Emo is a rock music genre characterized by an emphasis on emotional expression, even through confessional lyrics. Emo started back as far as the 80s, but the subculture really took its peak in the 2000s. This subculture is commonly associated with the stereotypes of the socially oppressed, shyness, sensitivity, dislike of humankind, introversion & angst, as well as depression, self-harm, and suicide.
As emo entered the mainstream, it became a subculture. Then, emo fashion started to include these items: skinny jeans, band shirts or tight t-shirts, studded belts, converses, vans, and more. Eyeliner & black fingernails became common as well. One known feature of emo fashion is the common hairstyle: flat, straight hair with long bangs covering some of the face. Emo fashion has been confused with scene & goth fashion before. It’s likely because of the "similar types" of clothing. Scene has similar types of clothing, just more colorful. Goth has black clothing too, however, the type of it is different. Since the early to mid-2000s, fans of emo music who dress like this have been referred to as “emo kids” or “emos” & known for listening to bands like My Chemical Romance, Fall Out Boy, The Used, Hawthorne Heights, and more.
Emo originated in hardcore punk and is considered a form of post-hardcore. It has also had a mix of genres, such as post-hardcore, alternative rock, screamo, pop punk, etc. Emo uses guitar dynamics that use both the softness & loudness of punk rock music. Some emo music uses characteristics of progressive music with the genre’s use of complex guitar work, unorthodox song structures, and extreme dynamic shifts. Lyrics are typically emotional and often personal or confessional, dealing with topics of failed romance, self-loathing, pain, insecurity, suicidal thoughts, love, and more. Early emo bands were hardcore punk bands that used melody and emotional or introspective lyrics and that were less structured than regular hardcore punk, making early emo bands different from the aggression, anger, and verse-chorus-verse structures of regular hardcore punk.
Emo is a rock music genre, specifying an emphasis on emotional expression, with some confessional lyrics at times. It appeared as a style of post-hardcore from the mid-1980s hardcore punk movement in D.C., where it was known as emotional hardcore or emocore. It developed bands like Rites of Spring and Embrace. Then, in the early to mid-1990s, emo was adopted and reinvented by alternative rock, indie rock, and pop punk bands like Sunny Day Real Estate, Jawbreaker, Jimmy Eat World, and more. By the mid-90s, bands such as Braid, the Promise Ring, and the Get Up Kids came out from the Midwest emo scene, & several independent record labels started to specialize in this genre. Meanwhile, screamo, a more aggressive style of emo that uses screaming vocals, also emerged, started by the San Diego bands Heroin and Antioch Arrow. Screamo had mainstream success in the 2000s by the bands Hawthorne Heights, Silverstein, Story of the Year, Thursday, The Used, & Underoath. Bands such as My Chemical Romance, AFI, Fall Out Boy and the Red Jumpsuit Apparatus continued the genre's popularity during the rest of the decade. By the early 2010s, emo's popularity had declined, with some groups changing their sound and others disbanding. Meanwhile, however, a mainly underground emo revival emerged, with bands such as The World Is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die and Modern Baseball, some drawing on the sound and aesthetic of 1990s emo. Some bands had gotten more popular in the early 2010s with the new emo sound, such as Pierce the Veil, Sleeping with Sirens, Black Veil Brides, and more. ----------------------------------------- Emo received a lot of backlash during the 2000s. Some emo bands, such as Panic! at the Disco and My Chemical Romance, rejected the emo label for its social stigma and controversy. Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman said that there was a "real backlash" by bands on the tour against emo groups, but he dismissed the hostility as "juvenile".
Screamo The term “screamo” was applied to an aggressive version of emo which developed in San Diego in 1991, and used short songs adding “spastic intensity to willfully expreimental dissonance and dynamics”. Screamo is a irregular form of emo influenced by hardcore punk, with typical rock instrumentation and noted for short songs, chaotic execution, & screaming vocals. The genre is "generally based in the aggressive side of the overarching punk-revival scene." It began at the Che Cafe with groups like Heroin, Antioch Arrow, Mohinder, Swing Kids, Portraits of Past, and more. They were inspired by the Washington D.C. post-hardcore genre, straight edge, the Chicago group Articles of Faith, hardcore-punk band Die Kreuzen, & the post-punk and gothic rock bands like Bauhaus. Other early screamo bands include Pg. 99, Saetia, & Orchid. The Used, Thursday, Thrice, & Poison the Well, who all formed in the United States during the late 90s and early 2000s, helped popularize screamo. Post-hardcore bands like Refused and At the Drive-In paved the path for these bands. Other screamo bands from the Canadian emo scene, like Silverstein and Alexisonfire, also emerged at this time. By the mid-2000s, the saturation of the screamo scene caused many of the bands to expand beyond the genre & put in more experimental elements. Non-screamo bands used the genre's characteristic guttural vocal style. Skramz Emo Pop (Pop Punk) This subgenre of emo music has more pop music influences, more brief but to-the-point songs, and hook-filled choruses. It’s been described as blending “youthful angst” with “slick production” & mainstream appeal, using “high-pitched melodies, rhythmic guitars, and lyrics concerning adolescence, relationships, & heartbreak”. This subgenre developed during the 1990s. Bands like Jawbreaker and Samiam are known for creating the emo pop-punk style. As emo became commercially successful in the early 2000s, emo pop became popular with Jimmy Eat World’s 2001 album Bleed American and its single “The Middle”. Jimmy Eat World, the Get Up Kids and the Promise Ring are also early emo pop bands. Emo pop became successful during the late 1990s, with its popularity increasing in the early 2000s. Some albums that gained popularity during this time, including: The Get Up Kids’ “Four Minute Mile”, Jimmy Eat World’s “Clarity”, Braid’s “Frame & Canvas”, and more influenced the genre even more. As emo pop came together as a whole, the Fueled by Ramen label became a center of this movement & signed off the bands (that we all know now off) Fall Out Boy, Panic! At the Disco, and Paramore. Two regional scenes developed. The Florida scene was created by Fuel by Ramen; midwest emo-pop was promoted by Pete Wentz, whose band Fall Out Boy rose to the forefront of this subgenre during the 2000s. Cash Cash released Take It To The Floor in 2008. You Me At Six released their debut album “Take Off Your Colours” in 2008 as well. These two albums were described as a more “definitive statement of airheaded, glittery, and content-free emo-pop”.