Indie Dance / Alternative Dance

familyStarted c. 2001Peak 2004-2012Last big hit active through revival, playlists, and club nights

Located in 1 route

Indie Dance / Alternative Dance is the zone where indie rock, post-punk, electro, disco, synthpop, house, and club remix culture blur together. It keeps the loose attitude, bands, vocals, and fashion of alternative music, but pushes rhythm, basslines, drum machines, and DJ-friendly arrangements to the front. The sound ranges from DFA dance-punk and bloghouse distortion to new rave, indie disco, dark disco, synthpop, and post-punk dance.

History

The family grew from late-1970s post-punk/funk experiments, 1980s alternative club music, 1990s big-beat/electroclash, and early-2000s New York/London scenes. DFA Records made LCD Soundsystem, The Rapture, The Juan MacLean, and Holy Ghost! central to a dance-punk vocabulary, while Erol Alkan's Trash, 2manydjs/Soulwax, Ed Banger, Modular, Kitsuné, and MP3 blogs connected guitar bands to electro and disco DJs. Later indie-sleaze nostalgia, nu-disco revival, and festival/playlist culture kept the style searchable as a broad alternative-club language.

Defining artists

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Essential listening

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← Explore Electronic / Dance

Sources

  • Pitchfork LCD Soundsystem/DFA features
  • Resident Advisor bloghouse history
  • The Guardian Trash club history
  • Wired bloghouse history
  • Pitchfork DFA compilation review