The dance of indie music

Wanna up your hipster cred? Need that new cool band to listen to? It aint gonna be easy. Because the indie music world is a game of mirrors, being popular but not mainstream.

It usually starts the same way. Some band posts a song to a music sharing site like Bandcamp or SoundClick. One person sends it to two people, who each send it to four, and so on, until it gets picked up by a music blog like Gorilla vs. Bear or Brooklyn Vegan and then aggregated on the Hype Machine. A week later, the band has caught the attention of record labels, tastemakers, and promoters.

But everyone wants to know, who is this act? They won’t do interviews, so all anyone has to go on is two MP3s and a low-resolution profile picture where they’re too far away from the camera to make out anyone’s face. And still, Pitchfork just gave their song the Best New Music designation. They’re booked for a South by Southwest showcase. Fifteen days have passed, and the band is now the blogosphere’s next big thing—even though the blogosphere couldn’t recognize the band on the street.

This is how underground bands come of age in 2011. “Mystery” is quickly becoming the default PR strategy for breaking indie acts. (Atlantic)

I tried the ‘mystery card’ for about 3 months at the bars. Turns out I’m not cool enough to pull off mystery but still keep women interested. I just look like a drunk creeper. Story of my life.

No band wants to be ‘over-hyped’. It’s why I wont listen to Bon Iver. They’ve already been hyped so much that I think everyone who listens to them are shallow, mainstream music sheep. Yup.

Keep on listening to that obscure music that nobody has ever heard of. Except you, of course.

Most obscure band I know.