From someone who was ‘there’ at the time of the original 80s and 90s shoegaze bands, this is a pretty accurate summary, and I’m glad you mentioned lesser-known bands such as Moose, Curve and Pale Saints. The Asian shoegaze scene isn’t something I know much about, so thank-you for that. I don’t know if you know a band from England called ‘Seefeel’? On their album ‘Quique’, they fused elements of shoegaze with dub, techno, minimalism and industrial sounds. This was quite ‘ahead of its time’, because it came out in the early 1990s. You can find it easily on You Tube.
My Bloody Valentine and my band The Nightshade Project became friends when we toured together briefly in the U.S. - I now own the bass guitar played in the video ‘Only Shallow’, and Belinda now owns the bass guitar Tamara played in our video ‘Only Nothing’.
Man, what a great time to be alive, late 80's, early 90's Shoegaze, Dreampop, but also Death and Black Metal, what a wonderful catalogue selection of music.
I first saw Lush and RIDE together in 1991 and will be at Miki Berenyi's NYC book talk tmw. This is one of the best Shoegaze overviews that I've ever watched. Thank you. RUBUR is a mainland Chinese band that I like, btw. Great job.
I guess you can say I'm an old school Shoegaze fan. My first club show was Lush and Ride in Palo Alto, California when I was 15 years old. I can close my eyes and still see Miki Berenyi walk up on stage. As the millennium turned, I was resigned to the fact that my beloved Shoegaze was destined to be forgotten, tossed into the dustbin of music history. But, I was so pleased to see the resurgence occur as all of these NuGaze groups sprouted up. I would even go on to see Lush, Ride, MBV, and Slowdive live again on their very popular reunion tours. This was a very well-informed video, and I'm glad that it came up on my feed. Great job!
A very well researched and presented video. You touched on all the main groups and many of the lesser known influences and early exponents like the underrated A.R. Kane. Although usually mentioned in shoegaze histories, you could argue the sonically magnificent Smashing Pumpkins album 'Siamese Dream' ticks all the boxes when it comes to the shoegaze sound and is a major album of the genre. A band that rarely gets mentioned is the Pacific Northwest post-hardcore band Unwound whose final album 'Leaves turn inside you' from 2001 has enough crunchy guitars and layered textures to qualify as a pretty decent shoegaze effort. Anyway great video Stella.
Thank you! I just listened to the Unwound album you mentioned, it sounds bit dry to me to be considered as shoegaze, but I can see where you come from!
As an old crank, I have had the good fortune to see many of these bands back in their heyday (for example, a triple bill of Buffalo Tom, Mercury Rev and MBV… this would have been around ‘92?) and the comprehensive nature of your video brought me right back there. As usual, well done, you! What has become my signature, have you heard of a band called Soundpool? They very much follow the Sunny Day in Glasgow model. They are quite good. There is another band named Asobi Seksu - they are from Brooklyn, of course. They have elements of shoegaze, but also a bit jangle pop and owe no small debt to Shonen Knife. The last band, yet again from Brooklyn, is one that sort of defies categorization: A Place to Bury Strangers. Have you heard of them? They are all over the map. I am a very big fan. Anyway, I will check another video soon and leave a comment.
Was hoping you would do a big shoegaze video like this, you make great content and have such a relaxing voice! You deserve lots more subscribers and views :) A few more bands you didn't mention that I would like to recommend you: Blind Mr. Jones, Pacific UV and Tribes of the City. And you probably know Coaltar of the Deepers, lots of shoe gaze elements to some of their stuff!
As an older generation, I had never heard of Shoegaze till we got Urban Hymns by the Verve, which is certainly not shoegaze, but it eventually led me back to "A Storm in Heaven" .
You introduce me to so much music that was made during my lifetime but I never heard. Kind of ironic with you being so much younger. Thanks for another cool and informative video. You always make me smile when you smile.
The volume ingredient is spot on. After seeing Ride at The Palace in Melbourne in about '92, my hearing was damaged for a week, but the "high" it created, made it worth it.
Slowdive's live performance of Golden Hair with that blue haired girl in the crowd, overwhelmed with emotion, shows how Slowdive has reconquered the stage and are very relevant into the 21th century.
🇧🇷 Vídeo muito bom Stella parabéns!!! I recommend a Brazilian Shoegaze band called GORDURATRANS. This group is recent on the national scene but is very promising. I hope you enjoy!!
You get it. I wasn't ready for this video to be SO good! And thank you for mentioning The Chameleons and Sarah Records, they hardly ever get mentioned by other videos on shoegaze!
Another relic from the late 80s/90s - pretty good history. Always funny to watch the kids "eulogising" just what was happening as a follow on from before as if it came out of nowhere, so very refreshing to have someone acknowledging the massive post-punk roots of shoegaze. Post-punk... where all the best music stems from.
Someone once qualified Jesus and Mary Chain as "accidental shoegaze", and to this day I think it's very accurate. They had a very unique sound, lots of anger, and amazing originality in both lyrics and music.
