A lot of people think that Indie is some kind of music genre for bands that make some kind of alternative popular rock music with a special twist. But actually indie is the shorting for independent which is created in the 80s. It is especially independence from multinationals and focuses around small decentralized production and distribution.
In the 80s there were three big multinationals, also called The Big Three; Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group. These companies were big factors in the music industry. The independence could be in production, but they had the opportunity to dependent distribution, so they would have a bigger audience. This is a sort of grey area and created big movements in the statics about music distribution and production. Indie would have a revenue of 15 till 30% of the total. A label also could have some advantages for starting musicians as the access to facilities as managers, expensive technology and distribution. So why would they stay independent?
Independent musicians were mostly independent for ideological reasons like freedom and most specifically financial freedom; after your success you are able to handle your own earnings instead of handing it over to the label. Being independent has everything to do with technology; because it is expensive it is harder to create your own music, but with the democratizing of the internet and the price reduction of technological stuff it became easier to be independent. But after all the biggest financial support is still with the big labels, because they have capital, finance and marketing.
For example; Youtube has created a big platform since 2005 for independent musicians to put their own created content online and distribute it themselves. The most famous example probably would be OK GO; with the Do It Yourself aesthetics.
Hip-hop is also a great example of a do it yourself aesthetic, because of the use of samples that you can put together in your own bedroom; you do not need a recording studio anymore to make music.
Eventually Indie became a ‘genre’ because of a cassette with a bundle of artists of independent labels; C68 by New Music Express (magazine) and Rough Trade Records. With this record in 1968 the independent movement shifted to the middle class, white boys, guitar genre; sweeter than the punk with a strong standardization of sound of instrumentation.
Yours Sincerely @inMusicalTerms
P.s.: Check out my last article about a new controversial rap https://steemit.com/music/@inmusicalterms/check-it-out-controversial-rap-whiteboy