Best Shoegaze Albums 2023 (2024)

FAQs

Best Shoegaze Albums 2023? ›

Finally, you might consider The Cure as the putative father of shoegaze. With their post-punk roots, intricate textures and melancholic soundscapes, they influenced not only the mood, but also the aesthetic of shoegaze.

Finally, you might consider The Cure as the putative father of shoegaze. With their post-punk roots, intricate textures and melancholic soundscapes, they influenced not only the mood, but also the aesthetic of shoegaze.

Right now, hundreds of thousands of young people are finding shoegaze for the first time on TikTok and Spotify, where they're being introduced to the genre in a de-contextualized vacuum.

Loveless by My Bloody Valentine is commonly discussed as the greatest shoegaze and indie album of all time and one of the best albums to come out of the 90s. Loveless was My Bloody Valentine second studio album straight out of the UK.

The genre gets its name from the guitarists' tendency to look down at their effects pedals during performances, seemingly gazing at their shoes. Shoegazer bands create a lush, immersive soundscape that invites listeners to lose themselves in its dreamy textures.

According to AllMusic, most bands drew from the music of My Bloody Valentine as a template for the genre, as well as groups such as Cocteau Twins and the Jesus and Mary Chain. British dream pop duo A.R. Kane have also been credited with producing a template for the genre in the late 1980s.

Their sound has been described as alternative metal, art rock/art metal, experimental rock, shoegaze, nu metal, post-punk, post-hardcore, alternative rock, dream pop, drone rock, post-metal, post-rock, progressive metal, stoner rock, math metal, hard rock, trip hop, glitch, funk metal, and psychedelia.

The current lineup consists of Corgan, Chamberlin, and Iha. The band has a diverse, densely layered sound, which evolved throughout their career and has contained elements of gothic rock, heavy metal, grunge, psychedelic rock, progressive rock, shoegaze, dream pop, and electronica.

Mazzy Star - So Tonight I Might See (1993)

With hazy guitar and a certain disparate nature, in many ways, this album was also defined by its trademark shoegaze atmospherics, a 'proto-shoegaze' album of the most ethereal quality.

Their music has been classified as garage rock, garage punk, gothic rock, shoegaze and post-punk revival. The band have released five studio albums: Strange House (2007), Primary Colours (2009), Skying (2011), Luminous (2014) and V (2017) all of which charted within the UK Top 40.

What type of people listen to shoegaze? ›

Interestingly, it didn't come as a surprise when I dug a little bit deeper into some online communities and concluded that the aforementioned elements of shoegaze particularly appeal to shy personalities, who tend to approach life in deep thoughtfulness and are especially keen to explore the facets of art.

The history of shoegaze is a testament to the power of music and its ability to transcend time and boundaries. What began as a niche genre in the 1980s has evolved into a global phenomenon, with its dreamy soundscapes continuing to captivate listeners today.

Emerging in the United Kingdom in the late 1980s, shoegaze was Britain's answer to America's emerging grunge craze. The name “shoegaze” is a reference to the motionless act of guitarists looking down at multiple guitar pedals, or more commonly, their shoes.

My Bloody Valentine:

Often quoted as the pioneers of shoegaze is the Irish-English rock band My Bloody Valentine. Their debut studio album “Isn't Anything”, released on November 21st, 1988, marks as the unofficial start of the genre.

My Bloody Valentine are regarded by some as the pioneers of the alternative rock subgenre known as shoegaze, a term coined by Sounds journalists in the 1990s to describe certain bands' "motionless performing style, where they stood on stage and stared at the floor".

The group earned critical praise for their ethereal, effects-laden sound and the soprano vocals of Fraser, whose lyrics often eschew any recognisable language. They pioneered the 1980s alternative subgenre of dream pop and helped define what would become shoegaze.

Musical style and influences. While the group's early material was folk-tinged pop, they became more rock-oriented after the rhythm section joined. Generally, the band's musical style has been described as alternative rock, indie rock, and shoegaze, with elements of dream pop, folk, grunge, pop, and electronic.