What does emo mean to you?

[HellforgedX]

Originally Posted by KontanKarite

Fair enough, but it's kind of... actually, you know what... goth and emo look really fucking similar. Fuck it.

WhaaaAAA...?!? How DARE you make such a comparison! I mean, c'mon, Kontan, clearly there's a difference! For one thing, most goths dress in black or dark clothes, and emos dress... in... uh, dark clothes...
THAT'S not my POINT! Emo music is made by bands that wear a bunch of dark makeup and most goth bands... do the same thing...?
Wait, never mind. How 'bout them Dodgers?

[Joker_in_the_Pack]

Originally Posted by xxDemonSlayerxx

So I've noticed that there are a lot of questions on this site so I have come up with one that hopefully no one esle has come up with yet!!!
Like the title says what does emo mean to you? (hopefully this doesn't seem insluting)

This isn't a, "mean to you" issue. Emo has a definition, it's not subjective. There's Emo music and Emo fashion. Stop trying to make it seem like it's an actual debatable issue.

[Jonathan]

Originally Posted by Joker_in_the_Pack

This isn't a, "mean to you" issue. Emo has a definition, it's not subjective. There's Emo music and Emo fashion. Stop trying to make it seem like it's an actual debatable issue.

I'm not challenging you here, but the last time I tried to look up the definition, I found "emotional hardcore" - most of the music considered emo doesn't really fit either term. Water it down a bit and you get "emotional".

With the exception of advertising jingles, what music isn't emotional? Isn't that kind of the point of all music? To feel and express things?

[dark luna]

In the UK emo dress sense seems to be different from the goth more of a mixture cybergoth+indie british bands..using a lot of vibrant colours in their clothing and trainers..with the black on the hair and make-up..with the black skinny jeans being favorite...its more of showoff,trying that everyone and anyone to notice..just to be the same as the other emo crossing the road...
As for emotion..this is what it makes us human emo or not emo..
Is a emo without their clothes still emo,without straight black hair...without having website telling how to be emo...or without having the bands that MTV feeds to pretend to be the "voice new generation"

Every generation wants be remembered with different fashion,music and even drugs..as for goth and emo for me they are different...to answer to question emo for me are just teenagers who think they found something new to express themselves only for the rest of us to know they are actually copying something thats already here and the emotion/self-harm/ adapt to their "culture" as its something new,Oh,well teenagers arent teenagers for long so MTV hurry up to find others to replace avril/fall out/chemical...fast time is ticking..tick ..tack

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by dark luna

Every generation wants be remembered with different fashion,music and even drugs..as for goth and emo for me they are different...to answer to question emo for me are just teenagers who think they found something new to express themselves only for the rest of us to know they are actually copying something thats already here and the emotion/self-harm/ adapt to their "culture" as its something new,Oh,well teenagers arent teenagers for long so MTV hurry up to find others to replace avril/fall out/chemical...fast time is ticking..tick ..tack

Emo's not really new. And Avril's not emo.

[Jonathan]

Originally Posted by dark luna

As for emotion..this is what it makes us human emo or not emo..
Is a emo without their clothes still emo,without straight black hair...without having website telling how to be emo...or without having the bands that MTV feeds to pretend to be the "voice new generation"

I used a similar argument in another thread, about "What Is Goth". The idea was it was basically just the music and the fashion, which I did not agree with.

I still look at "emo" as a manufactured genre, that has more to do with branding and merchandising.

I can understand a gothic, hippy, punk, and so on outlook on life. What is an "emo" outlook? It's already been done, trying to differentiate it as something special and set apart seems like more of a marketing effort than a social phenomenon.

Just my worthless opinion.

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by Jonathan

I can understand a gothic, hippy, punk, and so on outlook on life. What is an "emo" outlook?

For the kiddies, it's angst and hopelessness. The problem there being that even a person in a completely perfect (or very close) situation can force themselves to be emo. If emo had never become 'cool', it might have kept atleast a little credbility as a sub-culture. It's like if everybody started declaring themselves 'nerds'. What defines a 'nerd' gets *****. Suddenly, you'd have 'nerds' giving other kids wedgies and shoving them in lockers, and the 'nerds' who weren't busy with that would be exaggerated stereotypes who only buy 'nerd' clothes and only do 'nerd' things.

