Shoegazing: What's In A Name?

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While waiting to see Momus at Joe's Pub, tonight, I ran across an article on the history of Shoegazing in Magnet magazine (Slowdive, the mighty Ride, Curve, you know the drill). [Feb/March issue, if you wanna check it out]

According to the article, it appears to come in and out of fashion. Is it truly dead? After all, Curve are still here. My Bloody Valentine are constantly "breathing their last". Lush are DOA.

Or is it just renamed summat else?

― Nichole Graham, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

A brief stopover at Clairecords will indicate to you that Shoegazing is alive and well in the US of A. British shoegazing appears to consist solely of a Slowdive castoff (Monster Movie) and some more forgettable artists (Air Formation).

― electric sound of jim, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

disagree - there are loads of ne:uk shoey bands - it's just that they seem to prefer to namecheck other influences than the officialshoeycanon to maintain northern cred

― a-33, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Lush are DOA.

Ouch!

― Andy K, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

oh yeah, that is a little near the knuckle innit?

― chris, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

In the UK, Shoegazing (aka the scene which celebrates itself, aka the Thames Valley sound) died about 10 years ago. The UK is so fickle - most indie 'subscenes' last about 5 minutes & then the associated bands move with the times.

― Jez, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Clairecords, certainly (just ordered some stuff from them the other day! Astrobrite, woo-hoo!) but there are plenty of other American derivations. Windy and Carl are at the semi-center of a set of associated bands and friends (Landing/Surface of Eceon, Au Revoir Borealis, Auburn Lull, even Füxa, who are most emphatically *not* W/C's friends, admittedly!). Then you have Study of the Lifeless in Tennessee, Bethany Curve up near Santa Cruz, the Autumns from around here, to an extent Buddha in the Moon, etc. -- Hydroplane in Australia are sorta gaze-inspired as well.

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

well, i was going to say Alisons Halo, but even that is 4 or 5 years ago now. ned, i'll email you later about that slowdive stuff ok?

― gareth, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Allegedly some of the Alison's Halo crew are about to resurface on something -- maybe the new Lovesliescrushing?

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

While waiting to see Momus at Joe's... is a spectacular way to introduce a thread on any subject, let alone one about shoegazing. Any particular reason for the Momus reference, Nichole? It rather sounds like the opening line of a limerick. While waiting to see Momus at Joe's...

― Daniel, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

His farewell to NYC show was last night -- but yes, that's a good phrase in most contexts.

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

shoe (shoo) n 1. A durable covering for the human foot. 2. A horseshoe. 3.The casing of a pneumatic tire. 4.The part of a brake that presses against the wheel or drum to retard motion.

gaze (gaz) v. gazed, gazing. To look steadily, intently and with fixed attention.

― Poops McGee, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I have been using the term "neoshoegazing" to describe bands which seem to borrow from that whole tradtion, so I suppose it depends on how much of a purist you are. Since rock and pop culture subsist on the process of recyclying and rephrasing past trends, I wouldn't write the obituary just yet. That might upset Kevin Shields, J. Spaceman and Sonic Boom (as well as a host of others) anyway. -jeff ps a blissed-out recommendation : Au Revoir Borealis - "Tienken"

― mxyzptlk, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i certainly prefer to think of Shoegazing as "Retard Motion"

now finish the damn limerick!!

― mark s, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Of the original wave of shoegazing bands, which ones truly fit the term in live performance, i.e., heads hung down, no interest in engaging the audience? All I know is that Lush sure didn't "shoegaze". I get the feeling Ride were fairly extroverted; MBV and Slowdive no so much.

― Curt, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

While waiting to see Momus at Joe's,
An article tickled my nose.
It mentioned Slowdive,
and the mighty Ride:
both bands who look down at their toes.

― Vinnie, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Near perfect. But "Curve" and "early Verve" would complete the rhyme better.

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

For those who care, there's some great canadian SG bands: Southpacific (sadly, now defunct), sianSPHERIC, Hollowphonic, Mellonova, Readymade, etc. Yup - clairecords has some good stuff, as does Darla...

