“Hey Boston… Do-It-Yourself!”: The Role of Local Bands, Independent Record Labels, and Community Internet Groups in the Boston Music Scene

By Elliot Kerwin | March 18, 2019

Introduction

When we came to college in Boston the term “House Show” came up often. For the uninitiated, a “House Show” is a concert set up by local musicians, for local musicians, all in local music lovers’ homes. For many, a punk show in someone’s loud, sweaty basement may seem like a hellish experience; but for aspiring music professionals, going to a $5 underground show is a dream. The local Boston scene is a community of musicians, a network of like-minded music lovers, and it’s all DIY. Everyone has seen or heard the acronym “DIY” – which stands for “Do It Yourself.” This term often referred to the practice of creating, repairing and/or modifying things without the use of an expert craftsperson, but overtime it was gradually broadened to embrace a range of creative cultural practices, including music (Bennett 2018: 133). With regards to music, DIY involves playing and recording music with whatever means are available to you. But what happens when DIY movements look to tackle some of the largest cultural forces in the country? This blog post focuses on discovering how local bands and labels build their core fanbase and musical roster. Furthermore, does the DIY scene hope to work with – or against – the traditional practices of the industry? To understand all of this we attended local shows, interviewed local artists, and interviewed the leader of a DIY label. Boston is an incredibly interesting and diverse city – its music scene should be no different.

DIY Kick Drum, 3/16/19, Local band Asphalt Nap stores their kick drum in a kitchen, waiting for the show to begin

Topic/Why It Matters

When studied, every music genre can be traced back to its roots. Modern day rock music takes influence from hard-rock bands of the 70s, to the hair metal wave of the 80s, all the way to grunge music from the 90s. Every globe spanning genre has its own community spread across nations. Bands from all around the world play rock music, and blogs and record labels everywhere thrive off their success. But these communities didn’t proliferate overnight – they started from an innovative core base that molded and blended genres and styles over time to create what we know today. This idea of initial formation and generation is incredibly informative and interesting.

Take grunge music for example. While the music and style of grunge is often very conflicted and debated, its origins are not. Grunge music is, and forever will be, distinctly a staple and production of Seattle. Pioneers of grunge music such as Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and – the biggest of them all – Nirvana — were all bred out of the Seattle scene. The band Green River was never commercially successful. But, they are famous in that they are known to have started the trend of grunge music in Seattle while inspiring countless other bands to take the reins.

These bands together revolutionized rock music, and it wasn’t just a coincidence that they were all from the same city. In the same way, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, and Jeff Beck – three of rock’s biggest guitars players – didn’t just all happen to be have been in different iterations of the same London rock band The Yardbirds. The distinct music scenes all these musicians were in fostered and stimulated their innovative and creative spirits to propel them into breaking down the barriers of the established industry and create their own unique styles.

With all this, it is clear that the term “Music Scene” doesn’t just refer to the prevalence of music in a particular city. It can describe whole communities with characteristic styles and practices that are inexorably linked to that founding city; and a study of such a scene is more than just a study of what bands are popular and which venues are the trendiest. Instead, it’s a study of how these bands think about music, and how they choose to share it and communicate with the other members of the city – how a city can breed a community.

Research Methods

One of the most important aspects of any music scene, is the openness of the community. A DIY scene may seem like a tight-knit, closeted community; but they have good reason to be. Many of their shows are performed in houses – not venues. These kinds of things can’t be publicized, not only for legal reasons but simply because people live there. Music, photos, and reviews can all be spread and made available but finding a show can actually seem a daunting task at first. However, the Boston scene is very open and welcoming to newcomers. Shows are shared on Facebook through band pages or in public groups, and a simply online message can grant access to an address.

Our research methods included attending shows and getting a sense for the scene by talking and interacting with local community members. We attended multiple shows in basements, as well as many community event locations like Outpost 186 or The Democracy Center. These later venues are ones that actually have publicized addresses, and are rented out by DIY members looking to put on a show that don’t have a space easily available. This interaction foreshadows some of the engagement the DIY scene is bridging with the non-independent world. Attending shows for bands like The Water Cycle, The Jeb Bush Orchestra, and Butch Baby, we got a very diverse dose of musical style and audience attitude. A lot can be gleaned from simply being a part of audience for a show. The lyrics and music can shed light on how the bands think about music, and the actions and interactions of the other members can describe how the average person participates in a DIY music scene. Furthermore, we interviewed Ben Deruso, the creator of the local DIY record label and production company Citizens’ Loft. Ben has been in Boston and apart of the DIY scene since 2013 and has experienced the many different waves of culture through the scene. He also has run his own venue so we learned a lot about how those operations work, from things like equipment to general door and security. To be able to sit down and obtain a DIY member’s personal history of a music scene is incredibly useful, and to be able to compare our ideas with those of an experienced member can not only confirm certain concepts but bring to light completely new ones as well.