One band that should've been mentored on that first wave was the Vedlt. They played shows with many of those early shoegaze bands and were apart of the innovation of that genre. They collaborated with Cocteau twins as well as AR Kane. I did an interview with them recently . If you like, check it out
I have not listened to a lot of shoegaze sadly, but there's one band playing a dream pop and shoegaze blend that I really love (and I don't think you mentioned it): Asobi Seksu. They're an American band, but the singer is Japanese and sing some songs in English and some in Japanese. They were hand picked by Slowdive to open for them in 2014, but the band was actually only active between 2001 and 2013. I highly recommend the songs: Trails (2011), Stay (2002) and It's Too Late (2002). Hope you'll like those!
I absolutely love the shoe gazing scene. Got into them through Jesus and Mary Chain, Lush and My Bloody Valentine. Love the Boo Radleys and Spiritualized as well. But I appreciate you bringing out the early influences upon these bands. It all makes perfect sense. Great review !!
THIS VIDEO IS JUST SO PERFECT so well done and well explained, with all the delicacy with the history of the style leaving it so complete and well detailed, it's really a great documentary about the genre . . . *controversial opinions*: Cocteau Twins is the Shoegaze great primal act and Deftones is a valid crossover act between Alternative Metal and Shoegaze
Great video. This was my scene and I saw a lot of those bands back in the day. Good to see that younger people are getting into it. Really appreciate the time you took to properly research and present such a detailed overview. Subscribed.
A band I like which mix shoegaze with elements of electronica / trip hop is Bowery Electric. The song Freedom Fighter is a good example of what they do.
I was in this indie scene in Glasgow in the mid/late 80s, went to see many of these bands, and was friends with some. But we didnt like the terms shoegaze or twee. The word shoegaze seems to be mainly a term that younger folk not around at the time use as a shorthand to refer to the 80s indie music in Britain. And back then the scene was closely interconnected with people into 1960s music and style (which many younger folk into this music now seem not to realise)... So i always called it 'the 60s-indie scene'.
solid video again, great recognition of blackgaze. before i pressed play, i thought it would be criminal to neglect the fusion style. surprising there was no mention of A Place to Bury Strangers, one of the more better and more well-known groups whose sound embraces shoegaze and noise rock ala The Jesus and Mary Chain.
Hello. Wonderful video 👏🏼🎸. I’d recommend you the album “Dynamo” (1993) by the argentinian band Soda Stereo. They were by far the biggest and most popular latinamerican rock pop band by the beginning of the nineties, and in their musical quest they suddenly released a shoegaze record, the only one in their discography. Turns out their vocalist/guitarist and main composer was apparently listening a lot of shoegaze at the time of composition of the album. Many people was confused at the time, but the album passed the test of time. I love that record👌🏼🎸
And if you ever wondered what inspired the shoegaze movement in the first place you should look back at some of the early to mid 1970's UK prog, progfolk, whatever. Black Widow had some protoshoegaze elements and a general proto "indie rock" kinda vibe for 1973. Just remember. There was always something that came before!
Nice overview. I remember the Kitchens Of Distinction being an important part of the development of that blissed out Shoegaze sound. Their first two albums are fantastic. History has kind of forgotten about them which is a shame.
I met Kevin shields before he was the singer around the time of another record by my bloody Valentine ep.A tiny old 60s club called Basins in the brutalist shopping center in Portsmouth.Virtually everyone left after the support band 😳they were all friends of the band I guess.My friend Matt and I got talking to Kevin,he bought us a drink and took us backstage,where we shared our deep obsession with the Marychain.Kevin showed me his tuning at the time and how to play were so beautiful 😎.When we headed out there was I think one guy at the bar 🤦♂️ they basically played just for us it was a beautiful night,will treasure it.Years later Kevin was trying to get into a sold out marychain gig in Brixton and saw us in the queue,I gave him my ticket and we went in together then I pretended I needed to go outside and bought the ticket with me 😆🥳 could have met Jim and William as Kevin knew them but I just couldn’t bring myself too as I had shaved my head 😆 they didn’t look too impressed when they looked over 😆
He invited us to sleep over at his squat that had flooded,they were sleeping in hammocks apparently,but I didn’t want to take his money for the train the next day 🤦♂️what am I like 😆
Great job Stella, i found your video extremely accurate i have loved all these bands since way before i new the term Shoegaze ,i had all these bands on CD, it was probably 2010 when i first heard term shoegaze ,, i do believe the term Shoegaze came from journalists at Sounds Magazine in 1990 referring to Moose singer Russel Yates,, not NME..thanks for a great video.
I remember shoegaze starting, I went to the JAMC Psychocandy album launch and loved this type of stuff. Shoegaze was looked on as a joke by some in the music press, called Shoegaze because the band's spent most of their time looking down, at their shoes.
I also would have added the album "Dynamo" by Soda Stereo which was influentiated by mbv's loveless and was one of the big exponents of shoegaze in the hispanic countries. I loved your video btw
Some of my favorite modern shoegaze comes from the South Korean musician Parannoul. Definitely recommend to anyone into shoegaze or trying to get into shoegaze.
My discovery into Shoegaze maybe was backwards, I started with Black Metal and then discovered bands like Alcest and Sylvaine and then discovering Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine and Love Spirals Downwards and the like. Blackgaze is still probably my go to genre for when I don't know what to listen to.
