The music scene here in Madison, WI isn't that great. It's not awful, either, but there are a few things I could bitch about. One of those things is the hipsters, and how they've tried to hijack the term ‘indie.' They tag it to everything about their identity because it conveniently provides a means to boost their self-perception of being edgy and less mainstream than the average person, all while never bothering to find out what the term actually means.
To these kids, indie more or less means "cool." Most of them wouldn't know indie if Steve Albini (post-Nautilus, obviously) hit them in the face, but that won't stop them from being intolerant of everything without the indie tag. I don't know where this type of mentality trickles down from, but for the sake of moving on I'll go out on a limb, go against the grain, take the high road, etc., and assume it's Pitchfork's fault. Nonetheless, the dominant presence these kids have in things like the WUD music committee and Emmie magazine, two of the most visible and influential music-related operations in town, gives them a huge influence over which artists get press and which artists get paid to perform, meaning they basically decide what music is relevant in the downtown area.
Ironically, the Madison band most resembling the Midwestern indie prototype, The United Sons of Toil, has entirely flown under the hipster-radar. Considering that they actually rock and don't offer any stupid gimmicks or mash-up potential, this probably won't change. The United Sons of Toil probably won't ever receive the distinguished honor of a 7.1 rating from Pitchfork, but anyone who has seen them live will tell you all you need to know.
These guys are something to see. The 'Sons sound like a more aggressive Unwound, giving a sort of mathy post-punk vibe with some hints of chaos thanks to a seemingly heavy influence from the Touch and Go noise-rock movement. Guitarist Russell Hall wields distortion like Neil Young gone post-hardcore, his grating riffs appropriately complemented by the thunderous work of bassist Bill Borowski. The wild distortion exercises of the two are contained by the timely but urgent drumming of Chad Burnett, making for a collective that's both explosive and punctual.
Despite going largely unnoticed, the band's first release, Hope is Not a Strategy, was one of the absolute best albums of 2007. Less than a year from its release, the Sons released their second album, Until Lions Have Their Historians, Tales of the Hunt Shall Always Glorify the Hunter. As you might have guessed at this point, the Sons' lyrical content deals with political themes, usually expressing socialist and anti-imperialist attitudes. According to Hall:
The lyrical theme for [Lions] is the exploitation of indigenous peoples. In particular, half the songs are about native Americans; one song is about the British occupation of Ireland and one song is about Belgian King Leopold's rape of the Congo. For good measure, we threw in a song about the communist manifesto and one about separatist/survivalist/militia types. Like our last record we're still dealing with injustice and hypocrisy with a decidedly leftist slant.