― rob, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Also Canadian shoegazer/dreampop/whateveritisthisyear bands of note not listed above include Mean Red Spiders and The Peter Parkers. Im debating the shoegazery of Square Root Of Margaret who are excellent none the less.
South Pacific who blew Sianspheric out fo the water for their final show are now involved in other projects, but I forget the names of them.

― Mr Noodles, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Quite possible that you could also include Picastro in that list.

― Sean Carruthers, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Allegedly some of the Alison's Halo crew are about to resurface on something.

Some of them are in a Chicago pop band called Insta. I think they've been described as "Burt Bacharach with guitars" but they're better than that. They're just a big reverb-y pop band.

― Nitsuh, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

***Lush are DOA. Ouch!**

(gleam in me eye) Apologies, Andy. At times, my tongue is quicker than my brain;>

The sword of sensitivity is somewhat blunt at 4:30 in the morning...

― Nichole Graham, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I usually lump Picastro into Do Make Say Think/GYBE territory, but thats probably cause of their cello.
Have yet to hear their album or DMST's new one.
I should go check the thread where we created genre names to see which one they belong too, I just dont like calling it PostRawk.

― Mr Noodles, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

If you are interested in that sound, there is a website/Magazine called Masstransfer that is dedicated to the post-shoegaze indy sound. I used to do IDM reviews and other things for them a year or two ago. ILM'er Phil@masstransfer.net is also involved as well.

masstransfer

Also, The Fuxa/Windy And Carl fued was overstated. Ryan Anderson gets on quite well with WC tese days, Randall on the other hand...

― mt, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Noodles raises a good point. We've gone over the whole "lost generation" of bands that serve in many senses as a bridge between shoegazing and post-rock (Slowdive's Souvlaki ==> Pygmalion nicely summing things up), so it becomes hard to peg actual existing "shoegazer" bands these days: the shoegazing influence has, thankfully, proved rich and flexible enough to just sort of dissipate into lots and lots of different sounds. In fact, there are certain rock and post-rock territories where it's somewhat difficult not to find at least a couple shoegazer moves lingering in every band's sound.

― Nitsuh, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

You know what, you can all come round to my house tomorrow for tea if you like.

― Chris Sallis, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

MT: regarding Randall -- that's the whole point!

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

but the once dreamt album they made together is splendid. there was also ebbeling hughes, majesty crush(most of them are ps i love you), and ohio too.

― keith, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

― mig derig, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

sorry diaper you sad fucks

― mick derrick, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

SHOEGAZING IS FOR BED WETTING DIPER WEARING ANAL RETENTIVE RECORD COLLECTORS WHO THROW THEMSELVES OFF BRIDGES IF THEIR COPY OF SLOWDIVES CATCH THE BREEZE IS SLIGHTLY BENT THIS MUSIC IS WRONG I'D RATHER BE A FUCKING CHRISTIAN

hey mick, the thing is, you're just so right! i got some slowdive records, i love them too, and you know what, i actually am such a bedwetting diaper wearer! have you met me before at AA or something, cuz that shit is just uncanny!

― gareth, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

You'd rather be fucking a Christian, what?

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

two years pass...

What about Dreampop? I never thought of shoegaze as just how they played live. It was always about the sound. Souvlaki and Loveless have their differences. I always thought the more dreamy the music the more dreampop the sound. A storm in Heaven didn't sound all that shoegazey. Nor did Souvlaki. Has anybody heard of Australias A beautiful Machine?

― Z Davis, Wednesday, 22 September 2004 01:12 (twenty-one years ago)

i haven't, and i'm australian. apparently they haven't publicised themselves very well.

― the surface noise (slight return) (electricsound), Wednesday, 22 September 2004 06:25 (twenty-one years ago)

Before MP3.Com disappeared off the radar, I trawled through nearlyt everything that was under the Shoegazing genre heading and downloaded nearly all of it.

Most of the bands were either wet indie-pop by numbers or just plain bedroom.

I did find a handful of interesting bands, A Beautiful Machine being one of them.
Some of the others (off the top of my head)

Ariel Love Feed
Bethany Curve (who I've seen written about on ILM)
Headphone Overtone
A Northern Chorus

― mzui, Wednesday, 22 September 2004 08:03 (twenty-one years ago)

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