Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Eponymousity

Just a random observation: what's with all these hot new bands putting out songs named after their own band. Some examples: 'Crystal Stilts' by Crystal Stilts, 'Titus Andronicus' by Titus Andronicus, 'Wavves' by Wavves (off the Wavves LP), etc. I guess it's kind of a hipply slacker sort of thing to do. Self-reference in Indie music makes me think of hip-hop. The latter genre really pioneered the idea of shouting yourself out in your own song, not to mention in the title of your song. Self-titled songs have occasionally marked career highlights in rap, like 'Method Man' by Wu-Tang, or the Souljah Boy song. So what is the allure for these indie dudes? Is it dumb irony to be like souljah boy, or is it actually a savvy marketing strategy borrowed from the technique mastered by rappers? Not sure, but all of the indie tracks I mentioned above are pretty solid, so if nothing else, these band's know that they need to write a good song if they're going to put their group's name on it. Personally though, I like my rapper influence theory.

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