Your way in
Indie pop / twee 1986
Sweet melodies, shy vocals, clean guitars. The gentle reaction to rock machismo.
- Heaviness
- 1
- Speed
- 3
- Melody
- 10
- Where from
- United Kingdom
- Tempo
- 120-160 bpm
- Song length
- 2.5-3.5 min
- Written about
- Innocence, sincerely and ironically at once, Bookishness, Unrequited love, Refusal of rock's machismo
- Vocals
- Sung
Why this one
| You said | Indie pop / twee | Match | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Singing When someone is singing, what should come out? | clean | 100% | ×3 |
| Light How much weight do you want behind it? | 1 out of 10 | 90% | ×2 |
| Slow. Let it take its time. What pace? | 3 out of 10 | 80% | ×2 |
| Short. Say it and stop. How long should a song be? | up to 3.5 min | 88% | ×1 |
| Weighted mean | 91% | ||
Ranked over all 150 genres in the encyclopedia, on the 4 answers you gave, weighted vocals 3, heaviness 2, pace 2, length 1 out of 8. Indie pop / twee ties with the next, and won on being the broader of the two. Where two genres score the same the broader one wins, because a genre with subgenres under it is somewhere to carry on from and a leaf is a full stop.
Five records, in this order
- 1Start one step outside
Pavement, Slanted and Enchanted 1992
Pavement - Slanted and Enchanted. Studied indifference, excellent songs.
- 2The one to put on first
Belle and Sebastian, If You're Feeling Sinister 1996
Belle and Sebastian - If You're Feeling Sinister. Recorded in three days on a student budget.
- 3Then
- 4Then
- 5Then
The first is the entry point for Indie rock, one step outside, so the second record has something to be heard against. After it come Indie pop / twee's essential records in the order the encyclopedia lists them. Every one of these has a page here with links out to somewhere it can be played.
If that is not it
-
Dream pop 91%
The same reverb haze, but with the melody left on the surface and the tempo slower.
4 steps from Indie pop / twee, meeting it only at Alternative rock.
The way into Dream pop -
Folk rock 89%
Folk lyrics played on a twelve-string electric guitar. It taught rock that the words can matter as much as the riff.
4 steps from Indie pop / twee, meeting it only at Rock.
The way into Folk rock
Not simply the second and third of the ranking: those are almost always near neighbours of the first, which is three names for one suggestion. An alternate has to sit at least 4 steps through the tree from the headline and from the other alternate, which is the same floor the "sounds like this, but isn't" panel uses.
What your answers ruled out
- Singing put 54 genres at the bottom of that one question, among them Black metal, Death metal, Post-hardcore. Worth 3 of 8.
- Light put 12 genres at the bottom of that one question, among them Death metal, Brutal death metal, Sludge metal. Worth 2 of 8.
- Slow. Let it take its time. put 22 genres at the bottom of that one question, among them Hardcore punk, Black metal, Death metal. Worth 2 of 8.
- Short. Say it and stop. put 18 genres at the bottom of that one question, among them Doom metal, Progressive rock, Progressive metal. Worth 1 of 8.
Counted as genres scoring 20% or less on that answer alone. A recommendation that only shows what it chose is hiding half of what it did.