shoegaze

The tradition & historical record

Shoegaze (originally shoegazing and also known as dream rock) is a subgenre of indie and alternative rock characterised by ethereal soundscapes, obscured vocals, and extensive use of guitar effects and distortion. Rooted in Phil Spector's Wall of Sound, the Velvet Underground, and psychedelic pop of the 1960s, the genre originated in the late 1980s and early 1990s mainly among British acts who based their sound on groups such as Cocteau Twins, the Jesus and Mary Chain, and My Bloody Valentine. "Shoegazing" was coined in 1991 by music executive Andy Ross when describing Moose and first used by the British music press as a pejorative for bands with a motionless stage presence and guitarists who directed their look down towards their effects pedals. It was sometimes used interchangeably with "dream pop". The original scene developed after the introduction of Kevin Shields' glide guitar technique on My Bloody Valentine's 1988 records You Made Me Realise and Isn't Anything. Concentrated in London and the greater Thames Valley region, its core acts included Ride, Swervedriver, Slowdive, Chapterhouse, Lush, and Moose; they often attended each other's concerts, shared producers and labels (Creation and 4AD), and adopted similarly abstract approaches to album artwork. ¹

The term shoegaze—originally shoegazing—was coined by Andy Ross, who was a part-time Sounds contributor and head of Food Records, the label that promoted Blur. On March 15, 1991, Ross attended Lush's concert at the Venue in New Cross with his then assistant Polly Birkbeck, where Blur and Moose also performed as support. According to Birkbeck, Ross jokingly referred to Moose as "shoegazers" after noticing vocalist Russell Yates continuously looking down at his shoes during the set; guitarist Kevin McKillop later explained that Yates was actually reading lyric sheets placed on the floor as he couldn't remember them. According to writer Ryan Pinkard, an erroneous story claimed that Ross introduced the word "shoegazing" in a live review of the concert published in Sounds. Polly Birkbeck and Nathaniel Cramp (founder of Sonic Cathedral), whom Pinkard interviewed for his book on shoegaze, confirmed that no such review existed in issues of Sounds from that period. The earliest confirmed print use of the term appeared in the May 25, 1991, edition of NME, where Steve Lamacq, announcing Slowdive's third EP, Holding Our Breath, referred to the band as "shoe-gazers". This use predated Ross's recollection in his 2016 HuffPost article, in which he stated that he pitched "shoegazing" to Lamacq and fellow NME writer Simon Williams over lunch on October 9, 1991, after Sounds was shut down and he no longer had a publication in which he could promote his "groundbreaking genre". According to Pinkard, the appearance of the term in print several months earlier than Ross's conversation with Lamacq and Williams suggested a problem with Ross's timeline, with the most likely explanation being that he "got the dates wrong". ¹

Shoegaze combines ethereal, swirling vocals with layers of distorted, bent, or flanged guitars to create a wash of sound where no instrument is distinguishable from the others. To achieve this, shoegaze musicians often employ a wide range of effects pedals, including reverb, delay, chorus, tremolo, and distortion. According to Pitchfork, shoegaze is "above all else" a space for exploring the outer edges of guitar texture, and emotionally it turns inward—it's "music for dreaming". Although shoegaze has at times been used interchangeably with dream pop, the two are distinct. Galaxie 500 founder Dean Wareham explained the difference, noting that "shoegaze bands are more of an assault, a wall of sound", while dream pop allows "more room for melody and counter-melody, whether on vocals, keyboards, or guitars." ¹

According to Victor Provis the visual style of shoegaze album covers and music videos reflected its music. He wrote that the genre developed "an artistic code based on close-ups of objects, to the point of losing their definition and becoming nothing more than coloured, amorphous blotches"; it also often incorporated "fusions of images, projections, colour filters, and swirling cameras". Meanwhile, Rolling Stone Australia, when placing Loveless in its "100 Best Album Covers of All Times" list, noted that abstraction was a common visual aesthetic for turn-of-the-1990s shoegaze bands, including My Bloody Valentine, Ride, Slowdive, and Swervedriver. Slowdive's member Simon Scott considered that "Robert Smith, when he was in Siouxsie and the Banshees playing guitar [on the 1983's Nocturne live video], was the coolest as he just stood there and let the music flood out", which was like anti showmanship. ¹

Shoegaze traces its roots to Phil Spector's Wall of Sound technique, along with the psychedelic pop pioneered in the 1960s by bands such as the Byrds, the Beach Boys, and the Beatles. Songs such as "Tomorrow Never Knows" (1966) by the Beatles and "All I Wanna Do" (1970) by the Beach Boys have been retrospectively viewed as early predecessors of the genre. Other influences include the Velvet Underground, the Stooges, MC5, and the garage rock compilation albums Nuggets and Pebbles. Additionally, writer Vernon Joynson cites David Bowie's song "'Heroes'" (1977) written by Bowie and Brian Eno, as showcasing "the type of noisy production with distorted and reverberated guitars and a dreamy hazy atmosphere all of which became key ingredients of shoegaze". Siouxsie and the Banshees and the Cure are equally formative influences. ¹

As a music genre, shoegaze developed in the 1980s, when a group of Scottish and Irish bands such as Cocteau Twins, the Jesus and Mary Chain, and—most notably—My Bloody Valentine reimagined the sound of the electric guitar, combining contrasting sonic textures with dreamy vocals that challenged the idea of the singer as the central figure of the band. Emerging from the UK alternative scene with their 1982 debut album, Garlands, on 4AD, the Scottish trio Cocteau Twins had a substantial influence on the development of shoegaze. Their music featured ethereal, atmospheric guitar textures crafted by guitarist and producer Robin Guthrie, alongside Elizabeth Fraser's distinctive, often unintelligible vocals, which were mixed low in the recordings. Another Scottish group, the Jesus and Mary Chain, is credited as the immediate forerunner of shoegaze. Blending conventional pop with noise and guitar feedback, their 1985 debut album, Psychocandy, exerted a major influence on the subsequent shoegaze bands, including My Bloody Valentine, with Creation Records founder Alan McGee noting that the latter "changed their style because of The Jesus and Mary Chain." Parallel to this, groups such as Spacemen 3 and Loop revived elements of 1960s space rock in their first albums (Sound of Confusion, 1986; Heaven's End, 1987), exploring minimalist, droning psychedelia over conventional pop structures. ¹

The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Shoegaze”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. ¹

shoegaze is indie/alternative rock subgenre characterized by an ethereal mixture of obscured vocals, guitar distortion and effects, feedback, and overwhelming volume, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. ²

The source record links this tradition to 17 external registers, which can be verified through the citation. ²