American Football’s Steve Holmes gives us the lowdown on a genre the band may be synonymous with forever.

Wherever the name American Football appears, you can be sure the words “midwest” and “emo” are never far behind. The cult US indie-rock band were only together for a few short years in the late 90s, playing a handful of shows and, they say, largely a non-entity. And yet, following their split in 2000, their 1999 self-titled album – the noodly, atmospheric and overwrought classic known as LP1 – would, whether they liked it or not, become a template for what is known as midwest emo.

As their legend grew on message boards in their absence, the collective prayer for American Football to reform was answered in 2014, when frontman Mike Kinsella (also the founding drummer of Cap’n Jazz) reunited with guitarist Steve Holmes and drummer Steve Lamos, along with new member (and Mike’s cousin) Nate Kinsella. Since then, their sound has wriggled into unexpected corners. They’ve been sampled by PinkPantheress (on Just for Me), performed with A. G. Cook, won fans including Ethel Cain and Hayley Williams, and Jim Legxacy’s Old Place featured the sort of noodling riffs that would be right at home on an American Football album.

As the band gear up to release their fourth self-titled album (or LP4) – a dark, reflective set that pushes their sound further into post-rock, post-punk and more experimental territory – we risk the band’s ire by asking Holmes to break down the DNA of midwest emo. 

What midwest emo means to American Football…

I don’t recall when I first heard the term, but it probably wasn’t until around 2012 or so. Nobody really used the term ‘emo’ at the time, other than jokingly or disparagingly. Weirdly, I think of midwest emo as the bands that grew out of the suburban Chicago (and later Chicago) scenes in the early to mid-90s. To me, these were the bands I went to see in high school, like Gauge, Friction and Cap’n Jazz. But the lines between genres were blurrier, and I would have included other, more hardcore or pop-punk leaning bands from the scene as well, even though nobody would consider them midwest emo today – like Smoking Popes, 8 Bark, Trenchmouth, Los Crudos, Screeching Weasel and the Vindictives.  

… what midwest emo means to almost everyone else

Once we went off to college and bands got big enough to begin touring regionally, and eventually nationally, that small scene expanded to include bigger local and regional bands of our friends, like Braid, Rainer Maria, Joan of Arc and the Promise Ring, among others. Nowadays, the term is a fairly broad signifier, encompassing the various regional scenes happening simultaneously throughout the 90s.

Its DIY ethos keeps it relevant

There is something essentially midwestern and humble about the DIY spirit of these bands and this era. It was easy to go to a show and get inspired to participate, whether that was starting a zine, booking a show, starting a band or putting out a record. It was small and homemade, and I think that is what continues to resonate with people today.

The sound has a few defining characteristics

Noodly guitars, I guess? American Football get a lot of credit as an inspiration for bands who later took up the mantle of midwest emo, but we were a non-entity back then. I think, at least for bands taking inspiration from us, that midwest emo signifies open guitar tunings, odd time signatures, earnest, if slightly off-key, vocals. We may have turned down the distortion and emphasised the melodic and structural elements, but there were plenty of other bands of the time we took inspiration from. C-Clamp from Champaign come to mind, but also Slint, Rodan, June of 44, Rex, Drive Like Jehu, Codeine, Red House Painters, Low, Ida, the Sea and Cake, Lungfish, Don Caballero, Directions in Music, Tortoise, and on and on.

One influence was stronger than any other

I think the single most important band of the 90s was Fugazi. Dischord as a whole was a blueprint for the many DIY scenes that popped up in the 90s. Most of the bands from our scene that I’ve mentioned would probably not have existed without the influence of Fugazi and the DC scene. Being geographically in the middle of the country, midwest emo also borrowed from everywhere else. We took the DIY template and emotional spirit of DC hardcore, but were equally blown away by the pop-punk infectiousness of Lookout!-era Green Day. We loved the sad-sack melodrama of the Smiths and the Cure, but also took influence from the mathy weirdness coming out of Louisville. I think the alchemy was something like: DC hardcore’s independent spirit + pop-punk’s melodic sensibility + the UK’s melodramatic lyrics + math = midwest emo.

Midwest emo had a very clear epicentre

This is obviously personal bias, but I would say Chicago. Every band in the world came through the city. That stew of influences led to an adventurous spirit where anything seemed possible. When we started, we thought we were intentionally pushing back on the scene we grew up in and that we were defiantly not an emo band. It’s ironic that we later get reimagined as one of the innovators of the scene. We were intentionally pulling influences from a variety of non-rock genres, like classical minimalism, jazz fusion and folk, but also from math rock, slowcore, shoegaze and post-rock. We were music nerds playing with whatever ideas we were inspired by in the humble cocoon of Champaign-Urbana where we went to school. But that adventurous spirit was first sparked growing up in the Chicago punk scene.

Five first-wave midwest emo records we should hear

Soothe by Gauge (1992)
Blurred in Six by Friction (1993)
Shmap’n Shmazz by Cap’n Jazz (1995)
Nothing Feels Good by the Promise Ring (1997)
Look Now Look Again by Rainer Maria (1999)

UK rapper Jim Legxacy loves midwest emo

That’s mostly news to me, but I think it’s great. Part of the joy of being a music fan is seeking out and finding what connects with you. Musical discovery is a never-ending life journey. It’s also a gift to shine a light on your influences, especially the lesser-known ones, once you’ve achieved some level of success.