AllMusic's Top 20 Alternative and Indie Rock records

Allmusic.com recently did an overhaul of their site design.  So far, I don't care for it too much, but I think it's just because I was used to finding what I wanted to find quickly with their old design.  I stumbled upon this list of the top 20 alternative and indie rock records, and then had a lot of trouble finding it again.

They chose 1992 as the starting point for their list because they're celebrating their 20th anniversary.  With or without an anniversary to celebrate, I think it's a better starting point than a previous list I shared that included a fair number of selections from the 1980s.  Allmusic's list is alternative and indie rock, so it's relevant when each term came into vogue.

The wikipedia post on indie rock claims that the term indie rock was initially used interchangeably with alternative rock in the 80s.  I don't agree with that.  I think a lot of the usage of "alternative" in the 80s was related to commercial alternative stations that played major label college rock. While the terms "independent music" and "indie bands" were regularly used in the 80s, I don't think the real transition from the term "underground rock" to "indie rock" happened in the US until the early 90s.

I searched the NYTimes archives for the earliest usage of some of these terms.  Clearly, the earliest usage by the NYTimes is not the same as the earliest usage in 'zines, but my eyes got blurry trying to scan the small print in all my old 'zines and I gave up.  The earliest NYTimes appearance of "indie rock" came in January, 1992.  "Alternative Rock" showed up 5 years earlier in 1987, and "Underground Rock" shows up in a piece about CBGB's from 1976.  The term "underground rock 'n' roll" is also used in some even older pieces.

The Allmusic list gives the top 20 in date order rather than rank order.  The 20 albums are by Pavement, Nirvana, Liz Phair, PJ Harvey, Portishead, Pulp, Stereolab, Beck, Belle & Sebastian, Bjork, Radiohead, Flaming Lips, Shins, Strokes, White Stripes, Arcade Fire, LCD Sound System, TV on the Radio, Animal Collective, and the XX.  I think that makes it about half indie rock and half alternative, but it's difficult to classify some of the bands who started out on indie labels, but moved to majors for their biggest (and best?) records.

I'm working on my own list of the top 50 indie rock albums, which I'll post soon.

Top 25 Indie Rock Albums

Here's a list of the Top 25 Indie Rock Albums.  It's not an individual's list.  It was based on solicited votes from blog readers.  I don't particularly care for the fact that 3 bands show up twice, but I don't think the compiler/poster of the list liked that that much either - it was an earnest attempt at democracy.  It's reasonable that Pavement was one of the 3 to make the list with two albums.  It's unsurprising that Modest Mouse was one of the 3, and I still just don't get the Pixies.

Nonetheless, it's a pretty good list.  Identifying the best indie rock can be a bit challenging because some of the best bands reached a point where they weren't quite so indie.  You can take a look at the list yourself if you want to see the actual albums, but the top 10 were from these artists:

10) Minutemen
9) Pavement
8) Pixies
7) Postal Service
6) Belle & Sebastian
5) Sonic Youth
4) Modest Mouse
3) Arcade Fire
2) Pavement
1) Neutral Milk Hotel

I guess you can make a case for the Minutemen on this list in the same way that you can make a case for the MC5 or the Stooges on a list of great punk bands, but D. Boon had already died before the term "indie rock" was in regular use.  Sonic Youth also doesn't work for me on this list even though they did thrive into the indie rock era.  You can call them noise rock or underground rock or maybe even college rock, but they just don't fit my definition of indie rock.

I need to dig through my old issues of Option, Sound Choice, and Forced Exposure that I've held onto all these years to see if any of them were using the term indie rock in the 80s.  The term independent was definitely in widespread use, and I can't quibble with the notion of indie bands, but I just don't remember anybody talking about "indie rock" in the 80s.  Could those of you that remember the 80s weigh in here?  I'd like some comments on this.