Emo: A Short History

How did Emo music emerge from Punk to become its own unique genre, and how has Emo influenced a newer generation of artists and audiences?

Know (knowledge):

• The origins of Emo in Punk Rock
• The differences between Emo and Punk
• The position and culture of Emo today

Mastery Objective

• Students will be able to summarize Emo’s evolution from its Punk roots and identify its defining characteristics by analyzing lyrics and watching interviews with contemporary musicians and producers in the Emo genre.

In this lesson, students will examine the origins and development of the Emo genre by comparing songs, watching interviews with contemporary Emo bands and promoters, and writing their own Emo lyrics.

When one hears the word “Emo,” a plethora of things perhaps come to mind: the skinny jeans, the sad lyrics, the Vans or Converse sneakers, the straight hair, the black eyeliner. Or perhaps Emo provokes a recollection of the 2000s, when bands like Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Taking Back Sunday, and Dashboard Confessional dominated the airwaves on both MTV, Fuse, and the Vans Warped Tour.

But the roots of Emo precede the new millennium by decades. In the 1980s, a contingent of musicians began moving away from the aggressive socio-political tinged Punk ethos and towards a more introspective “emotional” approach. One of these groups was the Washington, D.C. band Rites of Spring, which is considered the first to be given the description “Emo” - much to the dismay of founding member Guy Picciotto, who rejected the label. To him, labeling Rites of Spring as “Emo” (short for “emotional”) was ironic, because he felt all music has emotions. Nonetheless, the name stuck, and Emo came to signify a mixture of the elements of Hardcore Punk with an introspective brand of songwriting.

A decade later, Emo expanded to the Midwest with bands including The Get Up Kids,, American Football, and Cap’n Jazz. These groups took an even more nostalgic and introspective approach to songwriting.

While the popularity of Emo grew throughout the 1990s, the majority of Emo bands were still “underground” and not featured on mainstream media. This changed during the third wave of Emo in the 2000s. At this point, a new generation of bands such as Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco, My Chemical Romance, Paramore, and the Used hit the mainstream, being in constant rotation on channels like MTV, FUSE, and VH1. With a lyrical prowess that focused on not only relationships, breakups, and love, but also the topic of mental health, these bands were mainstays during the height of the Vans Warped Tour, Skate and Surf, and Bamboozle festivals.

But three “waves” out, Emo as a genre had to confront some major problems. Parents felt the messages in certain songs promoted self harm or even suicide, but perhaps a more glaring and more insidious issue was the incorporation of sexism and misogyny in the lyrics, coupled with a significant lack of diversity among the bands. With the notable exception of bands like the woman-led Paramore, Versaemerge, and Hey Monday, Emo overwhelmingly featured straight, white, cis-gendered men, whose lyrics and stage presentation did little to confront the seeming homogeneity of the genre.

By the time the 2010s came around, Emo lost some of its mainstream momentum. The MTV/FUSE/Major label boom for Emo was losing steam, and the fourth wave of bands - including The Hotelier, and Mom Jeans - were taking things back to the Midwest Emo route of being more underground.

Today, bands have developed a more Pop-punk sound while retaining the DIY (do it yourself) ethos of the genre’s Punk roots. Subgenres and genre-crossovers, such as Emo-Rap have also developed. Importantly, with the diversity of sounds has come a diversity of artists, as people of all different backgrounds continue to be inspired by the Emo genre.

1. Create four stations around the room, each with a device capable of streaming video. Set each station to the following video:
   1. Station 1: Clip 2, Musical Journeys
   2. Station 2: Clip 3, Emo as a Genre
   3. Station 3: Clip 4, Asserting a Place in Emo
   4. Station 4: Clip 5, Advice