Indie or Pop?

A few months ago I read an article saying that one of the reason we heard more indie music this year is due to the fact that pop music went bad.

I have to admit it made some sense to me.

Bands and artists like Lana Del Rey, The XX, Arctic monkey etc. where never a real a part of the mainstream musical scenery. Today you see those artist reaching top 10 at Billboard every week.
It’s easy to think of them as mainstream themselves, but the truth is their music is very different from what we used to hear before.

There are two ways to look at this situation. The first is to admit that lately we get exposed to a better, more sophisticated kind of music. The current offerings are more diverse, deep and meaningful. Young teenagers get to listen to different kind of music than what we might have been exposed to ourselves at that age.

But there’s another way to think about this. Have we ever thought what exactly made us look for that kind of music in the first place? The most popular artists we used to know, artists like Madonna, Britney Spears and many more used to rule the hit charts almost solely. Could it be that their delivery was not good enough we had to get up and look for something else?

Maybe this new indie tolerant situation is an end result of us trying to find something else to listen to? Maybe those well-known artists all sounds the same? Or maybe just not good enough?

It’s hard to put the finger on this course of change. I remember being a young teenager and see the same five artists rule the chats with two or more of their singles every single week. Now, those artists are still present in the charts but they have new competitors. Competitors that brings a whole new wave and fresh way to listen to music.

2013 might not have been the greatest year for mainstream music artists and we see it clearly now when all music award events looking exactly the same. But, if this situation will expose us to newer more innovative music, I think we’ll be able to gain a lot from that.

Maybe these days aren’t the last days of pop music. Maybe, we are looking at the end of the distinctive term “Indie”. Maybe Indie music would turn into our new mainstream music.

Thinking about it this way, it’s the best news I’ve heard all year!