Indie
rock in America has always gone hand in hand with student life.
Band's are often formed whilst their members are studying at
university and college radio stations, often far more relaxed when it
comes to playlists than their larger, commercial counterparts, were
often the first places to hear new and exciting bands. Some of the
most fertile indie rock scenes in the USA started out in college
towns. It's of little surprise then that a city such as Boston, where
there is over 100 universities, would play host one of the most
diverse and fruitful scenes.
In
the 1980's Boston's hardcore punk bands gained a reputation as being
particularly ferocious but it wasn't until the late 80's and early
90's that Boston's more melodic bands started gaining more widespread
recognition. The Pixies, Dinosaur Jr and The Lemonheads are just some
of the bands that came out of Boston's historic streets, each of them
with their own individual sound. Unlike other regional American
scenes of the time (Seattle, Washington D.C etc), where there was a
specific “sound” all the Boston bands sounded different from each
other. Whether it was the feedback-drenched wall of noise produced by
Dinosaur Jr or the sharp post punk of Mission of Burma, each band's
style set them apart from the others. Whilst this lack of congruity
between acts created some of the most individual and interesting
bands of the era, it has also lead to the Boston scene being somewhat
under-recognised as a whole. Dinosaur Jr and The Pixies went on to
international fame and fortune, becoming huge in the wake of the Alt.
Rock boom in the early 1990's, though by the mid 90's both bands had
imploded. But whilst they were touring the world and selling
thousands of records, bands like the Blake Babies and Big Dipper,
were operating under the Radar.
