Independent

Ok so I was fascinated by how the term 'indie' has become quite a fad now in modern day, 21th century Singapore.

Much thanks to the local band scene here, the term indie has somehow been claimed authority amongst youth whom think they're cool since they are part of the gig-going/I have a non-mainstream local band song inside my mp3 circle.

Henceforth, the influx of a certain youth community or tribes whom labelled themselves "indie" and whom all look similar by thier dress sense.
To not further confused you, this youths actually listens to a deviation of sounds which distinctively have a Rock root.

Well so what is indie...
Indie was derived from independent. It refers to artistic expression outside of commercial mainstream. It can be either film, music, publications or of any similar mediums.

Here is some text form wikipedia which i find helpful.

In music context, indie music (from independent) is any of a number of genres, scenes, subcultures and stylistic and cultural attributes, characterised by perceived independence from commercial pop music and mainstream culture and an autonomous, do-it-yourself (DIY) approach.

One of the most common and simplest definitions of "indie" is the definition of not being connected with a major recording label (currently one of the "Big Four" recording companies: Warner, Universal, Sony BMG and EMI). This is the definition used by NME's indie music charts in the UK, among others.

Thus even rap/hiphop music that are not signed to a major recording label can be termed "indie"... Urban-indie.

So literally those kids who termed themselves "indie" are actually listening to indie-rock music. So screw the hey I'm indie,i don't lsiten to mainstream, i'm cooler than you, I wear skinny jeans and have mopped hair and i'm part of the scene rants.

I have even seen this "indie' bunch mocking a local hiphop performance, since the later was somehow a mainstream music genre- much thanks to the MTV overload of hiphop music recently- though it was a DIY production of good quality and is doing great music.

This is an irony since the indie-rock bands themselves are music lovers and would appreciate good music. It is also well known that these bands do collaborate with hiphop artist and have even embark friendship with some of them.

This can be associated with a slew of many friendster profiles disassociating
themselves at first from techno, then reggae and reggaeton recently.
This was much because of these youths thinking themselves of an upper or elite caste and wanting to distant themselves from the community of "typecast youth".
This so that they can post an impression that they're not a mat/minah- a labelled massively put onto these typecast youth by the community.


Besides musically, the term indie can be found in the film industry.
These are films that are produced with little or no help at all from major production house.
This films are usually avant garde or of arts house fare and are at times not appealling to the masses.
But some films can do good and even make it to the box office.

Therefore "indie" does not means those kids with mopped hair and tight jeans.
For a better understanding do visit here.