Foster the People, Cage the Elephant, Young the Giant, Portugal. The Man, and Imagine the Dragons

It seems to me that this variety of pop rock, naturally residing on what remains of the alternative radio format, is as faceless, corporate and bland as REO, Journey, Styx, Boston, Foreigner and Loverboy would have been to someone 20 years older than me. But late 70s/early 80s corp rock is emphatically not faceless to me and many in my early 50s cohort, and so I would like to hear from someone like 10 or 20 years younger than me who understands, likes, and can differentiate the individual acts within this genre, which will quite possibly amount to the last pop-rock style that impacts at a mass level.

Like many likely to read these words, hip-hop, r&b, girlpop and the mainstream edge of electronic music and indie rock are what I have paid attention to in popular music in the past 20 years, so this idiom really is unfamiliar and somewhat intriguing to me. If 10-20 years ago, the one thing that poptimist and rockist commentariats could agree on is that pop rock of this late aughts/early 10s variety fuckin' sucks, could it be that there are in fact merits to the these bands that people like us are too clueless to understand?

The other day, I listened to playlists of all the bands I cite above other than Imagine Dragons, whom I encounter so frequently that I don't need to seek it out. Other than the quite remarkable use of the definite article in the middle of a three word phrase that each incorporate in their, ahem, branding, what I can infer is that Coldplay was the biggest band in the world during the formative stage of each act and thus is by far the biggest influence as such, and that Beck and Daft Punk provide a soupcon of groove and irony that would not be forthcoming with Chris Martin et al.

Are there other acts that belong in this grouping? Bastille? And the only songs that I have encountered in the wild have been "Feel It still" and "Pumped Up Kicks" both of which I do like. What are the other big songs from this grouping? Are there identifiable qualities in the fandom of this subgenre? Or do Foster the People people not like Cage the Elephant people?

I reviewed a Cage the Elephant album once, and all I remember is that it was a generally positive review. I don't remember what the music sounded like at all.

I worked for Roadrunner Records from 2011 to 2014, and Young The Giant were actually on Roadrunner for their first album. None of us understood why they'd been signed; I was in charge of creating editorial content for the label website, and it was very odd to punch a YTG story in next to stuff about Trivium and Slipknot and Machine Head. I remember there was much excitement when one of their songs was performed on Glee, though. (When Roadrunner was absorbed by Warner Music Group as a subsidiary of Atlantic, Young The Giant were moved over to Fueled By Ramen.)

i've never listened to an album in full by any of these artists, but i think they appeal to folks who like indie on a playlist-level but couldn't name an album by arcade fire.

feel like cage the elephant is more post-kings of leon than post-coldplay, and that they have the most appeal to people who would self-identify as "music lovers" than the other groups. i would also lump in two door cinema club here. cage feels like diet white stripes and two door cinema club feels like coldplay if they were phoenix

Two Door Cinema Club is Hip™ for Basics

I put "Pumped Up Kicks" on my year-end list that (whatever) year--pretty catchy, and it had a whistling part, right? I had some grade-school students who lip-synced to Imagine Dragons, and I'm pretty sure I hated them.

https://www.msthofficial.com/

I was thinking about Walk The Moon the other day (thanks Mike TD!) and I reckon they fit here. All I could find on ILM about them was some people voting for Shut Up And Dance With Me in the 2015 tracks poll, nobody was saying that they hated it, which is surprising as I really fucking hate it, more than any of the above.

My younger son loves Imagine Dragons, and I have made peace with this fact.

shut up and dance is a major wedding staple these days (it was on my “do not play” list)

in 1993 my dad asked his wedding dj not to play "congratulations" - he played it anyway.

I have Thank You Happy Birthday by Cage Ghe Elephant and I think large swathes of it are indebted to the Pixies

glass animals, maybe more attuned to pop radio but feel like they fit here