Sunny Day Real Estate were a 4-piece from Seattle, Washington who were "the first emo band, along with Weezer", you state, embarrassingly. Actually, though, if you're looking for the source of ahistorical claims like the preceding, this is probably where you'd start. Prior to this troupe's arrival on the mainstream landing pad circa '94, music termed "emo" (endearingly or not) was pretty much exclusively relegated to dingy basement shows and channeled through bands burnt out on the pogo-thrash of the early 80's. I probably don't need to give you a history lesson (since you're on the internet), but essentially, Ian Mackaye and co. decided the genre they helped establish was becoming too much of a warzone for dumb, chipped-shoulder pit warriors and went on a mission to become the cool, damp rag patting the forehead of worked-up suburbanite white dudes everywhere. The hardcore scene, not knowing what to make of bands like Embrace, Rites Of Spring, and Dag Nasty, split them off from the catalyst with the mocking term "emocore" - a signifier that these bands often employed emotions, unlike hardcore punk, which was like listening to a home appliance user's manual.
Okay, and I guess they were also prone to utilizing more rock-oriented tempos and guitarwork, as well.
Around the dawn of the 90's the post-hardcore sound began to evolve frenetically and diverge into several disparate styles, embracing and expounding upon different facets of the style while drawing from surrounding scenes. From here, alongside the chaotic, shredding violence of bands like Honeywell and Heroin, and the epic, dynamics-laden approach of Moss Icon, Native Nod, and Hoover, came a smoother, much more accessible brand of emo that straddled the line between post-hardcore and indie rock. The most influential (ie mercilessly looted) example being Sunny Day Real Estate.
...like, Hot Water Music levels of imitation. Fugazi tier mimicry. It's probably grammatically incorrect to expand an aside hidden between parentheses like this, but the world is a crazy place.
After a couple EPs firmly footed in the underground sounds of the day, the band enlisted their friend Jeremy Enigk for guitar/frontman position, effectively clubbing the band's rawness into submission with a mace of distinctive mellow weenie vocals. Such is written in the Book Of Speculations. They went on to release two excellent LPs on Sub-Pop, the second of which sounds surprisingly refined for a snapshot of the band disintegrating in the immolating light of God's love. Unfortunately, they then released two more following Jeremy's conversion, replete with singing lessons, a faux-British accent, and a glaze of putrid alt-rock shellac.
That was what they call in "the biz" "an introduction that's too long to bother reading". This exists beyond my usual snooze-inducing self-depreciating tirades, as I literally only began writing this to point to share my current opinion of the band after some much needed time off. Like Rites Of Spring's s/t LP, I flogged their Diary album next to constantly for close to 6 months before it finally passed on due to a shattered will to live. That was a joke because I used the term "flogged" as a hyperbole for "listened to". Oh, ritualistic, prolonged torture jokes and their hilarity. Anyway, I just recently gave their debut and self-titled follow-up a re-review and I couldn't help but notice that despite how solid and effective they remain, Diary has a completely bizarre quirk to it that I totally overlooked back in the day.
Okay listen to this song:
This was probably my favorite song back in 11th grade. I still love it a lot. But hey, did you ever notice that at almost exactly halfway through the song, THE SONG STARTS AGAIN ALMOST EXACTLY AS IT BEGAN? I was going to italicize that last bit, but comedically timed caps lock seemed more appropriate. As you can tell, I'm entering a "painfully ironic" phase for everyone to revel in. But seriously, it's almost perfectly split into two near identical halves. What's even more bewildering is the fact that almost every song on here does the exact same thing. Go listen to "Seven" next. After that intro, the same EXACT verse is repeated, note for note, word for word, 3 times. Why? The structure is this:
1.) Intro
2.) Verse 1
3.) Bridge 1
4.) Verse 1
5.) Bridge1
6.) Chorus
7.) Verse 1 (really)
8.) Bridge (also identical)
9.) Chorus (and such and such)
I don't even mean this as a dig on the band, necessarily... I just don't know what to make of it. The more I listened with this principle in mind, the more I began to see it - near savant-esque rigidity and repetition. "Round" is exactly like this. "47" is exactly like this. Actually, from what I can recall (I don't have the album in front of me right now), nearly every song is structured like the band wrote a bunch of different song components and piled them up in the most logical progression. There's no room for improvisation, looseness, or ad libbing whatsoever. "But Steve", you might be saying, "aren't most pop song structures like this?". Well, yeah, but most of those songs aren't 5 minutes long and have no crescendos. In essence, Sunny Day Real Estate were pretty curious/awful editors at this point, but the chunks of music they comprised their songs from were all pretty spectacular.
I just realized why I don't update here as much as my old blog.
No amphetamines.
(frowny emoticon)
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