Musical Wednesdays: The Great Indie Rock Schism

Today I visited Pitchfork and found their reader poll, summing up what the site's readers thought were the top albums of 2009. I was really disappointed to see that the number-one album was Animal Collective's "Merriweather Post Pavilion." I don't know, I just don't really like Animal Collective. Most of the top ten, excluding Grizzly Bear's "Veckatimest," are some of the most overplayed independent records of the year, including Fever Ray and Girls, two bands that usually make me change the station when their songs come on. Right at number 11 is probably my least favorite album of the year, Passion Pit's "Manners," and number 17 is Dan Deacon's "Bromst." Again, these are change-the-channel albums for me. My favorite albums of the year? Didn't even crack the top twenty.

So I started thinking about something that occurred to me a few months ago: there is going to be an indie rock schism this year. A few years ago, when you said "Indie Rock," there were a few bands that were understood to fall under this catch-all name. While they were all very different, they were all rock, whether in the form of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs or the Shins. Some of it was more folksy, some of it was a little harder-edged, but it all could be called rock. But the rise of what are essentially dance bands in the later part of the last decade makes me think that a new genre is needed. Because dance music is not generally called "rock." This decade, there will be indie rock, with the same spectrum of folksy to hard, but independent dance music will emerge as its own genre, with its own stations. That's my big prediction for 2010.

I think this has to happen because of the sense of dissonance in indie rock stations--in general, I get the sense that the people who like the rock-influenced music are not great fans of dance-type music, and I don't know if that goes both ways, but I'd be much more likely to keep a station on if I didn't know that the latest Passion Pit single was just around the corner, or if I didn't have to wait through Fever Ray's "When I Grow Up" before I hear the new acts I'm really excited about, like Thao with the Get Down Stay Down.

Okay, cranky old man rant over. Let's go, indie rock stations. Split it up. I'll even take Animal Collective, if that's what it takes.