Stoked to see you bring up bands like Swervedriver, and also take the Wall of Sound into account! I always think of that when I think shoegaze. I never knew about Don’t Cramp My Style by My Bloody Valentine so that was cool to learn! Great video.
No one really called this music "shoegaze" when it was around, except for maybe one goofy NME writer. It wasn't until it was over and people had to distinguish it from the next thing and finally acquiesced. You've made a wonderfully comprehensive list here, but if you wanna get into the weeds, you should check out Medicine and/or Teenage Filmstars, both of whom put out crazy noise pop albums on Creation Records circa 1994. In some ways the UK label Too Pure that first released StereoLab, Pram, PJ Harvey, and most of all Seefeel always seemed to me like some kind of a aesthetic succession or evolution from MBV and company.
Hi Stella, another great video! It’s like you reached deep into my brain with a spoon and dug out a whole bunch of memories from the 90s. Love how you found the roots of the genre. So glad you mentioned Medicine too, who are amazing and quite underrated, especially their debut, Shot Forth Self Living! Brad Laner is a super nice guy-I met him when they played Maxwell’s in Hoboken. He showed me how he got that incredible distortion sound on his guitar. And the Wire tribute album Whore, wow. Someone mentioned Seefeel, (p.s. you’ll find a job someday) you could also add M83 to this subgenre. I am just about the biggest Ulrich Schnauss fan ever. So I’ll end this rambling post with a note that both Ride and Slowdive released fantastic “comeback” albums in 2017. Slowdive’s 2017 self-titled is like a time travel jump from 1995 to 2017 that proves the timelessness of this genre. P.S. My ears are still ringing from seeing MBV play in the 90s.
Excellent video, Stella. I was lucky to see My Bloody Valentine, Ride, Lush and the Pale Saints live. This just brought back some happy memories. As I am in Asia now, I will check out the scene here…I didn’t know it existed 😁😂
It's such a pity that some of the best Japanese shoegaze bands only managed to release one single album :( I would like to recommend bands like Burrrn, Clams and Bertoia, they truly are hidden gems imho. Oh and Luminous Orange, my fav Japanese shoegaze band ever, not really active anymore lately :/
Very solid overview! A few shoegaze bands I recommend: Chasms (The Mirage is a fantastic album), Crocodiles (Summer of Hate is very catchy), Dalek (rap and shoegaze, Absense is a solid album). I also have a soft spot for Magnetic Fields' Distortion.
I'm staring at my bare feet, but i loved your video. I really appreciated your deep dive into the early influences, through classic phases, contemporary offshoots of the genre and Asian iterations. Thanks for an informative video.
Another great video. You found some MBV EP's and compilations I never heard of. The downfall can be attributed to a lot of things. Lush of course turned to Britpop then had the death of their drummer. MBV and some other band I think dealt with a great deal of depression and substance abuse. I tried to find an Alternative Press article that was really good from the late 90's but I can't find it online. It goes into the details of the demise. Kevin Smith spent most of the money from Loveless on a studio and of course took 20 years to release a record. Very cool you mention Ulrich Schnaus - I had not thought of him as shoegaze. And of course great mention of Pale Saints who you know is one of my all-time favorite bands. I also like how you provide some resources to Chinese shoegaze. One interesting thing I find about shoegaze from talking to British people my age is apparently shoegaze was probably more popular in the US. I figured it would be so in Britain but not really the case.
MBV being so slow/patient when releasing music is also what make them great partially. I'm not sure if Shoegaze were more popular in the US. I guess a lot of British were listening to Britpop, drum&bass, jungle, trip-hop, and other nascent music styles which divided the listeners.
@@StellasEncounter Of course I don't have any hard data that shoe gaze was more popular, but just what I gathered from talking to people. Still shoegaze not a genre that stuck. It seemed shoegaze was mostly vanished by the early 00's.
You may try the Shoegaze scene here in the Philippines. Shoegaze Pilipinas already released 3 compilation albums namely Alunig, Alimbukad and ALPAS featuring various local DreamPop and Shoegaze bands.
@@StellasEncounter Megumi Acorda would be a great recommendation as well as Sonnet LVIII, Ozzga, Populardays, Sugar Hiccup, Polar Lows, WYWY, UJU, Precal Dropouts, Sleepwalk Circus, Memory Drawers, Spacedog Spacecat.. while some are mixed with post-rock or math rock like Cinema Lumière, Encounters With A Yeti and Sound Architects.. and some international artists with Filipino blood also incorporated dream pop and shoegaze styles on their music like Beabadoobee and Jay Som. I already shared this to my FB page, New Wave Era And Resurgence. New subscriber here! :-)
Another great video Stella. One can tell you really put the time and effort into it. Props for mentioning A.R. Kane (I love them) and Ulrich Schnauss (Gone Forever is one of my all-time favorites) and Loop (have you heard Main?) And I also love Vapour Trail and the MBV Wire cover. Shoegaze remains one of my favorite genres, and to see it’s ascendence in recent years has been interesting. One of my plans for this year is to spend time delving into specifically Asian shoegaze, I feel like I’ve been missing out! A couple of personal things-I once played a MBV tribute show in Seattle with thirteen other bands, we played Somewhere and No More Sorry. And Andy my band-mate and I hung out with Pete Kember at one of his shows once, he played Hall of Mirrors by Kraftwerk and it was mesmerizing. Again, stellar job Stella.
