Stavi Rants About: Emo (And How 90s Emo Became Fender-Washed)

As a brief introduction before the actual post, this is part of what I'm calling "Stavi Rants About" where I just rant about things I am interested in. It could be music related but it might not be sometimes. These will be more free form than the album reviews so expect paragraphs that wander everywhere and can be, at times, nonsensical. Enjoy!

Over the past few years, Emo has become one of my favorite genres of rock music. I used to reject the term Emo for a number of years when I first started listening to it, mostly because the term had a negative connotation in my mind, shaped by what popular culture had said about the genre. When I was a Punk fan listening to Rites of Spring, I would just call them Hardcore. They are hardcore but their album is certainly an Emo album in my mind. Similarly, I wouldn't call Cap'n Jazz, my first exposure to the 90s Emo scene, Emo. I would call them Indie Rock or Post-Hardcore, which they are but they are certainly Emo as well. It wasn't until I stopped actually caring about what people thought of what I listened to that I started saying that I was a fan of Emo music. 

What is Emo? I have no idea and neither does anyone else really! It's one of those genres that has had such a varied sound, a large amount overlap with other genres, and describes so many bands that trying to actually describe it is difficult. Any definition I see has exceptions to it. It is somewhat of a Potter Stewart situation, "I know it when I see it." I can tell that I consider an album emo, but if you asked me what about it makes it qualify as such I could not really tell you, and this differs greatly from person to person. For example, I do not consider Owls' self-titled debut album Emo. I think of it more as a Math Rock album, even if it is made by the reformation of one of my favorite Emo bands of all time. Despite this, the album is listed as Emo on Wikipedia and Rate Your Music. Things like this leads to great debates about what is and isn't Emo, and truly I believe none of it matters really unless someone is trying to use Emo to describe something that has no relation to the genre's history. Such as trying to apply Goth stylings and fashion as Emo's own fashion. Emo has roots in Hardcore and the DIY scene which is a scene famous for rejecting what is essentially branding like that. But the problem now is that calling "Emo" fashion Emo has been normalized that you can't really call it anything else! It isn't Goth, it is similar to Scene but still different enough to be it's own thing. It is all semantics anyway, so even if I care about it does it really matter? 

I just feel the history of things is very important. Looking back on the history of something is very important to think ahead for the future, but to also appreciate what it started as. This brings me to a big point of contention for me, which is the "Fender-Washing" of 90s Emo or Midwest Emo as it tends to be called. In the modern day, when people talk about the sound of Midwest Emo, the things that come to mind are tapping, complicated riffs, odd-time signatures, and the Fender Telecaster. These pristine, sparkly sounding guitars that play this progressive music. But when you truly look back a lot of the actual Emo bands from the 90s, their music 99% of the time sounds nothing like this. Many of those bands still had a lot of punk/hardcore influence, especially in the earlier half of the decade. In the late 90s, yes there was a little bit more of a shift to a more indie/alternative influenced sound with bands like Penfold or Mineral, but there was still this punk energy to them. Not to mention most of them weren't playing Fender Telecasters!!!! That is the big thing that sticks out to me. All of a sudden, the Telecaster is the ultimate 90s Emo guitar. Looking back at live footage from back then, the only two 90s Emo bands I can really see with a Telecaster are Victor from Cap'n Jazz... and American Football.

Do not get me wrong, I love American Football. Their first album will forever hold a special place in my heart and they've certainly influenced me musically. But, the rise of American Football in the 2010s has led to some revisionist history taking place about what Emo was like in the 90s. Now, people think that American Football's sound was the dominating sound back then, and the Fender Telecaster is the ultimate Emo guitar. Not to diss the Telecaster either, they are wonderful guitars, but this is just not the case. American Football was a very small band during their initial run, and did not see a lot of success. They barely even toured, breaking up right after they released their first album. Most people were more aware of frontman Mike Kinsella's other projects, such as the band him and his brother were in Cap'n Jazz, or his solo project Owen which he did after American Football. I mean, Cap'n Jazz's first album is often cited as this legendary Midwest Emo album, so it just pains me when American Football is the more remembered band nowadays by most people, and their sound takes the claim as the "Midwest Emo Sound". So now, to be a Midwest Emo band, you have to play twinkly and noodley guitar riffs and play with odd time signatures and all this stuff. The funny things is, American Football themselves admit that they were trying to go away from Emo. They felt that sound had been perfected, so they were taking more influence from indie bands like Tortoise. Quite ironic that they are the Emo gods now. 

I hope I don't come across as mad about all this. These things are kind of silly so it can be a little fun to take them seriously sometimes. I would just like the history of something dear to me to be properly looked at instead of revised like has been in the modern day. This is why it pays to do your research.