[Jonathan]

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

For the kiddies, it's angst and hopelessness. The problem there being that even a person in a completely perfect (or very close) situation can force themselves to be emo. If emo had never become 'cool', it might have kept atleast a little credbility as a sub-culture. It's like if everybody started declaring themselves 'nerds'. What defines a 'nerd' gets *****. Suddenly, you'd have 'nerds' giving other kids wedgies and shoving them in lockers, and the 'nerds' who weren't busy with that would be exaggerated stereotypes who only buy 'nerd' clothes and only do 'nerd' things.

So emo is nihilism/anomie with a bad haircut?

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by Jonathan

So emo is nihilism/anomie with a bad haircut?

That and listening to lots of indie music. Not that emos do that, anymore.

[a morbid curiosity]

OK, fuck it.

Jonathon:
Goth was a type of music that at least had a kind of image attached to it, so it ended up as a sub-culture and I guess it's slightly more justifiable to say that fashion and books are related to it.
However, emo didn't have the time to branch out and become a fully-fledged genre, let alone a sub-culture.

Nowadays, emo isn't a sub-culture.

a) Bands that get labelled 'emo' often sound and look totally different from each other, have crazily different influences, and have nothing to do with the original meaning.

b) There isn't an emo 'fashion' or 'style'. Half the kids I know that label themselves 'emo' shop at Primark just like the rest of their peers. And what people define as emo changes every few months. One minute it's My Chemical Romance and piercings, next it's Hello Kitty and tying bows in your hair, then it's leopard print footless tights.

c) And an emo 'outlook' or 'mindset' is just the same as a regular teenager's. The angst came first, the trend afterward, not the other way around.

The media, the 'emo' brand, the merchandised genre, doesn't really exist at all. It's more of a high-school name-calling thing. To say emo is a sub-culture is like saying 'chav' is a sub-culture. There's no 'culture' involved.

And that's my amazing explanation as to why I get very angry when the word emo is used, ever.

</rant>

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by a morbid curiosity

a) Bands that get labelled 'emo' often sound and look totally different from each other, have crazily different influences, and have nothing to do with the original meaning.
b) There isn't an emo 'fashion' or 'style'. Half the kids I know that label themselves 'emo' shop at Primark just like the rest of their peers. And what people define as emo changes every few months. One minute it's My Chemical Romance and piercings, next it's Hello Kitty and tying bows in your hair, then it's leopard print footless tights.

A) Then they aren't being labeled 'emo' by people who know what emo is. 'Emo' IS a recognizable type of music. Its child, 'emo pop' is what causes confusion.
B) There are certain bits of fashion associated relatively well with emo. It pretty much goes like this:
Things you need to look emo:
1. Tight Jeans, preferably black.
2. Fringe or hair that covers eyes. Also preferably black.
Naturally, it's pretty vague. If somebody says they're emo, but doesn't dress it, they're either a closet-emo or just in it for the lulz.

[a morbid curiosity]

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

A) Then they aren't being labeled 'emo' by people who know what emo is. 'Emo' IS a recognizable type of music. Its child, 'emo pop' is what causes confusion.

Yes, but this has nothing to do with the 'sub-culture'. That was the whole point.

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

B) There are certain bits of fashion associated relatively well with emo. It pretty much goes like this:
Things you need to look emo:
1. Tight Jeans, preferably black.
2. Fringe or hair that covers eyes. Also preferably black.
Naturally, it's pretty vague. If somebody says they're emo, but doesn't dress it, they're either a closet-emo or just in it for the lulz.

This still isn't enough to constitute a sub-culture. And most 'emo' kids feel the need to evade the stereotype and wear crazy way-out colours and prints in order to feel 'individual'.

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by a morbid curiosity

Yes, but this has nothing to do with the 'sub-culture'. That was the whole point.


This still isn't enough to constitute a sub-culture. And most 'emo' kids feel the need to evade the stereotype and wear crazy way-out colours and prints in order to feel 'individual'.

A) You said it wasn't a genre. And, yes it has to do with the subculture.
B) You're thinking SCENE KIDS. Scene kids didn't even come until the very late '90s, whereas the Emo Subculture had been evolving since the mid-'80s.

[Underwater Ophelia]

Who. Cares.

[a morbid curiosity]

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

A) You said it wasn't a genre. And, yes it has to do with the subculture.

I said emo barely had time to evolve as a genre, let alone into a sub-culture. It's a tiny little obscure branch of hardcore. This tiny little obscure branch of hardcore had fans, yes, but even that didn't constitute a sub-culture, and it's pretty much dying out as the bands are. It doesn't have to do with current emo, which is what you described when you talked about tight jeans and fringes and angst. Emotional hardcore bands were about music, really, not image.

