Maybe you caught a few exhilarating seconds of “Teen Age Riot” on a nearby college radio station while scanning the FM dial in your parents’ car. Maybe your friend invited you to a shabby local rock club and you ended up having a religious experience with Neutral Milk Hotel. Perhaps you were scandalized and tantalized upon sneaking Liz Phair’s Exile in Guyville from an older sibling’s CD collection, or you vowed to download every Radiohead song you could find on LimeWire because they were the favorite band of the guy you had a major crush on.
However you found your way into indie rock, once you were a listener, it felt like being part of a secret club of people who had discovered something special, something secret, something superior. Music journalist Chris DeVille brilliantly captures this cultural moment, from the early aughts and the height of indie rock, until the 2010s as streaming upends the industry and changes music forever. DeVille covers the gamut of bands—like Arcade Fire, TV On The Radio, LCD Soundsystem, Haim, Pavement, and Bon Iver—and in the vein of Chuck Klosterman’s The Nineties, touches on staggering pop culture moments, like finding your new favorite band on MySpace and the life-changing O.C. soundtrack.
Such Great Heights: The Complete Cultural History of the Indie Rock Explosion will be published on August 26, 2025. St. Martin's Press provided an early galley for review.
This is not a period of music (late 90's/early 2000's) that I was as familiar nor a genre that was in my radius. So, I looked forward to learning from the author. I did appreciate that each chapter of DeVille's book starts with a soundtrack/playlist of tunes to supplement the readings. That is a very nice touch that goes a long way for this big music fan.
DeVille does a good job covering the evolution of the indie scene over a two decade period, showing how it went from underground to mainstream and how it influenced other genres of music as well.
The chapter on of the intersection of indie music and Hollywood (via TV shows and films) was certainly something I could relate to. Over the decades, I myself have found a lot of songs and bands I like through those mediums. It was interesting to read the response of some of the bands to this newfound fame from those avenues. I also enjoyed the chapter on the influence of technology in this sphere, being at times an ally and at times an enemy to the artists.
Recommended for music fans both familiar with this era and those wanting to expand their knowledge of it.
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