I feel like shoegaze is humid, inward, and slightly insular, which actually interwines quite well with east-asia (and UK too). Yes I know Main but not quite familiar, another project of Robert Hampson I rem? Cool of you to have tributed to MBV as well as hanging out with Pete - I bet it was precious memory!
@@StellasEncounter I meant Sometimes (not Somewhere) in the above comment, and Main is Robert Hampson doing very abstracted guitar/dub ambience. Hanging out with Pete was/is a precious memory.
Name your fav Shoegaze bands here! 😁😁😁
Slowdive !!!!!
Lush
Tokyo shoegazer untuk saat ini
Cocteau Twins, and The Pixies.
Lush
The Veldt
Star Flyer 59
A.R Kane
Fold zandura
My bloody valentines. Cool
I LOVE Gen-Z re-discovering the whole Shoegaze/Dream Pop scene. Believe me, it was an AMAZING time for music‼️
From someone who was ‘there’ at the time of the original 80s and 90s shoegaze bands, this is a pretty accurate summary, and I’m glad you mentioned lesser-known bands such as Moose, Curve and Pale Saints. The Asian shoegaze scene isn’t something I know much about, so thank-you for that. I don’t know if you know a band from England called ‘Seefeel’? On their album ‘Quique’, they fused elements of shoegaze with dub, techno, minimalism and industrial sounds. This was quite ‘ahead of its time’, because it came out in the early 1990s. You can find it easily on You Tube.
Thank you! Yes I've heard of them, not very familiar though...
The Birthday party and Pale Saints just don't seem to get credit for being so dreamy and delicious. Love them, still!!
@@pluise true
That Seefeel album is a masterpiece 👌
Listened to Seefeel 'Quique' today, like it a lot! Like shoegaze meets Aphex Twin! Thanks :)
Slowdive releasing Slowdive years later was awesome such a great comeback album
My Bloody Valentine and my band The Nightshade Project became friends when we toured together briefly in the U.S. - I now own the bass guitar played in the video ‘Only Shallow’, and Belinda now owns the bass guitar Tamara played in our video ‘Only Nothing’.
wow, nice to meet you there! Glad you came by!😄
Lush is legendary but underrated as well imo
Lush is the best , especially live.
Man, what a great time to be alive, late 80's, early 90's Shoegaze, Dreampop, but also Death and Black Metal, what a wonderful catalogue selection of music.
I first saw Lush and RIDE together in 1991 and will be at Miki Berenyi's NYC book talk tmw. This is one of the best Shoegaze overviews that I've ever watched. Thank you. RUBUR is a mainland Chinese band that I like, btw. Great job.
thank you! Glad you enjoyed it! :) And yes RUBUR!!! Hahaha
Spot on adding Spacemen 3 and Loop to this discussion, absolute must haves
both good bands too!
Shoegaze and Dreampop forever ❤
I guess you can say I'm an old school Shoegaze fan. My first club show was Lush and Ride in Palo Alto, California when I was 15 years old. I can close my eyes and still see Miki Berenyi walk up on stage. As the millennium turned, I was resigned to the fact that my beloved Shoegaze was destined to be forgotten, tossed into the dustbin of music history. But, I was so pleased to see the resurgence occur as all of these NuGaze groups sprouted up. I would even go on to see Lush, Ride, MBV, and Slowdive live again on their very popular reunion tours. This was a very well-informed video, and I'm glad that it came up on my feed. Great job!
Thanks for sharing your anecdotal story :) I do believe shoegaze deserves to stand the test of time! Glad you enjoyed it!
Liked and subscribed! Well done, and a nice overview of shoegaze. 🎸
Thanks for the sub!
You should check out the Taiwanese band Fuguko (河豚子)! They're one of my favorite shoegaze acts at the moment
I laughed so hard when you started singing Vapour Trail.
Haha cheers!
My god. So many great songs and bands in this mini-documentary. So glad I experienced it as it happened.
Slowdive's "Star Roving" started to flow in my ears immediately after this clip 🤟
A very well researched and presented video. You touched on all the main groups and many of the lesser known influences and early exponents like the underrated A.R. Kane. Although usually mentioned in shoegaze histories, you could argue the sonically magnificent Smashing Pumpkins album 'Siamese Dream' ticks all the boxes when it comes to the shoegaze sound and is a major album of the genre. A band that rarely gets mentioned is the Pacific Northwest post-hardcore band Unwound whose final album 'Leaves turn inside you' from 2001 has enough crunchy guitars and layered textures to qualify as a pretty decent shoegaze effort. Anyway great video Stella.
Thank you! I just listened to the Unwound album you mentioned, it sounds bit dry to me to be considered as shoegaze, but I can see where you come from!
As an old crank, I have had the good fortune to see many of these bands back in their heyday (for example, a triple bill of Buffalo Tom, Mercury Rev and MBV… this would have been around ‘92?) and the comprehensive nature of your video brought me right back there. As usual, well done, you!
