User:OnBeyondZebrax/sandbox/Post-hardcore

The genre began when bands like Black Flag "began to bore with the formulaic constraints of hardcore, more experimental sounds began to appear in their music".

Saccharine Trust, Naked Raygun, and The Effigies, forerunners to the post-hardcore genre.

During the early to mid-1980s, the desire to experiment with hardcore's basic template expanded to many musicians that had been associated with the genre or had strong roots in it. Outside the United States, the genre would take shape in the works of the Canadian group Nomeansno,

some of these bands have been considered as contributors to the birth of emo,

t younger bands "flowered into post-hardcore after cutting their teeth in high school punk bands". The genre also saw representation outside of the United States in Refused who emerged from the Umeå, Sweden music scene. T

The San Diego scene

The VSS performing in 1997. While formed in Boulder, Colorado, the group has been associated with the post-hardcore sound developed in San Diego and led by independent labels like Gravity.

The early-to-mid 90s would see the birth of several bands in the San Diego, California music scene, some of which would lead a post-hardcore movement associated with the independent label Gravity Records. This movement would eventually became known as the "San Diego sound". Gravity was founded in 1991 by Matt Anderson, member of the band Heroin, as a mean to release the music of his band and of other related San Diego groups, which also included Antioch Arrow and Clikatat Ikatowi. The label's earlier releases are known for the definition of "a new sound in hardcore rooted in tradition but boasting a chaotic sound that showcased a new approach" to the genre. Heroin were known for being innovators of early 90s hardcore and for making dynamic landscapes "out of one minute blasts of noisy vitriol". These bands were influenced by acts like Fugazi and The Nation of Ulysses, while also helping propagate an offshoot of hardcore that "grafted spastic intensity to willfully experimental dissonance and dynamics". This movement has been associated to the development of the sub-genre of screamo, while it also should be noticed that this term has been, as with the case of emo, the subject of controversy. The label also featured releases by non-San Diego bands that included Mohinder (from Cupertino, California), Angel Hair and its subsequent related project The VSS (from Boulder, Colorado), groups that have also been associated with this sound. The VSS was known for their use of synthesizers "vying with post-hardcore's rabid atonality".

Outside of the Gravity roster, another band that played an important role in the development of the "San Diego sound" was Drive Like Jehu. This group, founded by former members of Pitchfork, was known, according to Steve Huey, for their lengthy and multisectioned compositions based on the innovations brought by the releases on Dischord, incorporating elements such as "odd time siglayed an important role on its development in spite of the band's music not resembling the sound such term would later signify. In a similar manner, Swing Kids, composed of former members of hardcore bands from the San Diego scene such as Unbroken, Struggle and Spanakorzo, have been described by journalist Zach Baron as the moment in which the "hardcore" sound of bands like Unbroken effectively became "post-hardcore", known for "covering Joy Division songs" and for its sonic "jazz-quoting" and "guitar feedback" experimentation features. They were also one of the first bands released under the independent label Three One G, founded by the band's vocalist Justin Pearson and later known for releasing the works of several other post-hardcore, noise rock, mathcore and grindcore groups.

Bands like At the Drive-In have acknowledged the influence of the post-hardcore sound coming from the San Diego scene, with vocalist Cedric Bixler-Zavala citing elements such as "screaming vocals with over-the-top emotions, calculated, heavy riffs, [...] offbeat rhythms" and an "incredible amount of energy, chaos and melody" put by these groups as crucial in the development of his band's sound.

Moderate popularity

According to Ian MacKaye, the sudden interest in underground and independent music brought by the success of Nirvana's Nevermind attracted the attention of major labels towards the Dischord imprint and many of its bands. While the label rejected these offers, two Dischord acts, Jawbox and Shudder to Think, would sign deals with major labels. The former's signing to Atlantic Records would alienate some of the band's long-term fanbase, but it would also help with the development and recording of the 1994 release For Your Own Special Sweetheart, considered by Andy Kellman as "one of the best releases to come out of the fertile D.C. scene of the '80s and '90s". The subsequent tour for the album and the MTV rotation of some videos would introduce the band to a handful of new crowds, but ultimately the album would remain "unnoticed outside of the usual indie community".

Likewise, out of the Dischord label, Interscope Records would sign Helmet after a reportedly "ferocious" bidding war between several major record companies, and while MTV would air some videos by the group, which by the time of the release of their major-label debut Meantime, was considered then as "the only band close to the Seattle grunge sound" on the American East Coast and would be hailed as "the next big thing", these expectations would "never be fully realized" in spite of the record's later influence. In another notable case, Hum would sign to RCA in 1994, selling approximately 250,000 copies of their album You'd Prefer an Astronaut fueled by the success of the album's lead single "Stars", and while the band had established by this point a strong underground fanbase, this would prove to be "the pinnacle of Hum's media attention", as its follow-up, 1998's Downward Is Heavenward would sell poorly, resulting in the decision of RCA to drop the band from their roster.

2000s

Silverstein (Shane Told) in concert.

Record producer Ross Robinson, who was credited for popularizing nu metal with bands like Korn, Soulfly and Limp Bizkit in the 1990s, helped post-hardcore achieve popularity during the 2000s. Mehan Jayasuriya of PopMatters suggested that Robinson's sudden focus on post-hardcore was his "pet project" designed to redeem himself of "the 'Nu-Metal' scourge of the late '90s". Robinson recorded At the Drive-In's Relationship of Command (2000), Glassjaw's Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Silence (2000) and Worship and Tribute (2002), and The Blood Brothers' ...Burn, Piano Island, Burn (2003); four albums that are said to "stand as some of the best post-hardcore records produced" during the 2000s. In John Franck's review of Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Silence for Allmusic, he stated: "Featuring extraordinary ambidextrous drummer Sammy Siegler (of Gorilla Biscuits/CIV fame), Glassjaw has paired up with producer/entrepreneur Ross Robinson (a key catalyst in the reinvention of the aggro rock sound) to take you on a pummeling ride that would make Bad Brains and Quicksand proud."

2010s

The beginning of the next decade has seen the emergence of independent post-hardcore bands like The Men, Cloud Nothings and METZ, described as moving closer to the dynamics and aesthetics of earlier acts, whilst diverging deeper into external influences. Reviewers have also noted the incorporation of a diversity of elements like krautrock, post-rock, sludge metal, shoegaze, power pop and no wave in addition to previous hardcore, noise rock and post-punk sensibilities.