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

B) You're thinking SCENE KIDS. Scene kids didn't even come until the very late '90s, whereas the Emo Subculture had been evolving since the mid-'80s.

Evolving?
More like the entire meaning of the word 'emo' being changed.
And IT WASN'T A SUB-CULTURE. IT WAS NEVER A SUB-CULTURE. No matter how you look at it, there isn't enough to constitute one, and it wasn't widely acknowledged enough or mainstream enough to constitute one either. You're definitely taking liberties when you say emo was all tight black jeans and fringes and angst from the 80s on, 'cause like I said, emo wasn't concentrated on image. The point I was trying to make is that people use 'emo' and 'scene' interchangeably now, therefore there isn't even so much as a style any more.

[a morbid curiosity]

Originally Posted by Underwater Ophelia

Who. Cares.

Me, I have a penchant for Sunny Day Real Estate and I think leopard print footless tights are ugly.

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by a morbid curiosity

I said emo barely had time to evolve as a genre, let alone into a sub-culture. It's a tiny little obscure branch of hardcore. This tiny little obscure branch of hardcore had fans, yes, but even that didn't constitute a sub-culture, and it's pretty much dying out as the bands are. It doesn't have to do with current emo, which is what you described when you talked about tight jeans and fringes and angst. Emotional hardcore bands were about music, really, not image.

Wrong. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emo
It DID evolve, whether it "had enough time" or not.

Evolving?
More like the entire meaning of the word 'emo' being changed.
And IT WASN'T A SUB-CULTURE. IT WAS NEVER A SUB-CULTURE. No matter how you look at it, there isn't enough to constitute one, and it wasn't widely acknowledged enough or mainstream enough to constitute one either. You're definitely taking liberties when you say emo was all tight black jeans and fringes and angst from the 80s on, 'cause like I said, emo wasn't concentrated on image. The point I was trying to make is that people use 'emo' and 'scene' interchangeably now, therefore there isn't even so much as a style any more.

First off, there are emos who still listen to indie, emocore, and emo-pop.
Not everything can boom immediately like goth. While Emo was small in the '80s, it was far from insignificant, and artists such as Kurt Cobain have been influenced by first-wave emo bands (no, I'm not saying Nirvana was emo).
Also, I didn't say 'from the '80s on', you twit! It evolved (yuss!). If people say 'bird' and 'dinosaur' interchangeably, it doesn't make a Sea Gull a Pteranodon.

[dark luna]

I agree with a morbid curiosity...this emo different as it didnt evolve from the 80's emo so it should be called something else..should be called Tip (teenagers emotional problems) i know it should be tep but its more fun or something else..emo pop in the end its pop just dress with other package with black nails and skinny jeans..black hair

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by dark luna

I agree with a morbid curiosity...this emo different as it didnt evolve from the 80's emo so it should be called something else..should be called Tip (teenagers emotional problems) i know it should be tep but its more fun or something else..emo pop in the end its pop just dress with other package with black nails and skinny jeans..black hair

It evolved from '90s emo which evolved from '80s emo. Listen to some '80s emo, then listen to some '90s emo.

[Albert Mond]

Oh. And after that, listen to some Screamo, which also evolved from emo.

[a morbid curiosity]

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

Wrong. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emo
It DID evolve, whether it "had enough time" or not.

I never said it didn't evolve, I said it barely had time. It was an obscure sub-genre and it died out pretty fast. It couldn't have spawned a legit sub-culture.

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

First off, there are emos who still listen to indie, emocore, and emo-pop.

All three of which have little or nothing to do with emotional hardcore.
Indie doesn't really exist as a genre anymore.
Emocore never really existed as a genre.
Emo-pop is very distantly linked to emo and sounds nothing like it.

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

Not everything can boom immediately like goth. While Emo was small in the '80s, it was far from insignificant, and artists such as Kurt Cobain have been influenced by first-wave emo bands (no, I'm not saying Nirvana was emo).

I'm perfectly aware of this. I'm also aware that it has nothing to do with whether emo is a sub-culture or not.

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

Also, I didn't say 'from the '80s on', you twit! It evolved (yuss!). If people say 'bird' and 'dinosaur' interchangeably, it doesn't make a Sea Gull a Pteranodon.

No, what I was getting at was that scene and emo are now the same thing. It did evolve. It keeps evolving too fast, the latest 'emo' trend changes every couple of months and it can't really be pinned down anymore.