What has become my signature, have you heard of a band called Soundpool? They very much follow the Sunny Day in Glasgow model. They are quite good. There is another band named Asobi Seksu - they are from Brooklyn, of course. They have elements of shoegaze, but also a bit jangle pop and owe no small debt to Shonen Knife. The last band, yet again from Brooklyn, is one that sort of defies categorization: A Place to Bury Strangers. Have you heard of them? They are all over the map. I am a very big fan.
Anyway, I will check another video soon and leave a comment.
Thanks for your comment and support! Yeah I've heard of some of these, not Soundpool though, thanks for letting me know! :)
Was hoping you would do a big shoegaze video like this, you make great content and have such a relaxing voice! You deserve lots more subscribers and views :) A few more bands you didn't mention that I would like to recommend you: Blind Mr. Jones, Pacific UV and Tribes of the City. And you probably know Coaltar of the Deepers, lots of shoe gaze elements to some of their stuff!
Haha thank you! I didn't know about your recs and gave them a listen, all good finds - esp Pacific UV - thanks again :)
Very awesome that you talked about MBVs early history. People tend to ignore it, but the first song by MBV my dad showed me was Tiger In My Tank
The Things I Miss is in my top five for MBV. It's so sweet!
As an older generation, I had never heard of Shoegaze till we got Urban Hymns by the Verve, which is certainly not shoegaze, but it eventually led me back to "A Storm in Heaven" .
If you haven’t already, check out A Northern Soul. I think that is even better than Heaven.
@@Jabberwok28 Ashcroft is more out front on this one, not mixed as a sound effect. So the Shoegaze is being left behind.
Ohh... and dont forget "Swirlies" !!!
You had my respect for including Curve and Flying Saucer attack, they are my favorite!
You introduce me to so much music that was made during my lifetime but I never heard. Kind of ironic with you being so much younger. Thanks for another cool and informative video. You always make me smile when you smile.
@ artomatt I feel ya! I didn't discover Lush until 2005...ten years after the fact! I was forty-something.
Brilliant video!
The late 80’s and early 90’s were good times to a teenager from north west England.
I loved this music
Shoegaze is my favorite music genre, period
The volume ingredient is spot on. After seeing Ride at The Palace in Melbourne in about '92, my hearing was damaged for a week, but the "high" it created, made it worth it.
Would love to see Ride in the 90s! I saw them a few years ago didn't find the volume to be too loud. I guess they play live differently now.
Slowdive's live performance of Golden Hair with that blue haired girl in the crowd, overwhelmed with emotion, shows how Slowdive has reconquered the stage and are very relevant into the 21th century.
🇧🇷 Vídeo muito bom Stella parabéns!!! I recommend a Brazilian Shoegaze band called GORDURATRANS. This group is recent on the national scene but is very promising. I hope you enjoy!!
You get it. I wasn't ready for this video to be SO good! And thank you for mentioning The Chameleons and Sarah Records, they hardly ever get mentioned by other videos on shoegaze!
You deliver a very entertaining music genre educational experience. I could listen and look for hours straight! Awesome work Stella!
I'm glad you are exploring my channel. Thanks for the kind words and positive feedback, it's well received.
Another relic from the late 80s/90s - pretty good history.
Always funny to watch the kids "eulogising" just what was happening as a follow on from before as if it came out of nowhere, so very refreshing to have someone acknowledging the massive post-punk roots of shoegaze.
Post-punk... where all the best music stems from.
I love your mini-documentaries and your upbeat attitude.
Someone once qualified Jesus and Mary Chain as "accidental shoegaze", and to this day I think it's very accurate. They had a very unique sound, lots of anger, and amazing originality in both lyrics and music.
One band that should've been mentored on that first wave was the Vedlt. They played shows with many of those early shoegaze bands and were apart of the innovation of that genre. They collaborated with Cocteau twins as well as AR Kane. I did an interview with them recently . If you like, check it out
Great overview! I've been re-descovering shoegaze and dreampop lately, so this video fits right in. Keep up the good job!
Thanks, will do!
I have not listened to a lot of shoegaze sadly, but there's one band playing a dream pop and shoegaze blend that I really love (and I don't think you mentioned it): Asobi Seksu. They're an American band, but the singer is Japanese and sing some songs in English and some in Japanese. They were hand picked by Slowdive to open for them in 2014, but the band was actually only active between 2001 and 2013.
I highly recommend the songs: Trails (2011), Stay (2002) and It's Too Late (2002). Hope you'll like those!
Yes I know the band Wasobi Seksu, and they're good, good shout!
Acá en Argentina tuvimos a "Asalto al Parque Zoológico". Bandon! Y su disco "Noise Sweet Noise"
I absolutely love the shoe gazing scene. Got into them through Jesus and Mary Chain, Lush and My Bloody Valentine. Love the Boo Radleys and Spiritualized as well. But I appreciate you bringing out the early influences upon these bands. It all makes perfect sense. Great review !!
THIS VIDEO IS JUST SO PERFECT
so well done and well explained, with all the delicacy with the history of the style leaving it so complete and well detailed, it's really a great documentary about the genre
.
.
.
*controversial opinions*:
Cocteau Twins is the Shoegaze great primal act
and Deftones is a valid crossover act between Alternative Metal and Shoegaze
Thank you am glad you liked it! You're right, deftones is up there as a crossover band of shoegaze!
