You never knew you loved... Shoegazing sound
Look at the ground. Imagine it cluttered with effects' pedals for the guitar you are playing. Picture your lyrics taped down next to them. Now imagine how you must look to the crowd of people standing at the front of the stage, splitting their attention between your nearly immobile visage and the thickly layered music pumping out of the speakers that flank you.
They might briefly wonder what was so fascinating about your sneakers.
The image of the detached performer, far more interested in the introspective elements of their music than a lively performance, became the face of a newly emerging genre in the second half of the 1980s, and is precisely how the term “shoegazing” came about. The late 80s and early 90s saw the rise of a genre of music that layered multiple distorted guitar sounds with subdued vocals to create a style so present that it harkened back to Phil Spector's Wall of Sound.
A rather unfortunate second moniker was “The Scene That Celebrates Itself.” While descriptive, it was less catchy and promoted an image of indulgent self-infatuation that played a role in shoegaze's decline in favour of the fresh new sounds of grunge and proto-Britpop.
The style cites influences from across indie and alternative rock, as well as pulling from new wave, proto-punk, and post-punk bands such as The Cure, The Smiths, The Velvet Underground, and Sonic Youth.
While using fairly conventional pop instruments, shoegaze created a unique sound by having no focal instrument. There were guitar solos, but they weren't brought out in front of other elements. Similarly, vocals were present but not always distinguishable from the instrumentation. Each sound was somewhere between nested and buried in the mix, thus forcing the ear to take in the feel moreso than the melody.
Recently the genre has enjoyed something of a resurgence being interpreted through nu-gaze, spacegaze, stargaze, and metalgaze. But for a true taste of the sound it's best to stick with the originals.
Moose - It was in fact a review of a Moose concert in Sounds magazine that brought about the term “shoegazing” as lead singer Russell Yates kept his eyes focused on his taped-down lyrics. Listen to Suzanne from 1991's Cool Breeze.
Lush - This band continued to release albums throughout the 90s, maintaining an audience as their sound evolved into Britpop. Their second studio album, Spooky, released in 1992, features the track Untogether.
My Bloody Valentine - The name these days is more often associated with an old slasher film that was recently released in 3D, but starting in 1984 it was the name of a band that was both precursor and pioneer to the shoegazing genre, typifying the use of distorted guitars with such hyper-abrassive tones as in Only Shallow from 1991's Loveless.
They might briefly wonder what was so fascinating about your sneakers.
The image of the detached performer, far more interested in the introspective elements of their music than a lively performance, became the face of a newly emerging genre in the second half of the 1980s, and is precisely how the term “shoegazing” came about. The late 80s and early 90s saw the rise of a genre of music that layered multiple distorted guitar sounds with subdued vocals to create a style so present that it harkened back to Phil Spector's Wall of Sound.
A rather unfortunate second moniker was “The Scene That Celebrates Itself.” While descriptive, it was less catchy and promoted an image of indulgent self-infatuation that played a role in shoegaze's decline in favour of the fresh new sounds of grunge and proto-Britpop.
The style cites influences from across indie and alternative rock, as well as pulling from new wave, proto-punk, and post-punk bands such as The Cure, The Smiths, The Velvet Underground, and Sonic Youth.
While using fairly conventional pop instruments, shoegaze created a unique sound by having no focal instrument. There were guitar solos, but they weren't brought out in front of other elements. Similarly, vocals were present but not always distinguishable from the instrumentation. Each sound was somewhere between nested and buried in the mix, thus forcing the ear to take in the feel moreso than the melody.
Recently the genre has enjoyed something of a resurgence being interpreted through nu-gaze, spacegaze, stargaze, and metalgaze. But for a true taste of the sound it's best to stick with the originals.
Moose - It was in fact a review of a Moose concert in Sounds magazine that brought about the term “shoegazing” as lead singer Russell Yates kept his eyes focused on his taped-down lyrics. Listen to Suzanne from 1991's Cool Breeze.
Lush - This band continued to release albums throughout the 90s, maintaining an audience as their sound evolved into Britpop. Their second studio album, Spooky, released in 1992, features the track Untogether.
My Bloody Valentine - The name these days is more often associated with an old slasher film that was recently released in 3D, but starting in 1984 it was the name of a band that was both precursor and pioneer to the shoegazing genre, typifying the use of distorted guitars with such hyper-abrassive tones as in Only Shallow from 1991's Loveless.