DIY Mixer, 3/16/19, Nearly defective mixer used by bands

Zac and Gabe, 3/16/19, Authors Zac and Gabe at the Democracy Center, a local DIY space

DIY Stage, 3/16/19, Instruments and cables strewn across a local venues floor

Findings

One of the first things we discovered upon thoughtful analysis of the Boston DIY scene is the variety of musical styles represented. As stated before the music most associated with DIY culture – and probably the first to ever begin to organize DIY communities – is punk rock. Boston has a long and rich history of punk rock and it is clear that this is still the most common form of music within the scene. However, there is also a very visible movement of lofi indie music, post punk, psychedelic/funk, along with more extreme forms of grindcore and noise music. When conducting our fieldwork, we attended shows for local hard-rock bands like Squitch and Butch Baby, and then the next week saw indie-pop rockers The Water Cycle, only to go to a funk house show the next weekend. While most of these genres and bands fall under the broad category of “rock” music it is a diverse enough collection that many of these genres sound nothing alike, even though they may appear on the same bill. I think a big reason for this diversity is the infrastructure provided by the DIY music community. Any major city will host a variety of artists making obscure underground genres of music but rarely do they have a way to connect with one another or with their listeners outside of the typical music venues which may not be so friendly to them. A DIY community provides an environment where all sorts of creative individuals can come together and have a cheap and accessible vessel with which to share their music. I think the new trend of lo-fi bedroom pop music is clearly something that was born from punk and post-punk as a whole and it is thanks to DIY communities like the one in Boston that these seemingly obscure forms of music, like grunge and lofi, can suddenly become worldwide trends.

Another distinguishing feature of the scene was the liberal attitude and openness to diversity of the DIY community. It is generally expected that artists and musicians tend to be more progressive and sometimes anti-establishment. But similar to the effect on different genres of music I think the DIY community creates a space where people are more comfortable with sharing potentially radical ideas that may be generally avoided in the “outside” world. Sometimes these ideologies and beliefs come to define the music spaces or events. The aforementioned Democracy Center is used for shows but is actually a “21st century meetinghouse” that seeks to provide an independent non-commercial community space. And one of the house shows that we attended was a “festival” for trans and queer artists called Sheer Queer Fest. Along with this identity of LGBT activism, many of the bands were involved with communist/anarchist and anti-imperialist identities. It is hard to think of any place outside of a DIY show where you could find a harsh noise set dedicated to anti-imperialism. This community provides a bastion for new ideas to be heard and shared. It is also interesting to not that most of the people in attendance were just looking for any shows to attend and have fun at and could be inadvertently exposed to new thoughts and ideas along with new genres and artists. Again, it may not be a coincidence that very progressive ideas are going mainstream thanks to DIY communities providing a safe environment for these ideas to flourish and be directed to a general public. Of course we don’t want to generalize a community but from observing for only two months it is clear that this community has attracted or nurtured a group of people who share beliefs much more progressive than the average citizen of Boston and maybe even average college student. And it is clear from looking at names of venues like the Democracy Center that this state of mind has a part in directly shaping the community.

Furthermore, the DIY scene is host to a slew of independent organizations. This strictly independent standard is common in the DIY scene. With organizations like the record label Citizens’ Loft, the events organization Artificial Contact, and the independent music blog Allston Pudding, there is a rich prevalence of DIY organizations committed to creating and proliferating independent music. These were all organizations started by members of the DIY scene and have grown to be staples of the Boston underground industry. Furthermore, this industry acts quite differently than the established music industry. When talking to Ben Deruso – the creator of the local record label Citizen’s Loft – on how he signs talent he said, “They’re not looking at you like you’re going to take advantage of them, you’re not looking at them like they’re going to take advantage of you (Personal Interview, 23 February 2019).” This emphasizes the overall communal nature of the DIY scene and those involved. Artists don’t send demos to local labels looking for some kind of deal, friends work with other friends to help each other share music. Allston Pudding, a website that reviews local music, doesn’t write fluff pieces paid for by bands, they review independent music that they just happen to like. When talking to members of the scene they describe a very present dichotomy between the established an underground scene, but with an optimistic view that it will eventually work together. It already has in some sense, many local DIY bands like Sidney Gish and Vundabar have started cultivating mainstream success and they all started in the local DIY scene.

Another interesting wrinkle in this scene that we discovered was the popularity and usage of the internet. For a scene that seems very secretive, they actually rely heavily on online websites and resources to publicize their brands. Local bands need to know where and how to reach audiences, and how to best showcase a specific message to bolster fans (Borg 2014). Boston is unique with its vast amount of students, and therefore targeting the appropriate physical areas and – almost more importantly – digital areas can be the difference maker in drawing crowds. Speaking again on Ben and the rest of Citizens’ Loft, they have devised a suitable marketing scheme. With an online presence on all the social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter; and on music streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music, and Bandcamp, the Loft is ever prevalent in their target audiences’ online news feeds. When new shows are created they are announced on all social media pages – as well as the bands’ pages – and a Facebook Event is created. This allows fans to track the event easily, seeing who of their friends are interested or going, and how many days until the event. What seems likes a simple and obvious practice, these Facebook events prove to actually be incredibly useful.