Thanks for all this good info, and thanks to commenters for more good info.
Great video!! I always felt dinosaur jr early albums should be mentioned more in the early shoegaze conversation
Great video. This was my scene and I saw a lot of those bands back in the day. Good to see that younger people are getting into it. Really appreciate the time you took to properly research and present such a detailed overview. Subscribed.
A band I like which mix shoegaze with elements of electronica / trip hop is Bowery Electric. The song Freedom Fighter is a good example of what they do.
why am i just finding your channel!!
Thank you for this intro to a genre I've always been so near to, but never understood!
You're very welcome, and I'm very glad you've found it.
Have a great weekend, and Happy Halloween.
I was in this indie scene in Glasgow in the mid/late 80s, went to see many of these bands, and was friends with some. But we didnt like the terms shoegaze or twee. The word shoegaze seems to be mainly a term that younger folk not around at the time use as a shorthand to refer to the 80s indie music in Britain. And back then the scene was closely interconnected with people into 1960s music and style (which many younger folk into this music now seem not to realise)... So i always called it 'the 60s-indie scene'.
solid video again, great recognition of blackgaze. before i pressed play, i thought it would be criminal to neglect the fusion style. surprising there was no mention of A Place to Bury Strangers, one of the more better and more well-known groups whose sound embraces shoegaze and noise rock ala The Jesus and Mary Chain.
I forgot why I didn't include a place to bury strangers.....good shout! Thanks for watching! :)
This was an impressive video! I was really impressed at how you included many obscure early bands and took the story through to the present day!
Glad you enjoyed it!
How did I not know about your channel before? Brilliant…
Thanks for making this video. You did an awesome job!
Thank you!
Hello. Wonderful video 👏🏼🎸. I’d recommend you the album “Dynamo” (1993) by the argentinian band Soda Stereo. They were by far the biggest and most popular latinamerican rock pop band by the beginning of the nineties, and in their musical quest they suddenly released a shoegaze record, the only one in their discography. Turns out their vocalist/guitarist and main composer was apparently listening a lot of shoegaze at the time of composition of the album. Many people was confused at the time, but the album passed the test of time. I love that record👌🏼🎸
you had me at
dut
dut
dut
dut
wheeeh wooo
wheeeerrrhhhhrr
hahaha
And if you ever wondered what inspired the shoegaze movement in the first place you should look back at some of the early to mid 1970's UK prog, progfolk, whatever.
Black Widow had some protoshoegaze elements and a general proto "indie rock" kinda vibe for 1973.
Just remember. There was always something that came before!
Nice overview. I remember the Kitchens Of Distinction being an important part of the development of that blissed out Shoegaze sound. Their first two albums are fantastic. History has kind of forgotten about them which is a shame.
Good shout on them, didn't recognize the name, playing "Drive That Fast" feels like I've heard this song many times....
@@StellasEncounter Its such a beautiful song. They are worth checking out.
I met Kevin shields before he was the singer around the time of another record by my bloody Valentine ep.A tiny old 60s club called Basins in the brutalist shopping center in Portsmouth.Virtually everyone left after the support band 😳they were all friends of the band I guess.My friend Matt and I got talking to Kevin,he bought us a drink and took us backstage,where we shared our deep obsession with the Marychain.Kevin showed me his tuning at the time and how to play were so beautiful 😎.When we headed out there was I think one guy at the bar 🤦♂️ they basically played just for us it was a beautiful night,will treasure it.Years later Kevin was trying to get into a sold out marychain gig in Brixton and saw us in the queue,I gave him my ticket and we went in together then I pretended I needed to go outside and bought the ticket with me 😆🥳 could have met Jim and William as Kevin knew them but I just couldn’t bring myself too as I had shaved my head 😆 they didn’t look too impressed when they looked over 😆
He invited us to sleep over at his squat that had flooded,they were sleeping in hammocks apparently,but I didn’t want to take his money for the train the next day 🤦♂️what am I like 😆
Belinda was hauntingly beautiful.
@briared Path
what a story!
thank you for sharing. I really don't know how to reply beyond, lol, wut!
Have a great weekend
Great job Stella, i found your video extremely accurate i have loved all these bands since way before i new the term Shoegaze ,i had all these bands on CD, it was probably 2010 when i first heard term shoegaze ,, i do believe the term Shoegaze came from journalists at Sounds Magazine in 1990 referring to Moose singer Russel Yates,, not NME..thanks for a great video.
Thank you!! Glad you enjoyed it :)
I remember shoegaze starting, I went to the JAMC Psychocandy album launch and loved this type of stuff. Shoegaze was looked on as a joke by some in the music press, called Shoegaze because the band's spent most of their time looking down, at their shoes.
In the UK it was called indie.
Btw, all members of the Marychain went to the same school as me!
This was such an enjoyable summary of a time I remember very dearly. Great retrospective
Glad you enjoyed it!
Glad you enjoyed it!
I also would have added the album "Dynamo" by Soda Stereo which was influentiated by mbv's loveless and was one of the big exponents of shoegaze in the hispanic countries. I loved your video btw
I like Soda Stereo!! And thanks for your comment and support!!
