indie rock haters' definition of "indie rock"?

I don't like certain music that is rhythmically inert, relies on guitar sounds derived from the Byrds and Buffalo Springfield without substantial development or exploration of same, and has vocals that are a)buried in the mix b)given a melodic range of 2-4 notes so it sounds like a drone c)sung in that English style of e-nun-ci-at-ing every syllable. By rhythmically inert I mean that the bass always follows the tonic and stays on the beat. (As for the enunciation, if you can't understand the words it's because they put a cavern of reverb on the vocals.) Any other type of music released on an independent label, I'll judge on its own merits.

If the bass follows the tonic wouldn't that be harmonically inert? :)

That, too.
Although extended chords should never be allowed to be used by Scottish bands. Ever.

By rhythmically inert I mean that the bass always follows the tonic and stays on the beat. (tarden)

I know what you mean but since about 1990 a lot of Indie has, even more annoyingly, tried to 'get funky' - shuffly sub-James Brown drumbeats (they actually sound nothing like James Brown but that's the kind of beat - via late 80's hip hop - they were trying to copy...now they're probably just copying each other).

Indie = albums that don't sell well.

bit of a complicated one this. i mean, i slag off indie, but i've got loads of the stuff lying round the house (it ain't all Green Velvet round my house y'know).

at some point (93? 94? subjective realisation though, perhaps backlash to dance music?) indie seemed to mean "fear of pop" or even "fear of...", i think thats probably the point when i started to feel uncomfortable around the idea of 'indie' as a label (probably felt neutral previously).

however, at the same time, a lot of mainstream indie or rock bands seemed to look back to the 60s in a way that didn't seem to have happened before (yeh ok, this is leading into britpop isn't it?), and a lot of the bands involved self-consciously seemed to distance themselves from the term 'indie' (the irony being, the more they did it, the more 'indie' they seemed!).

at this point, i certainly didn't want to be aligned to this retrogressive and classicist way of thinking, the dismissal of 'indie' seemed to come from an even more insular and classicist viewpoint than the pro-indie faction (esp the focus on bigness and sales and fame to the detriment of all else)

there's a strange thing about the concept of indie, now which is ana morphous label that nobody wants but seems to cover all, from flowchart to manic street preachers, from radiohead to gnac.

Indie = albums too clever to sell well ;-)

Anything earnest with guitars and lyrics that include the word 'shine'.

Anything written about by pitchforkmedia.com (this includes the good indie too).

DG is close to the monet - though his admirable definition would cover indie 'POP' too, surely.

Monet? That's one for Nick Dastoor's future Creative Mistypes thread.

I can see I made an *impression* on you, Pinefox. Ha ha ha. Sorry, couldn't resist.