How to be Emo
Being Emo is an art, not a science. We are going to discuss each one of these in more detail, but here are the basic things you need to consider when you are considering how to be Emo:
- Emo Music
- Emo Hair
- Emo Clothes
- Emo Make up
- Emo Style
- Emo Attitude
Emo music is arguably the most misunderstood aspect of the Emo culture. People believe that Emo songs are typically depressing and focus on death or the desire to bring it about. This is actually far from the truth. There are many Emo songs that are incredibly passionate and uplifting. Remember that the term Emo stems from the word Emotional. Naturally, life is difficult and often painful.
Take the band Young Guns for example. As described in our Emo Bands page, they don’t care about trying to be like some other commercial band. They believe in themselves as a band and have nothing to prove to anyone. You get their music or you don’t have to listen to it.
Part of the Emo fashion and persona is the hair style. The hair is usually black and characterized by randomly distributed bright highlights. Brown and blonde are also fairly common. The fringe is very important, but you don’t necessarily want to have too long of a fringe. Emo girls tend to trim their fringes more regularly. Layering is also important.
Ok, so you’re listening to the right music and you’re sporting a cool Emo hairstyle, so what’s next? The clothing is really important. You want to convey a unique sense of self with an indie style of fashion and attitude. Black is a common Emo trend when it comes to clothing, but pink and purple are also very popular. Another common Emo clothing trend is stripes on the clothes. Jeans or trousers must be tight and a good belt that sticks out must accompany them. The single most important trend when it comes to Emo clothing is that the clothes must be tightly fitting.
Emo culture and its origins
“Emo” emerged as a movement in Washington DC in the early 80’s, breaking free from the place’s hardcore punk scenario. This was started out by Guy Picciotto and his band the Rites of Spring in 1984, which created a genre that was more melodic and less aggressive. Unlike punk music, has more varied rhythms, melodic guitars, and a more personal and passionate lyrics. They’d further insert other emotions in the songs, such as romance, desperation and nostalgia. Their performances would greatly reveal their viewers’ emotions, sometimes making them weep.
A lot of other bands inspired by the Rites of Spring also emerged, namely Embrace, Beefeater, Fire Party, Dagmaster, Kingface and Lunch meat. They all joined in Washington DC’s movement, the “Revolution Summer” back in 1985 to uplift the spirit of creativity in the place.
There were no definite names on who first coined the term emo, but the emo music we know today is called emo-core, with its core all about being emotional. Despite the bands disliking this new label, it stuck, nonetheless.
With the success of ”Revolution Summer” in 1985, other bands around the country adapted this new music trend, incorporating different emotions as the music begins to evolve. In the early 90’s, bands like Jawbreaker and Sunny Day Real Estate redefined emo and turned it mainstream.
At the same time that emo went mainstream, other underground indie and punk bands also emerged. A lot of recording companies focused on alternative rock bands and other underground music, spending a lot of cash for their promotion.
Over the following years, emo has retreated, morphed, returned and grew to become something even more than a music genre. The new brand of emo music is a mixture of indie rock’s brilliance and hardcore punk’s fervor and aggression, albeit a little milder and smoother melodies, even the more ‘yearning’ vocals.
The 90’s was also the year when their fashion statements begin to take shape: a lot of people are now into jet black hair and tight wear, add the black makeup they wear all over their faces.
As the millennium was fast approaching, emo’s fame skyrocketed even more: a lot of recording companies are now looking into the genre’s marketability. It is at this era that emo music really flourished, and has shown a lot of changes. Bands like Story of the Year, Simple plan, Fallout boy, My Chemical Romance and many others had their shares of chart-topping songs.
With emo music being redefined by the artists, the emo culture is being redefined as well. Instead of being just plain emotional, now emo is associated by self-mutilation, angst and suicide, which is the tendency of the people within that culture.
From a movement to oust violent punk music back in the 80’s, to people who cut themselves with a razorblade, the definition of emo has gone a long way. Which kind of emo do you wish to have?