By Sarah Teitel
It’s exactly the sort of breezy summer evening that the heat-starved Canadian masses spend ten months of the year dreaming about. Still, a good bunch of them, forty at least, have forsaken the sublime pleasures of the patio, opting instead to cram themselves into the long, narrow back room of Czehoski, a popular resto-bar on Toronto’s trendy Queen West strip.
The line-up is eclectic, as it is most Tuesdays. To open, there’s an acoustic
trio whose lyrical ballads have distinct medieval overtones. Next, pounding
the keys solo, is a husky-voiced, alt-country chanteuse. Then there’s a four-
piece funk ensemble led by a bespectacled crooner who catapults himself
gymnastically all over the stage. Finally, another trio steps up — rock, a step shy of hard.
According to the textbook (read Wikipedia) definition, all the acts are
independent — that is, not supported by a major record label. But none of
them have the aesthetic so commonly associated with indie music. Not a
single pair of natty sneakers or skinny jeans will grace the stage tonight.
On the floor however, amongst the gathered listeners, it’s a different story.
Those items abound, as do vintage frocks, thick-rimmed “geek” glasses, body- hugging t-shirts blazoned with the logos of defunct brands, carefully mussed heads of hair. While there is no cohesive style to the musicians, there is a certain look to the audience. You get the sense that when casting directors put out calls for “indie-rock types” — as they now frequently do on CraigsList — it's exactly this crowd they are dreaming of. But how much does the indie look have to do with indie music?
Hard to say, because, nowadays, it's hard to say what indie music actually
is. There was a time when the term “indie” implied something specific,
explains Carl Wilson, music writer for the Globe and Mail and author of
“Let's Talk About Love,” a tome exploring the rise and reign of Celine Dion
(definitely not indie).
It referred to “music made in non-corporate contexts, growing out of
punk scenes.” He quibbles with the Wikipedia definition, pointing out that
even when “indie” had a more clear-cut meaning, “it didn't refer to all music
on independent labels, only to that which fell in a certain self-consciously
delineated range.”
Now though, he says, the term is a “sloppy shorthand for most of the
music that isn't either dance music, stadium rock, country, hip-hop or teen
pop,” and that it doesn't reference a type of music so much as it does a demo-graphic — “people in their twenties in big cities and college towns, mainly with some sort of artsy bent, who hang out at bars.”
If Wilson's take on the situation is apt, “LIVE Tuesdays” are indie music
showcases regardless of who plays them because it's not the musicians who
make the scene “indie,” but the scenesters themselves. The only thing an
audience can expect to find onstage at an indie music event is diversity.
Purists might be disturbed by the vagaries of “indie”.
Still, on a hot Tuesday night at Czehoski, watching several pairs of trainer-
clad feet tap time enthusiastically to all the varied pieces of a sonic hodge-
podge, it’s hard not to experience something akin to genuine delight. In fact
you just might find yourself thinking the best thing about indie music is that
there's no such thing as indie music.
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