularly pointless.

wouldn't you say that Smashing Pumkins is indie?