Some of my favorite modern shoegaze comes from the South Korean musician Parannoul. Definitely recommend to anyone into shoegaze or trying to get into shoegaze.
thank you so much for this. All of my favorite bands as a kid, and some new to me.
My discovery into Shoegaze maybe was backwards, I started with Black Metal and then discovered bands like Alcest and Sylvaine and then discovering Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine and Love Spirals Downwards and the like. Blackgaze is still probably my go to genre for when I don't know what to listen to.
As long as you enjoy the journey, I'm not sure the path is important.
Thanks for taking the time to reply!
Have a great day!
I was searching for some shoegaze music playlists & stumbled upon this video. Love the history explanation & hopefully to see more in future :)
Glad you enjoyed it!
god bless my youtube recommendations, great stuff!!
Another one of my favourite genres that you covered with great detail. Good work! Thanks for the information, great research!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Stoked to see you bring up bands like Swervedriver, and also take the Wall of Sound into account! I always think of that when I think shoegaze. I never knew about Don’t Cramp My Style by My Bloody Valentine so that was cool to learn! Great video.
No one really called this music "shoegaze" when it was around, except for maybe one goofy NME writer. It wasn't until it was over and people had to distinguish it from the next thing and finally acquiesced. You've made a wonderfully comprehensive list here, but if you wanna get into the weeds, you should check out Medicine and/or Teenage Filmstars, both of whom put out crazy noise pop albums on Creation Records circa 1994. In some ways the UK label Too Pure that first released StereoLab, Pram, PJ Harvey, and most of all Seefeel always seemed to me like some kind of a aesthetic succession or evolution from MBV and company.
When I think of Shoegaze I immediately think of MBV & Slowdive 🎸 🎶 🎵
I feel like ive been missing out big time having only just found this channel
I'm glad you've found my little bit of the internet too!
Hi Stella, another great video! It’s like you reached deep into my brain with a spoon and dug out a whole bunch of memories from the 90s. Love how you found the roots of the genre. So glad you mentioned Medicine too, who are amazing and quite underrated, especially their debut, Shot Forth Self Living! Brad Laner is a super nice guy-I met him when they played Maxwell’s in Hoboken. He showed me how he got that incredible distortion sound on his guitar. And the Wire tribute album Whore, wow. Someone mentioned Seefeel, (p.s. you’ll find a job someday) you could also add M83 to this subgenre. I am just about the biggest Ulrich Schnauss fan ever. So I’ll end this rambling post with a note that both Ride and Slowdive released fantastic “comeback” albums in 2017. Slowdive’s 2017 self-titled is like a time travel jump from 1995 to 2017 that proves the timelessness of this genre. P.S. My ears are still ringing from seeing MBV play in the 90s.
Thank you very much for the kind words, they're appreciated.
Thank you also for the suggestions.
Have a great rest of the weekend!
Hey there. I'm new here and have been loving all of your Brief History-s. Not just the content, but your presentation. Subscribed! Thanks
Thanks and welcome!! :)
The Sunday’s album Blind is a beauty,one of Elizabeth Frasers favourite singers.
I wasn't aware.
Thank you for the heads up. Have a great weekend!
That was great!
I know and love about 90% of these bands.
I don't know how I found this, but, thank you.
Everything you said is true.
I won't assume everything I said/say is true, but thanks for giving me credits for that!
I love your enthusiasm, Stella. I look forward to hearing your takes on different music genres and phenomenon.
Thanks for your support, I appreciate it!
Excellent video, Stella. I was lucky to see My Bloody Valentine, Ride, Lush and the Pale Saints live. This just brought back some happy memories. As I am in Asia now, I will check out the scene here…I didn’t know it existed 😁😂
Glad it introduced you some newer stuff. And lucky you to have seen them back in the days!
It's such a pity that some of the best Japanese shoegaze bands only managed to release one single album :( I would like to recommend bands like Burrrn, Clams and Bertoia, they truly are hidden gems imho. Oh and Luminous Orange, my fav Japanese shoegaze band ever, not really active anymore lately :/
Bloodthirsty Butchers is one of those type of bands sorta
Fantastic video Stella! I'm from that early era and still learned quite a bit. btw, Ride 'Nowhere' will always be my favorite shoegaze album. ❤
Awesome! Thank you!
Very solid overview! A few shoegaze bands I recommend: Chasms (The Mirage is a fantastic album), Crocodiles (Summer of Hate is very catchy), Dalek (rap and shoegaze, Absense is a solid album). I also have a soft spot for Magnetic Fields' Distortion.
Very very cool suggestions. Thanks for take the time to share them.
Have a great day!
Yes! Dinosaur Jr.! That's my local hometown band. AND Sonic Youth also lived in the town over. I'm such a Shoegaze nerd. Great round up. 🤘
Ahh cool, have you met J Mascis outside of a show? Long live Dinosaurs!!! /S
@@StellasEncounter He would come into the record store where I worked but I never talked to him (too shy!)
@@ChongqingPeter Aww hahaha!
Ester Drang’s Goldenwest is a highly underrated shoegaze album.
Aside from missing Ultra Vivid Scene & a couple of others, this is good video. I'm a 52yr old bloke who was there btw.