I'd say being influenced by something and evolving from something are two different things.

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by a morbid curiosity

I never said it didn't evolve, I said it barely had time. It was an obscure sub-genre and it died out pretty fast. It couldn't have spawned a legit sub-culture.

Again, it wasn't nearly as obscure as you make it out to be. Emo didn't die out. Ever. If you don't believe me, you can check out the lengths of time that bands lasted. Also, Goth started a subculture within a relatively short time period.

All three of which have little or nothing to do with emotional hardcore.
Indie doesn't really exist as a genre anymore.
Emocore never really existed as a genre.
Emo-pop is very distantly linked to emo and sounds nothing like it.

1. 'Indie' just refers to any independent music. Unless every artist signed a contract with a record company after the '80s, it's impossible to end it.
2. 'Emocore' is short for 'Emotional Hardcore'.
3. Anyone who listens to enough emocore can tell that emo-pop is just a watered-down version.

I'm perfectly aware of this. I'm also aware that it has nothing to do with whether emo is a sub-culture or not.

That wasn't what I was saying. I was saying that it wasn't nearly as obscure as you'd painted it to be.

No, what I was getting at was that scene and emo are now the same thing. It did evolve. It keeps evolving too fast, the latest 'emo' trend changes every couple of months and it can't really be pinned down anymore.

No. Most emos are actually scenesters. This in no way makes them the same thing, it just means that emo's the "thing to be". Once the fad dies, the subculture will still be there.

[a morbid curiosity]

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

Again, it wasn't nearly as obscure as you make it out to be. Emo didn't die out. Ever. If you don't believe me, you can check out the lengths of time that bands lasted. Also, Goth started a subculture within a relatively short time period.

I'm talking about music in general here. Emo is minuscule compared to so many genres, as was their fan base. I know a lot of the bands continued, but some of the most influential were the most short-lived.

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

1. 'Indie' just refers to any independent music. Unless every artist signed a contract with a record company after the '80s, it's impossible to end it.

Yes, I know indie refers to independent music, but it's not a genre. There's no set style of indie music.

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

2. 'Emocore' is short for 'Emotional Hardcore'.

Uh huh. I forgot that it existed 'cause I never use the term, it makes me think of "emotional hardcore hardcore" and that just gets confusing .

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

3. Anyone who listens to enough emocore can tell that emo-pop is just a watered-down version.

It isn't, though. The most popular emo-pop bands sound nothing like emo. The bands that actually count as real musicians take influence from other genres than just emocore, and the rest of the bands that 'emo' kids listen to are just manufactured power-pop at best. Sure, there are a few emo-pop bands that sound vaguely like second wave, like Automatic Loveletter and Taking Back Sunday, but they're not so popular and there are fewer. Besides this, the majority of 'emo' kids don't get it.

Originally Posted by Albert Mond

No. Most emos are actually scenesters. This in no way makes them the same thing, it just means that emo's the "thing to be". Once the fad dies, the subculture will still be there.

Emo is NOT a sub-culture! Even if what you're saying was true, emo would only consist of a very small minority and would still therefore be doomed!

[Ms.Crowbar]

Emo- A music genre that died in the early 90's.
"Emo" kids steal styles from Punk, Goth and Scene and mis them together, calling it "Emo". They have no imagination to make their own style.
They whine at just about anything. For fucks sake, people are dying in Africa from hunger and horrible, easily curable diseases. They have no reason to whine unless they're being abused by their parents.
And for fucks sake, people who are really depressed do NOT fucking flaunt their cut wrists like it's cool. They get proper help.

[Albert Mond]

Originally Posted by a morbid curiosity

It isn't, though. The most popular emo-pop bands sound nothing like emo. The bands that actually count as real musicians take influence from other genres than just emocore, and the rest of the bands that 'emo' kids listen to are just manufactured power-pop at best. Sure, there are a few emo-pop bands that sound vaguely like second wave, like Automatic Loveletter and Taking Back Sunday, but they're not so popular and there are fewer. Besides this, the majority of 'emo' kids don't get it.

If they sound nothing like emo, they aren't emo-pop. End of. And for the record, MCR sounds rather emo.

Emo is NOT a sub-culture! Even if what you're saying was true, emo would only consist of a very small minority and would still therefore be doomed!

Doomed to fucking what? Being a small subculture? I mean, there aren't that many skinheads. They're still a subculture.