2008: The Indie Hipster's Guide

So it's about that time of the year when the message boards and blogs are a buzz with talk of who's going to be hot and who's not in the year 2008, the time of year when magazines run articles called things like "The Class Of 2008" and include bands that you were listening to last year. Because, let's face it, you're a hip indie bastard. But in this post 9/11, post-Web 2.0 age, there's so many bands to listen it's almost impossible to know who to look out for, who to name drop and who to avoid; it's getting harder and harder to tell your Twang from your Tunng. In order to help you wade through such shit as Jo Lean And The Jing Jang Jongs and find some good new bands, I've assembled this handy guide to hip new(ish) bands for 2008. GO!


Johnny Foreigner - Champagne Girls I Have Known
We kick off proceedings with this little nugget of noisey indie rock. Johnny Foreigner manage to sound like all the good shouty indie bands of yesteryear with out sounding like they belong in 1998. A kin to Idlewild when they could be described as "a flight of stairs falling down a flight of stairs" with some added nods to Cap'n Jazz. So all in all pretty good.

Fuck Buttons - Bright Tomorrow
Up next we have the indie hipster's noise band of choice, Fuck Buttons. Recently signed to ATP Recordings this song is the lead track from their debut picture disc, released last year. Avoiding the typcial noise band route of yelling into a microphone whilst playing with a delay pedal, Fuck Buttons create semi-ambient drones from layers of keyboard loops and tribal drums before adding some yelling into a microphone. If you're going to namedrop them, just describe them as drone.

DANANANANAYKROYD - Song 1 Puzzle
So far DANANANANAYKROYD have released two 7"s, both of which are sold out. They debut ep comes out on Jealous Records in March. An important thing to note is that they have changed singers since those vinyl releases. This gives you plenty of opportunity to maximize your indie credibility - if their name ever comes up in conversation simply say "Oh yeah those guys - I only really like their early stuff with the original singer; you know the guy from Kill Yourself?". With this one sentence, your friends and relatives will know that you are far cooler and hipper than they could ever be. You are indie. They are not.

Los Campesinos! - Death To Los Campesinos!
Finally, we have a band who need no introduction. If you don't know who they are then frankly you should not be on the blogosphere. If you need a bit of an introduction, they're from Cardiff, they got signed after 14 gigs and their demo set the internet on fire. Sounding like a combination of Broken Social Scene, Pavement and any other indie rock band you could think of, LC! release their debut album in February. This gives you a month or so to tell people that you liked them before they got popular. But you probably blogged about their demo didn't you?

Here are the songs.