Let’s take a one day break from the minority conservative series to give a round of applause to “independent” music and film for making its way into the mainstream. Those of us who appreciated indie before Modest Mouse was crooning for Nissan or even before Common was rapping for Sprite (and that was all of us right?) aren’t sure how to react to the success of our old best friend, Uncle Indie.

No one is more upset about it than the website partly responsible for it. Here’s what Pitchfork Review has to say:

With Modest Mouse, Franz Ferdinand, Garden State, and “The O.C.” opening doors for small bands to earn some mainstream respect, 2004 is being considered by some publications to be the year that “indie” ceased to be shorthand for “independent”

It’s more than just music though. 2004 was the year of Indie Film as well. Today’s entire Calendar section of the Los Angeles Times is dedicated to last year’s huge success of indie film.

My sister was talking to me about this same subject last night. Here’s her dilemma. Last year she and her group of friends were the first ones in the school to become “indie.” You know, the Converses, the denim and corduroy jackets, the double espressos, and the Kerouac. We’ve all been there and we all pretended we were first.

So they were the outsiders and she liked it that way. But then indie became cool in the same way that grunge did back in the 90’s and all of a sudden her and her group of friends are in the popularity spotlight. Some of these friends are enjoying this popularity quite a lot and my sister wants the group to keep its outsider status. To actually be “independent.”

But isn’t that like us all. We’re reluctant to say Sideways is a good movie because everyone’s saying it’s a good movie. And yeah “Modest Mouse used to be OK” even though really, their newest album is by far their best.

We were the ones always complaining about radio and our local movie theater because we said there was nothing any good on. And now the radio is full of our songs and the theater has all our movies. What do we do? We pout.

Or maybe not. The Pitchfork passage goes on:

; just as likely, it could be the year that “pop” ceases to be derided as merely short for “popular,” as it saw MP3 blogs and other internet outlets paving new, industry-free avenues for should-be worldwide hits from artists such as M.I.A., Rachel Stevens, The Knife, Fox n’Wolf, Ce’Cile, Scissor Sisters, U.S.E., Slim Thug, PAS/CAL, Lady Sovereign, Love Is All, Johnny Boy, and Girls Aloud, among others.

And that’s so true. I still haven’t gotten around to posting about my time at the Internet and Society Conference in Boston, but one of the most interesting conversations I had there was with the folks behind Downhill Battle. They have got some fantastic ideas to revolutionize how music is produced, distributed, and consumed. They put the musician in touch with the listener. And I think this is really the future of music. Musicians need to stop fighting to get in touch with big record labels and throwing around names and need to start working their asses off to build an audience, respect them, and keep in touch with them. The money will follow, but they will need to work for it.

Check out this software Downhill Battle is producing for free.

Check out GarageBand.com where a lot of musicians are starting to get noticed by offering up non-RIAA music. (and please please, get rid of that god damn audio on the index page GarageBand)

Check out Steve Holden’s weblog where local musician Billy Watson ok’d his music to be played on Steve’s podcast. Next time I’m at Lou’s, I’m gonna pick up Watson’s CD - the first album I’ll have paid money for in more than a year.

I don’t know if Moreno has received any paypal donations for his mp3’s, but I do know he could certainly do more to publicize Via Violenta on the web. For now, Cindy is helping out. Look who she was listening to while writing her post on Monday.

Speaking of which, I have always been el oso celoso of Cindy’s “Escuchando” space where she writes in what she’s listening to while she posts. So, using WordPress’ custom fields, I’m going to do the same thing on ours.

Also, make sure to check out Revaz’s Recommended list for 2004. My sister likes Revaz because Revaz likes Death Cab for Cutie. In fact, you should check out everything Revaz has been writing. I’ve come short on my promise to help him get his blog going, but he’s more than taking care of the content.

Last thing: I can’t get enough of Flickr and paid the $40 something dollars for a pro account - the first software I’ve paid for in a long long time. So I’ll be adding a lot of new pictures each day and sorting them into albums in the gallery. You can see other changes I’ve made to the blog on the Change Log and see other things I want to do, but haven’t gotten around to yet. If you have any ideas or see any bugs, please let me know.

Listening to: Sur O No Sur by Kevin Johansen