Are the Decemberists too pasty to dance to?
By Lauren Giniger
New Yorker pop music critic Sasha Frere-Jones recently provoked an online brawl when he accused indie-rock of being, well, too white. I know, duh.
His complaint, laid out in an essay published in the Oct. 22 issue of The New Yorker: the new indie, as typified by the holy-white-trinity of Arcade Fire, the Shins, and the Decemberists, can’t get a groove on to save its life. Underlying his distaste for modern indie is his sense of loss. According to Frere-Jones, the music had retreated from the heady, early ’80s days of cross-pollinating New York rock, the days of punky funk and rap-disco hybrids, the days of Factory Records’ infatuation with NYC clubs.
He also argues – although, he admits, reductively – that as indie rock has retreated from black music, so has society become increasingly racially polarized. There’s no doubt about the latter. But there may be a flip-side to what he perceives as racist retreat from black music.