The modern music industry is nearly in a state of total disrepair.
Whether it’s the insistence on pushing inoffensive guitar pop from shaggy-haired models or the deification of teen pop idols, the airwaves are polluted with musicians that don’t play music — models that trade on their looks and attitude in lieu of musical ability.
Music is a tool used to sell clothes, an image builder that keeps pushing the definition of cool so that no one can ever meet it. No wonder so many of the most popular rappers limit their lyrical subject matter to bragging about guns, money and abusing women: Popular music has become a place for self-glorification at the expense of everything.
But even within this ugly mess of teens with implants and middle-class thugs, a few standouts appear.
One notable group of musical visionaries is housed by Omaha, Nebraska’s Saddle Creek Records. This indie-rock collective started in the mid ‘90s as a group of friends uniting to promote their music.
Currently they’re approaching critical mass, with several acts reaching out of the underground into mainstream sources. But despite their recognition, they’ve remained true to their roots: a label devoted to promoting powerful, passionate music defined by its quirkiness and individuality instead of market-researched focus group standards.
By far the most popular act on the label is Bright Eyes, a solo project by singer-songwriter Conor Oberst. Often hailed as the next Bob Dylan, he sings songs that are achingly personal, an embarrassing photo album of his life and thoughts.
Oberst’s rise has occasioned much criticism from within the indie community — sellout being the usual word — and he certainly deserves some of the disdain he’s received for helping to popularize whiny, self-pitying indie-folk about middle-class white kids with heartbreak. Despite the output of his many clones, however, he never comes across as anything but sincere, sharing himself as honestly as possible.
His newest records, two simultaneously released albums sharing different themes, drop the high-schooler-in-love themes for a more self-deprecating look at his recent move to New York. Weaving tales of love and confusion against the backdrop of the impending war in Iraq, Oberst bares his most personal moments in a startlingly affecting fashion.
If Oberst is personal, then fellow Saddle Creek band Cursive is utterly raw, gruff and D.C.-style post-punk in an almost aggressively confessional manner. Singer and lyricist Tim Kasher tells gut-wrenching tales of alcohol abuse and broken relationships. Mixing confrontational, dirty rock with anguished shouts, and then layering it with haunting, gorgeous cello harmonies, the band has a sound like no other.
Most of Cursive’s albums tell a single story over the course of the record. Kasher sings melancholy lines of distraught nights that always seem to end in anger and confusion. Although its oppressive, dour attitude may be too intense for some, the band embodies the agony of disappointment like no other.
Also receiving interest on the national scale is The Faint, a club-beat-heavy dance rock band that combines ‘80s-synth with disco beats and punk-rock attitude. Before The Rapture and Radio 4 heated up dance clubs in 2004 with the rise of dance-punk, The Faint was churning out club-ready hits with thumping beats and sex-obsessed lyrics. Wet From Birth, released last fall, has garnered them some airplay on MTV2, and they recently headlined a national tour.
Each of these bands has also generated a number of side projects, all of which are worth listening to. From Bright Eyes came Desaparacidos, a grungy rock band also headlined by Oberst that kicks up the tempo and the volume a notch from Bright Eyes’ acoustic-oriented folk. Cursive’s Tim Kasher took the other route, toning down his rock for The Good Life, which finds itself in much the same emotional territory as Cursive, but focuses on a gentler, more melodic sound, full of lush acoustics rather than harsh, distorted guitar.
The Faint’s Joel Petersen works overtime, playing bass in the Rapturesque disco punk band Beep Beep, as well running the entire show for his dark electronic side project Broken Spindles.
The Clear Channel and video jockeys parked in MTV’s Times Square studio might be making every effort to turn music into a fashion accessory for promoting vapid trends, but the music world is far from devoid of great songs and songwriters. Saddle Creek is just one example among many of artists who remember that playing music is about more than silicone and gold chains. Good music is out there — it just has to be found.
Contact Peter Suderman at spinnakerfeatures@yahoo.com.
