Emo

One peek at the cartoonish 2007 book Everybody Hurts: An Essential Guide to Emo Culture and it becomes obvious that Emo has outgrown its definition as a subset of confessional hardcore like a husky mall kid in a youth large tee. It had become fodder for coffee tables. Maybe no musical genre since punk has suffered such long debate about its cultural definition and sociological baggage as the better half of "tional," which, depending on who you ask, can be a musical style or interpersonal affectation, a badge of honor or a scalding slander. People started kicking around the taxonomy back in the late '80s as an outgrowth of Washington DC's hardcore scene. Back then, bands like Native Nod and Rites of Spring actually called themselves Emo (or Emocore) and inspired a golden period for the genre in the mid-90s when groups like Texas Is the Reason, Braid and Cap'n Jazz won audiences though DIY tours, deafening basement shows, and songs that sought to plunge new expressive depths through the ethos of hardcore and punk rock. But the turning point for the genre's definition came when Kansas City's Get Up Kids released Four Minute Mile, a revolutionary document proving that hardcore and power pop made oddly comfortable bedfellows, which spawned imitators by the dozens and growing audiences. When seminal Emo acts from the mid '90s like Jimmy Eat World topped rock charts, the genre's definition blurred, leading to a post-millennial landscape where Emo might encompass anything from popular rock acts like My Chemical Romance to acoustic post folkies like Dashboard Confessionals Chris Carrabba. But don't get worked up about it�that so Emo.