Indie bands with jams

August 7, 2019 2:00 PM

I feel like in the 2000's there were a lot of "indie" bands that were doing outros in their songs that were either jams or big, explosive, loud walls of sound. When I was a teenager I had mix CDs with tons of songs by bands that had these qualities, but now that I'm 15 years older I'm having a hard time finding these. I have three that I can mention here:

These two songs have very loud, shoegaze-y outros:
Asobi Seksu, "Red Sea"
Silversun Pickups, "Lazy Eye"

This song has a short jam as their outro, which I love. Easily one of my favorite songs ever:
Deerhunter, "Nothing Ever Happened"

Deerhunter is somewhat known for having pretty amorphous, shoegaze-y, ambient songs in their earlier releases, so I am not sure if they really fit the bill like those first two I mentioned above. For example, their song Spring Hall Convert, definitely has a somewhat extended, ambient jam, but most of the song is like that. However, their song Twilight at Carbon Lake would likely fit the bill.

I really miss this style of music, not only from a nostalgic standpoint, but from a music standpoint as well. I listen to a lot of dreamier and heavier shoegaze music these days, bands such as Nothing and a lot of others, but I miss this style where the songs went from calm, dreamy indie-rock or indie-pop into this explosive, forceful noise.

Can anybody help me remember some of these bands and songs that were this style, which I feel was very big in the mid-2000's?

posted by gucci mane to Media & Arts (18 answers total)

Best answer: Harder than shoegaze-y, but the Hives and Cato Salsa Experience were both like this. The first Cato Salsa record (from 2002) has hella outro jams, like the last minute and a half of Time to Freak Out.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 3:02 PM on August 7, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: How about some Wolf Parade? Dinner Bells (live). California Dreamer (live). Kissing the Beehive (live) (album).
posted by kittyb at 4:03 PM on August 7, 2019 [2 favorites]

Best answer: The Deerhunter song with an extended coda jam that came to mind for me was "Desire Lines". The coda feels like it's a few minutes long and it's fairly distinct from the rest of the tune.
posted by Beardman at 4:12 PM on August 7, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: It’s from 1995, but Sonic Youth’s The Diamond Sea is a languid, dreamy song that explodes into a cacophony of beautiful noise not once, but twice. And it’s, er, 20 minutes long.
posted by ejs at 4:14 PM on August 7, 2019 [4 favorites]

Best answer: I really love the way Scrabble Girl by Joe Christmas starts with a couple of simple vocals, then turns into a long instrumental song. It's great to drive to.

But Joe Christmas isn't very heavy. If you don't know Starflyer 59, they might be what you are looking for - they are certainly my favorite shoegazer band. Duel Overhead Cam is a good example that fits what you are asking for. Or Indiana, which is from the same album, "Gold." A more recent example from the same band is Cry, which comes from their new album "Young In My Head" which came out last May. It isn't as heavy, but it has a great outro, in my opinion.

One last self-serving answer: Dead is a song by The Bonhoeffers, which was my brother's college band. This song was recorded in 1996 or so, and I think his instrumentation is awesome, making the song build up to a great climax.
posted by tacodave at 4:30 PM on August 7, 2019

Best answer: My Morning Jacket songs are rife with this.
posted by sallybrown at 5:09 PM on August 7, 2019 [3 favorites]

Best answer: Not in a place to flip through tracks to figure out which songs fit your criteria, but I think some of Broken Social Scene’s stuff might be up the alley you describe.
posted by Gymnopedist at 5:39 PM on August 7, 2019 [4 favorites]

Best answer: This way predates your time frame, but your description kind reminded me of Spacemen 3.
posted by scratch at 6:25 PM on August 7, 2019 [2 favorites]

Best answer: Interpol's first album "Turn On The Bright Lights" was king of this. I think literally every track had a wall of sound outro if I'm not mistaken, it was like their signature. NYC and PDA in particular but I think all of the songs on the album do it from the intro track to the last one.
posted by windbox at 7:34 PM on August 7, 2019

Best answer: The Wedding Present's Dalliance gradually builds and then explodes.
posted by Tuba Toothpaste at 8:02 PM on August 7, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Built to Spill - check out their live album, there is like a 20 minute cover of Cortez the Killer. I saw them live many times, but one time in particular they riffed on "How Soon is Now" by the Smith's for what felt like 30 minutes at the Urban Lounge in Salt Lake. It's like they were trying to outlast the crowd. One of the greatest indie jam bands of all time. I celebrate their entire catalog.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0LQ5DC1uIw
posted by trbrts at 8:28 PM on August 7, 2019 [5 favorites]

Best answer: Methinks Rocket From the Crypt's Glazed might qualify. (Okay it's more 90's, but still)
posted by gtrwolf at 9:13 PM on August 7, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Yo La Tengo?
Also Mogwai, Godspeed You! Black Empower, Sigur Ros, Spiritualized
posted by rd45 at 12:42 AM on August 8, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: She Came Home for Christmas and Comforting Sounds by Mew both have a build/explode dynamic that never fails to send shivers down my spine.
posted by parm at 12:58 AM on August 8, 2019

Best answer: Almost every song on Modest Mouse's Lonesome Crowded West (97) has a jammy outro.
posted by M.C. Lo-Carb! at 6:08 AM on August 8, 2019

Best answer: This Will Destroy You. All their work is stunning & gorgeous.
posted by kariebookish at 6:10 AM on August 8, 2019 [1 favorite]

Best answer: This article about how Indie went Jam might have some inspiration for you
posted by benbenson at 11:50 AM on August 8, 2019

Best answer: Wow I asked almost this same question a few years ago. My favorite answer from then was The Joy Formidable
posted by FirstMateKate at 2:56 PM on August 8, 2019