Some of the instruments used frequently by Alternative/Indie artists:
1. Guitar
Guitars, usually electric, may be the main harmonic instrument. Guitar sounds commonly associated with Alternative/Indie vary greatly depending on an artist’s sub-genre, and can range from picked, sustained arpeggios sometimes with additional effects to experimental solos in the case of rock bands for example.
Sometimes two guitarists are used (lead and rhythm).
2. Keyboards/Pianos
The presence of keyboard and piano in alternative music captures the range of sounds and diversity this genre is characterised by.
Radiohead is one such band within this genre that has often employed pianos in their music, sometimes along with a combination of other instruments and synths.
3. Bass
Bass plays an integral role in preventing a song from sounding “hollow.”
According to a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the bass is one of the most important parts of a song. The study found that your brain has an easier time finding the rhythm when sound is played in a lower tone, like that of a bass guitar. It also found that people were more likely to tap their feet to songs with more prominent bass in them than higher-pitched sounds of guitars and drums.
In other words, if you ever need to defend your love for bass in a heated argument with an electric guitar enthusiast, you can win by providing very legitimate scientific proof.
4. Drums
Much like bass in some ways, drums typically provide the foundation for the rhythm and tempo of a song.
As Julian Casablancas once said:
(Do we get brownie points for making blog post titles out of pop-cultural memes?)
Alternative music’s DIY ethos often manifests itself in the way that alternative artists may self-produce their recordings and use non-traditional instruments/sounds. Alternative/indie songs could be considered the quirky manic pixie dream girl of music, if you will, and this means a lot of them are characterised by unconventionality and not conforming to mainstream norms—a notion that naturally seeps into the instruments and musicality alternative artists employ.
All of that is to say that Alternative/Indie music is still defined by a sense of rebellion against mainstream music and employs experimentation in a way that might make it difficult to identify the instruments “conventionally” used by alternative artists.
For example, the post-punk band Gang of Four made use of a drum machine in lieu of a live drummer. New wave bands such as The Cars and Blondie incorporated synthesisers into their sound. And gothic rock bands like Bauhaus and The Cure often made use of distorted guitars and atmospheric keyboard sounds.
The often low-budget nature of alternative music and its promotional methods, thus, lend to creative ways of making a song unique; for instance, the alternative pop artist Finneas is known for incorporating everyday, mundane sounds into the production of his and his sister’s music, e.g. "Bury A Friend" features the sound of Billie Eilish essentially getting her teeth drilled.
An insightful excerpt from the video above:
Jimmy Fallon: But the way you put a song together is very interesting. I was asking you about this. You told me that you would record different sounds and Billie would record different sounds. And you'd go, "Hey, can we use this in the song?"
Finneas: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, because computers and everything have gotten so much cheaper and more accessible, I feel like a lot of music producers have the same toolbox. And I think, like, to me, as a producer, I always want something to set my stuff apart. And so I'll walk around with just an iPhone will work, but sometimes I'll bring a little mobile recorder. And if I hear an interesting sound, I'll just record it, and then later I'll listen through them and I'll go like, "I wonder how I can use that."
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