ode to the hipster impulse

09 Jun, 2025

Several years ago, when I was still on Facebook (ugh, I know, right?), I had a friend who was posting that she was intending to watch Star Wars for the first time ever.¹ She was curious about what order to watch the movies in, since, you know, famously episodes 1-3 came out after episodes 4-6. I brought up as a possibility the Machete Order, in which, for reasons of structure and preservation of major plot revelations (to wit: the audience learns that Darth Vader is Luke's father at the same time Luke does), the episodes are watched in the order 4, 5, 2, 3, 6. (You can slip 1 in before 2 but it's kind of irrelevant to the story.) I had recently watched through the films in that order (out of curiosity; I grew up on Star Wars) and found it pretty solid, and, like, it's interesting. Anyway, some other person commented something like "ignore that hipster, just watch them in episode order²"; my natural response, before ditching the thread, was "hey, 2008 called, it wants its word for 'person with better taste than me' back."

He was not, of course, using the word "hipster" strictly accurately. It started its life³ as a term from within the self-same indie subculture that it went on to deride, a word used to call out those who were perceived as being inauthentic. Indie being a subculture about finding the independent, the obscure, the underground, it attracted those who sought to become cool by adopting the trappings of obscurity: "Oh, you probably haven't heard of them." "I liked them before they were cool." You know, people who aren't actually here because they think they have discovered something cool and unique and interesting, who aren't here for the love of the independent human spirit, the people who are just here for clout. These people were called hipsters. (This is why, famously, no one would ever self-identify as a hipster. It'd be like saying you're a member of the poser subculture.) As indie went mainstream, so, too, did hipster backlash. But as with any word that started within a subculture and achieved mainstream success, the word "hipster" lost its meaning, and became a word used to mark as undesirable someone who liked things that deviated from the norm.

The mainstream hipster backlash has largely died down, largely because the indie rock fad has itself died down, but there remains, I think, this lingering sense that a love of the obscure, the unknown, the less popular, is still somehow shameful or undesirable, a minor foible but still not something to be proud of. Why would you listen to this indie band no one has ever heard of when you could instead be listening to, I don't know, Taylor Swift or whoever? Why watch independent cinema when there's an AMC just down the street?

After I wrote my list of recommendations for the most recent Bandcamp Friday, I of course immediately discovered a small handful of bands that I had either forgotten to include (which, I promise you, is not a slight on these bands! my brain is just very bad!) or had not previously realized were on Bandcamp, so I began preparing to write the next one. At the time I didn't have enough to feel that it merited another post, so I set about looking for new music.

When I first moved to Seattle, I had no trouble finding new music more or less passively, because all I needed to do was show up for the opening act of, say, a Harvey Danger show and I'd find a new band to check out. And I could do what I always liked doing and explore the bands and artists that the bands and artists I liked had collaborated with or toured with or talked about, and failing that there was always just getting recommendations from friends who were also big into indie music. And that was enough to tide me over for several years when I moved to Boston and stopped going to shows as often, and when I was back in Seattle there was a new rotation of artists I could rely upon to provide an interesting time and new music. I didn't need to try. And I didn't need to care about how popular they were--as I told a friend a few years back, I didn't realize Death Cab for Cutie was, like, a big band when I first discovered them⁴ because I mainly just thought the name was fun and I saw that Sean Nelson of Harvey Danger had apparently provided backing vocals on one of their albums. That was enough.

Anyway, then the pandemic rolled around, and live shows slowed down, and none of the artists I was following were playing locally, and for a while I wasn't really getting that passive influx of new cool bands that I was used to. So I've decided to start looking more actively. It has, of course, largely been based on vibes: skimming articles in the local alt weekly to see if anything appeals, exploring the "you may also like" sections on Bandcamp or letting the Youtube algorithm feed me a music video. It goes like this: pick a band that seems promising, google them to make sure they actually have a Bandcamp (this is, ostensibly, the point), and if they have a Wikipedia article, try to make sure they aren't someone everyone has already heard of.⁵⁶ So far I have had enough success that I may already have material for a third post, if I don't want the second one to go on too long.

I can imagine there being some pushback to the whole "make sure they aren't too popular" thing, not least because I had to sit and ask myself if that was a fair thing to do, and it was that sitting and thinking that made me want to write this in the first place. I do not, obviously, have an objection to popular music. I went to Death Cab for Cutie's 20th anniversary tour for Transatlanticism at the Key Arena or whatever the fuck they're calling it these days. I strive, at karaoke, to sing songs that people have probably heard before. But I don't feel like I'm gaining anything by seeking out the things everybody already knows about.

And I think there is value in the obscure. There are bands I'm going to be talking about on my next Bandcamp Friday recommendations post that I would be genuinely shocked if you have listened to before. They are bands that I have carried with me over the years, whose songs I have found myself singing to myself as I wander the city, whose words and turns of phrase have burrowed into my brain and refused to let go, and while I know I'm not the only person to have ever listened to them, I'm definitely one of a very small number. Engaging with art that is rare, is at risk of being forgotten, helps keep it alive.

But beyond that. There are bands I can't listen to without thinking of the people who recommended them to me--that personal connection, that deepening bond with a person, is only possible if you don't already know the music they're introducing you to. Sharing art that has meant something to me with other people is an inexpressible joy. Discovering something new, discovering artists whose works I feel driven to explore in depth and learn all of their secrets, that is the best feeling in the world. And you just can't get that from just buying off the best sellers pile or letting the Spotify algorithm decide what to feed you. It happens when you make a deliberate choice to get out there and explore.

I'm talking about music here but this, of course, applies to all forms of art. Sometimes when you take a chance with something that looked cool, that had a neat sounding title, that you have otherwise never heard anything about, or that you've only ever heard one friend talking about, you find a real treasure. There is so much joy and wonder to be found in exploring works that are lesser known.

So next time you find yourself making that self-deprecating comment about how you are drawn to the road less traveled, indulging that hipster impulse, knock that shit out. You are doing something beautiful.

#essay