Where did the term ‘indie’ come from?
For anyone around the age bracket that might constitute being a ‘millennial’, the term ‘indie’ has a very specific meaning. As many things that conjure up stark emotional responses and usually within the remit of something nostalgic, indie, for many within this group, is strongly attached to that glorious period of time when music sounded like summer, and nothing mattered except the drink in your hand and the unmistakeable riffs of The Strokes.
Indie, in this context, was more associated with the genre of music. In the early to mid-2000s, this flavour of indie had infiltrated the mainstream, with countless bands suddenly being billed on major festival lineups and played on commercial radio. However, beneath the indisputable greatness of Arctic Monkeys, Interpol, Arcade Fire, Bloc Party, and more was also a burgeoning new wave movement.
Granted, this wasn’t so much a movement as a broader cultural moment, with indie becoming a capture-all term for those who felt more well-versed in the alternative groupings that existed alongside the accessible tropes of the mainstream. It felt less radical than perhaps many other subcultures throughout history felt, mainly because it suddenly seemed like anyone and everyone could be a part of it.
However, long before this, indie was already a term capturing the essence of its roots, signalling a broader, though no less intricate, concept about pushing against commercialism and maintaining artistic and psychological independence. More than just short for ‘independent’, indie emerged as a commonplace term in the 20th century to embody the idea of art existing outside the realm of mainstream influence.
Where did the term ‘indie’ originate?
Notably, the rise of independent cinema in the 1960s and onwards sparked discussions about indie art, mainly concerning filmmakers who longed to disentangle themselves from mainstream or commercial expectations. In Hollywood, this was a significant risk, but it paid off well for any filmmakers or directors who actually knew how to tell impactful stories without doing so for the sake of shunning the world around them.
As we’ve established, the word in music spaces adopted a similar meaning. Especially as the punk movement burgeoned, being indie in music meant embracing the culture of doing whatever you wanted, whenever you wanted, as an act of rebellion against the status quo. While the etymology of the word itself is a little difficult to trace, the term ‘indie rock’ in music started to gain significant traction in the 1980s, especially as it was regarded more as a viable subgenre and less of a holistic term for a specific attitude or mindset.
As digital media came into play, the term expanded to mainstream vernacular, not just within music but in youth culture, and was used to describe groups of people who disassociated themselves from subscribing to mainstream characteristics. While some of these lines are now blurred, they provided gateways to other styles and tropes, like indie sleaze, which sought to reinvent the flavours of old to romanticise the radicalisation of being someone who didn’t do what was expected of them.
