Label Whore

Last week I saw a concert. I saw a little band called The Hush Sound play at a venue locally and found myself wondering how many people genuinely liked the band, and how many just like Fall Out Boy (don't worry, I'll explain the relation in a minute). Is there really that distinct of a difference? Where do I stand in this debate?

Fueled By Ramen is taking over the world. If you don’t know (or more, haven’t checked the label on your latest CD and learned that it was brought to you by them) FBR is a more or less (or less, or less) indie music label. Up until a few years ago (and until anyone cared about them) FBR brought us FOB. Now we also have Panic! At the Disco, Gym Class Heroes, The Academy Is…, Cobra Starship, Cute is What We Aim For, The Hush Sound and a load of other acronym-ready bands. And all but one of those bands are associated with Decaydance records, Pete Wentz (FOB’s bassist and resident man-whore)’s label and FBR subsidiary.

So, now, unlike the days of yore when kids looked for different musicians who had similar sounds or styles by asking their friends and going to shows and browsing through the record store, kids find new music by checking the label (or for that matter, checking to see who is in the music videos, as any FBR video is a virtual Where’s Waldo of other FBR bands). I’m not sure that if they weren’t on the same label, anyone obsessed with Fall Out Boy’s charmingly angry pop-punk would find themselves addicted to Gym Class Heroes’s hip hop emo, much less The Hush Sound’s bouncy piano driven rock. I think there would be few who would argue against this being case of the label making the band, I feel like the true question is: Is this label mongering really such a bad thing? The answer, as one of my former professors would say, is no… and yes.

Personally, I wouldn't listen to any of these bands if their music weren’t good (okay, maybe TAI, but only because TAI TV is pretty much awesome). There are many who would argue against the assertion that all (or any) of these bands produce good music, but this is my opinion, and I happen to be a fan. The assumption, however, that any properly labeled band can be a hit could lead to less effort going into signing only good bands. I mean, have you heard Tyga? For your sake, I hope not. But, for FBR’s sake we’ll just call that one nepotism (Tyga is some relative (cousin, nephew, something) of Gym Class Heroes’s Travis McCoy). But the fact remains that the increase in popularity of Fueled By Ramen could lead to a decrease in quality of their music.

But for now, you can just call me a label whore. While you’re busy doing that and listening to only the indie-est of indie bands, I’m going to go get a copy of the new Paramore album. And The Cab.

Next issue I’ll be covering: The movement from acronyms in band names to short, single-word names.