They sold out on us, but we're sort of buying it.

This Entry wraps things up. I'll try to answer some questions I asked when I first started...

Will selling out change your Indie sound? Indie sound is widely variable. New Order's electro post-punk and Nirvana's grunge are poles apart in style, but both have independent inflections. The context of the sound's dissemination is perhaps more important. For example, Song 2, by Blur and 'Creep' by Radiohead are possibly now mainstream songs, as is the Cure's 'Just Like Heaven', and more recently Feist's '1234'. If songs are reproduced extensively in mainstream spaces and texts (through advertising, movies, and tv shows) they possibly lose some authenticity. But single songs do not represent entire creative outputs.

Does it matter who you sell out to??
Signing to Universal (or other major labels) is something numerous Indie bands (not just Sonic Youth) have done. It has also been shrugged off by people who opposed the Starbucks deal.
Queens of The Stone Age and The Mars Volta are label buddies with Sonic Youth (as are Elton John and Janet Jackson) The Yeah Yeah Yeahs must be signed to Universal, as I walked past their clothing store yesterday only to find a giant Karen O cutout pouting at me through the shop window.
Over at EMI, in the last 25 years seminal avant garde and Indie bands like The Butthole Surfers and (even earlier) Television have shared their label with Interpol.

Ruling out the input of major labels in creative production would rule out many great works by many artists that started out with an 'Indie sound'. The system is too institutionalised, too extensive and too varied to discount its relevance. Homogenised sound is not such an issue. The political clout of Indie in response to corporations is certainly minimal. However, with the advent of the internet and the download revolution, labels are having to work outside traditional structures to gain revenue.

Starbucks music has a digital deal going with itunes where you can buy its music online, so the relevance of new media is noted by newer conglomerates as well. However, Starbucks (and for that matter P & O cruises) represent (as fans pointed out in the forum) cultural and aesthetic values that Indie cannot always reconcile itself to. Gentrification is a no no, as is conventional politics. Consumerism is tolerated, and sometimes even adapted to fit nostalgic ideals of 'vintage' culture. But it has to suit notions of original, authentic (and sometimes high) art.

But getting back to the argument, it does matter who you sign to. Branding is a signifier and if the starbucks green circle nears any Indie icons, there is a clash in ideologies, taste and culture.

So, scanning back even further, why does the Brisbane Indie community (or the one represented on Triple Zed) roll its eyes at powderfinger? They are a local band that have at times been a great source of pride and identification for various strata of Indie culture. They formed and grew from grunge to Indie rock and ballads, to commercial air play, and then to the Arias and a song in a Tom Cruise movie. It may be that Indie does not like tall poppies, but Powderfinger's sound has also gone through a gradual commodification. Bernard Fanning voices some left-wing political concerns in his music - often about tolerance of difference, and eradication of prejudice. But he stops there. Besides, I know some diehard Indie snobs who shudder at tolerating other people's taste in music. Or the bourgeois sensibilities that taste represents.

Last question: what are the practices and ideologies within the Indie scene that distinguish between merely utilising mainstream production, and selling out completely.
I guess selling out to major record labels is an aging issue, so perhaps it will even have some vintage appeal for Indie nostalgia. I think it's possible to see it as a utilisation of the system without surrendering to it. I think, as in Robert Lanham's review, it is often the thought of the unreceptive (or apparently ignorant) audience that shares access to that label's music that riles some Indie ideologues. When economic necessity (or ambition) has overtaken the need to be politically independent, fans tend to turn to aesthetics and taste as signifying belonging and superiority (note artist from Melbourne).

This fits in with the David Bowie argument. He did sell out in terms of commercial hits- however his work (and its vintage appeal and high art connotations) prevailed. In the end he made so much money that he could 'buy' independence.

And Nick Cave? Is it once a punk always a punk? He has been at it longer than Thurston Moore and has generally stayed independent (currently working with mute records) As long as he doesn't start singing at the cricket, his Indie cred is probably assured.

:)