Brief History of Indie Rock

Indie Rock started in the 1980's, formed around the pre existing genre known as college rock, which included pioneering bands like REM and The Smiths. As a new genre, Indie Rock inspired many new bands to be formed such as The La's and Pixies. Shortly after the arrival of Indie Rock, yet another genre came about that was derived from Indie Rock known as Indie Pop. Indie Pop was first seen in the UK and was the result of the popularity of bands such as Primal Scream and Orange Juice. New Order, a band created from the remaining members of Joy Division after the death of lead singer Ian Curtis took a different direction with Indie Pop, focusing on experimentation with Techno and House music. The other major movement in Indie Rock in the late 1980's was the nationwide Madchester scene lead by bands like The Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses who mixed Acid House Dance music with Northern Soul and Funk. This means that within the first decade of its arrival, Indie Rock had already become one of the most diverse and wide ranged music genres known to the mainstream. 

The 1990's also brought about major changes to the Indie Rock scene and this was the first time that alternative music made it clearly into the mainstream, with the introduction of Grunge. Lead by bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Hole and Soundgarden. The introduction of angry teenage vibes in Grunge allowed the bands to top the charts with several new releases and many of these bands are still popular among the indie scene today. In the UK, however this coincided with the arrival of Britpop bands such as Oasis and Blur, who abandoned the 80's Indie Pop which tended to focus on political ideals, usually in protest to the policies and views of Margaret Thatcher's government. 

The 2000s saw the revival of stripped down Indie bands that played in a back-to-basics style which hit the mainstream faster than anybody could have expected. The movement was led by four main bands; The Strokes, The Hives, The White Stripes and The Vines. The commercial success of these bands inspired many more to take up Indie Rock in a second wave of new bands. From the US these included The Black Keys, Interpol, The Killers and Kings of Leon. The UK revealed bands such as The Libertines, The Fratellis, Bloc Party, Franz Ferdinand and the Kaiser Chiefs. The most prominent of British bands was Arctic Monkeys, who were the first band to owe their success to the use of internet social media. The first single they released was "I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor" with a music video that was one of the most basic, yet recognisable of the decade, as it was a clip taken from their first performance on Later... with Jools Holland. 

The success of Indie Rock died down towards the end of the 2000s but many new bands and artists continue to have large amounts of success in the Indie Rock genre four years into the 2010s. This includes artists such as Jake Bugg, Two Door Cinema Club and Strypes.