The internet is not only used to market shows but it also used but it also allows organizations and bands to share content and videos associated with their brand. In regards to online marketing, videos of live performances serve as a conduit to fan communities, bolstering and proliferating specific messages and the overall brand (Lingel 2012). On YouTube, there are hours of videos dedicated to bands, posted not just by the bands themselves but fans as well. These live performances prove to not only give fans a chance to see what the show was like if they couldn’t make it, but also allows fans who did see the show the ability to relive it the following day. This sense of being present in both the physical and digital domain prove to make the house shows more memorable and helps artists resonate more with fans.

Interview with Ben Deruso

Audio snippet from our interview with Ben Deruso, the creator of the local DIY record label and production company Citizens’ Loft. Ben has been in Boston and apart of the DIY scene since 2013 and has experienced the many different waves of culture through the scene. He also has run his own venue and helped others in the community create a similar space in their homes.

In this snippet, Ben speaks on how his DIY record label interacts with artists and other members of the local DIY scene. The difference in how he operates a label – opposed to how some major labels operate – is quite fascinating. This emphasizes the overall communal nature of the DIY scene and those involved. Here, he talks about how – when booking his first show at his own venue – he met the local band Raavi & the Houseplants, and how this relationship developed into what is now.

Conclusion

DIY music communities are filled with opportunities for people to share music and ideas, for artists to gain a larger following, and for obscure genres to have a comfortable home. History shows that many of the most exciting and important mainstream genres of music were born from DIY musical communities. For all of these reasons we felt it necessary to enter the Boston music scene and see what makes it unique and important. Boston is known for its thriving underground music scene and coming to understand how the scene works while also documenting some of the events taking place is important to understanding Boston as a whole. The DIY community in Boston is a perfect environment for new artists and important to the development of art in this city. Here musicians of many different genres can find a place to diffuse their music to a general audience that may otherwise not have found their work. Audience members can learn about and experience firsthand new and strange artists and genres and maybe even become inspired to join the music scene themselves. In addition to our initial findings we could theoretically continue our research and involvement into this community in a number of ways. Anyone could continue to look into the community and see what new trends have emerged and what type of growth has occurred in the scene. If the community becomes more open and the conditions are right for it to grow it could be the source of new popular genres of music in the region. Perhaps the next big music act will blossom from this DIY community. The community could also shrink and become more isolated and it would be interested to see what conditions in the city would be responsible for this and how other cities could try to support their own musical communities.

In the future we could also theoretically help out in a number of ways. The biggest complaint that we heard was about infrastructure. There is a lot of equipment needed to put on professional sounding shows and people with limited resources can find it difficult to acquire and transport this equipment. Donating equipment would probably be a huge help to most house venues or to people looking to begin putting on their own shows. A bigger obstacle is the legal limitations of house shows. As they become more popular venues run a higher risk of being shutdown, this is a huge limitation on the growth and accessibility of the scene. Providing art spaces like the Democracy center and Outpost 186 would again be a huge help to people putting on their own shows or looking to begin doing this. This is all hypothetical and I don’t know how this would all be organized, but I think it is in the interest of the city of Boston to promote art and creative growth among its citizens.

Video

Jeb Bush Orchestra, 3/16/19, Local funk band Jeb Bush Orchestra performs at the Democracy Center, a DIY space in Cambridge, MA.

Endnotes

Links:

  1. Grow, Kory. “Green River and the Birth of Seattle Grunge: The Oral History.” RollingStone.com. February 01, 2019. Accessed April 01, 2019. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/green-river-seattle-grunge-oral-history-pearl-jam-mudhoney-783878/.
  2. Peck, Gabrielle. “Boston DIY Community.” Boston DIY Community Public Group. Accessed April 01, 2019. https://www.facebook.com/groups/1338298636199955/.
  3. Blum, Sam. “Boston Calling: The City at the Heart of America’s DIY Renaissance.” The Guardian. January 03, 2015. Accessed January 24, 2019. https://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jan/03/boston-calling-american-bands-diy-renaissance.
  4. Dunn, Kevin. “One Punk’s Guide to Starting Your Own DIY Record Label.” Razorcake. January 29, 2018. Accessed January 24, 2019. http://razorcake.org/one-punks-guide-starting-diy-record-label-kevin-dunn/.
  5. Varriale, Christine. AllstonPudding.com. Accessed April 01, 2019. http://allstonpudding.com/.

 

Interview:

  1. Deruso, Ben. “Ben Deruso Interview.” Interview by Elliot Kerwin and Gabriel Pino.

 

Scholarly Sources:

  1. Borg, Bobby. Music Marketing for the DIY Musician : Creating and Executing a Plan of Attack on a Low Budget. MusicPro Guides. 2014.
  2. Lingel, Jessa, and Mor Naaman. “You Should Have Been There, Man: Live Music, DIY Content and Online Communities.” New Media & Society 14, no. 2 (2012): 332-49.
  3. Bennett, Andy. “Youth, Music and DIY Careers.” Cultural Sociology 12, no. 2 (2018): 133-39.

 

Acknowledgments

Thank you to Ben Deruso for giving us an important insight to the scene and its history, thanks to the Democracy center for letting us conduct research in their space, and big thanks to all the other venues, people, bands, and organizations that helped us make this project happen!
Posted in Spring 2019