Great video, great work keep it up Stella!
Thank you! Will do!
Excellent video. You're very good at this. I love your voice.
Thank you.
Thank you too!
Thanks for making a video on this!
Brilliant description of the shoegaze genre
I'm staring at my bare feet, but i loved your video. I really appreciated your deep dive into the early influences, through classic phases, contemporary offshoots of the genre and Asian iterations. Thanks for an informative video.
Thank you and glad you liked it! And hahaha @ staring at feet!
OMG Do You Have To Be Adorable ALL THE TIME!?! Gosh Girl Give It Break LOL... Really Great Work!
haha thanks, i try and it's hard work!
@@StellasEncounter Well It Shows Miss Stella... You Have A New Fan ... One That Knows To Watch , Like & Comment! God Bless!!
@@thedarkblockagency thanks for the support! Appreciated.
Great vid. Love the shoegaze content. thank you for sharing 😍🥰😍
Thank you so much 🤗
Great video! Just about my favourite genre, and you capture the essence of the feelings evoked so well. So cheerfully presented, too.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Very interesting documentary, there is so much independent music out there,hard to keep up with.👍
Awesome video! Thanks for opening my eyes to some new sounds :))
More than a genre, considering the mix and tone that doesn't go from band to band, I think it's more like just an important music scene.
Pretty interesting video! HUM is another great band that uses shoegaze elements in a few of their songs. I'd recommend them as a band in general
Hum definitely uses shoegaze in their songs and they make it work perfectly.
Another great video. You found some MBV EP's and compilations I never heard of. The downfall can be attributed to a lot of things. Lush of course turned to Britpop then had the death of their drummer. MBV and some other band I think dealt with a great deal of depression and substance abuse. I tried to find an Alternative Press article that was really good from the late 90's but I can't find it online. It goes into the details of the demise. Kevin Smith spent most of the money from Loveless on a studio and of course took 20 years to release a record. Very cool you mention Ulrich Schnaus - I had not thought of him as shoegaze. And of course great mention of Pale Saints who you know is one of my all-time favorite bands. I also like how you provide some resources to Chinese shoegaze. One interesting thing I find about shoegaze from talking to British people my age is apparently shoegaze was probably more popular in the US. I figured it would be so in Britain but not really the case.
MBV being so slow/patient when releasing music is also what make them great partially. I'm not sure if Shoegaze were more popular in the US. I guess a lot of British were listening to Britpop, drum&bass, jungle, trip-hop, and other nascent music styles which divided the listeners.
@@StellasEncounter Of course I don't have any hard data that shoe gaze was more popular, but just what I gathered from talking to people. Still shoegaze not a genre that stuck. It seemed shoegaze was mostly vanished by the early 00's.
Very cool video, I really liked it :)
Another cool shoegaze artist from Asia is Parannoul. I love how he mixes shoegaze with emo
You may try the Shoegaze scene here in the Philippines. Shoegaze Pilipinas already released 3 compilation albums namely Alunig, Alimbukad and ALPAS featuring various local DreamPop and Shoegaze bands.
Found it on discord! will give a listen. Thanks for the recs :)
@@StellasEncounter Megumi Acorda would be a great recommendation as well as Sonnet LVIII, Ozzga, Populardays, Sugar Hiccup, Polar Lows, WYWY, UJU, Precal Dropouts, Sleepwalk Circus, Memory Drawers, Spacedog Spacecat.. while some are mixed with post-rock or math rock like Cinema Lumière, Encounters With A Yeti and Sound Architects.. and some international artists with Filipino blood also incorporated dream pop and shoegaze styles on their music like Beabadoobee and Jay Som.
I already shared this to my FB page, New Wave Era And Resurgence. New subscriber here! :-)
Utterly adore Shoegaze. My favourite band has to be The Daysleepers..simply immaculate. Thank You for posting the interesting video.
Another great video Stella. One can tell you really put the time and effort into it. Props for mentioning A.R. Kane (I love them) and Ulrich Schnauss (Gone Forever is one of my all-time favorites) and Loop (have you heard Main?) And I also love Vapour Trail and the MBV Wire cover. Shoegaze remains one of my favorite genres, and to see it’s ascendence in recent years has been interesting. One of my plans for this year is to spend time delving into specifically Asian shoegaze, I feel like I’ve been missing out!
A couple of personal things-I once played a MBV tribute show in Seattle with thirteen other bands, we played Somewhere and No More Sorry. And Andy my band-mate and I hung out with Pete Kember at one of his shows once, he played Hall of Mirrors by Kraftwerk and it was mesmerizing. Again, stellar job Stella.
I feel like shoegaze is humid, inward, and slightly insular, which actually interwines quite well with east-asia (and UK too). Yes I know Main but not quite familiar, another project of Robert Hampson I rem? Cool of you to have tributed to MBV as well as hanging out with Pete - I bet it was precious memory!
@@StellasEncounter I meant Sometimes (not Somewhere) in the above comment, and Main is Robert Hampson doing very abstracted guitar/dub ambience. Hanging out with Pete was/is a precious memory.
@@davidtollefson8411 if you meet him again, tell him some rando on TH-cam advised him to write a book!
Emotionally reserved!