What does "Indie Music" mean to you?

[Donnie]

All Indie means to me is any label not supported by a major.

All the other social stigma hype nonsense around the term is meaningless to me.

[Poop_Smear]

For me, "Indie Music" evokes an image of disposable mediocre McTunes made mostly by smelly unemployed marginally talented Gen-Y or Gen-X "artistes" with cheap retail grade sound gear. Basically, this shit is made by faux-musicians with no formal musical training or real knowledge of music theory who make up the ubiquitous masses of lazy morons too lethargic to get a real job and who like to get high and hang out at Starbucks to siphon off the free Wi-Fi. The REAL labels probably fill several trash barrels each day with the crap "demos" they receive from these cretins. Oh yeah...you'll also find Indie Musicians frequently hanging out in the keyboards section of the local Guitar Center banging on the Korgs...you can't miss them...just look for the crappy haircuts and stinky Birkenstocks.

My explanation was better.

Woops...didn't see it on the first pass, but yes.....I like it.

[djsynchro]

[FlightPlan]

honestly, it's just such a worn out hack desciption that it means absolutely nothing. I would honestly avoid anything that called itself 'indie' - it so bespeaks against anything actually creative going on.

[Poop_Smear]

honestly, it's just such a worn out hack desciption that it means absolutely nothing. I would honestly avoid anything that called itself 'indie' - it so bespeaks against anything actually creative going on.

Exactly. You know all of those crap bands or "solo-artistes" you find on MySpace or Facebook with downloadable tunes? That's "Indie" shit. I blame Bitorrents for that whole scene because now any talentless P-Diddy wannabee schmuck can snag a free copy of FruityLoops or Sonar and brew up "clips".

[leedsquietman]

What a load of toss.

Throughout history, it has often been independent label artists who have been the trailblazers pushing the boundaries. They have been less controlled and given more artistic license typically than major label artists.

In this day and age, major label music has become something marginalized to teens. Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, Jonas Brothers etc. Most decent music is still made and distributed by independent labels, which gives it the 'independent' status.

However, some independent labels are actually not technically, as the example I gave before regarding Creation Records, who were part owned by Sony (a major) - so long as the major doesn't own a majority stake, this loophole is legal. To get around this, they used Pinnacle, Southern and Vital to distribute the releases instead of Sony BMG and they then get labelled independent and the songs can then feature on the independent charts.

Like I said, I worked for 2 years as an assistant manager at a major record retailer in the 90s so I got to know these ins and outs (and how labels gouge people on CDs, especially back catalogue).

[The Carpet Cleaner]

as always, very good explanation leeds.

So now, the interesting part : I do basically noise, how can I sign with sony so I can buy a swimming pool?