Us v. Them: The Age of Indie Music and a Decade in New York (2004–2014)

Music writer Givony (Not for You) pulls from interviews and personal experience for a vivid, nostalgic chronicle of Brooklyn’s DIY indie scene in the early aughts. Spanning from 2004 to 2014, the account spotlights lesser-known artists like Oneida, a band who “specialized in performances that went on as long as twelve hours”; Skeletons, whose “sound could veer from Afrobeat to indie pop to noise”; and Sea Ray, whose eclectic style set them apart “from their more fashion-forward peers.” All three groups helped build the indie scene and a network of “unconventional venues” where bands got their starts. The author also catalogs the music media that shaped the scene (including Pitchfork, once able to “lift an artist from obscurity at its whim”) and explains how the atmosphere of post-9/11 uncertainty, coupled with immense technological changes, pushed artists in new creative directions. The scene began to fizzle by the beginning of the 2010s, as bands were priced out of an increasingly gentrified Brooklyn and indie music leaked into the mainstream. Despite sometimes indulging in overlong tangents, Givony captures the era’s energy in vibrant prose (“that singular strip of Kent Avenue... was both a party and an experiment in self-governance every night”). The result is an effusive and intimate ode to a heady period of music history. (Mar.)