Trish Keenan 1968-2011

With shifts in music distribution from the radio and record store to the internet, the music-listening public has become increasingly fractured.  For every recently emergent band that seems to have staked its place in history (Arcade Fire, LCD Soundsystem, Animal Collective), there are 50 artists that are beloved by a niche audience, whose best shot at history is through chance re-discovery in some undetermined future.

Broadcast, a Birmingham-born band of Brits, is likely to fall into the latter category.  Beloved by a small group of pop connoisseurs and vinyl-rack browsers, Broadcast remains largely unknown in indie-buying circles and largely unheard even among those by whom they are known.  The band has been re-discovered this week under sad circumstances, specifically the tragic and all-too-early passing of frontwoman Trish Keenan from pneumonia at the heartbreaking age of 42.

Emerging from the stables of the great Warp records at the beginning of the last decade, Broadcast occupies an odd and easily neglected historical space.  The late 1990s saw the emergence of both radio-friendly (Daft Punk) and wildly experimental (Aphex Twin) dance music, and over the last 15 years electronics have become the dominant medium for young music-makers.  In the interim, dozens of cult acts from The Beta Band to The Notwist experimented with how to meld 21st-century technology with classic pop textures.  No band navigated this new territory better than Broadcast.

From the release of 2000′s minor classic The Noise Made By People to the 2009 collaboration Broadcast & the Focus Group Investigate Witch Cults of the Radio Age, Broadcast created 3-minute pop collages blending past ideas of the future with present ideas of the past.  Lilting, breezy melodies mixed with harsh electronics and gentle acoustic instrumentation to form something wholly original but, in 2011, immediately recognizable.

Over the course of ten years, Trish Keenan’s ensemble moved from ground-breakers to elder-statesmen, touring with Deerhunter side-project Atlas Sound, contributing to the Gonjasufi remix record The Caliph’s Tea Party, and inspiring countless indie-world upstarts.  Many of these upstarts came out this week mourn Keenan’s passing and the band’s dissolution, from Flying Lotus (“It’s not fair…I wish you well on your journey Trish. RIP”) to The Antlers (“Damn it. R.I.P. Trish Keenan. I can’t thank you enough for years and years of amazing music”) to Of Montreal (“Rest In Blissfulness TK, you will continue to inspire and comfort us until the end of human days”).

Of course, many of these artists, no matter how buzz-worthy and beloved at present, are likely to fall into the hole occupied by Broadcast and dozens of other cult acts, remembered by critics and nerds but largely relegated to the dustbin of history.  It is a sad truth, but it is one that sites like this are trying to change.  By bringing you music that might otherwise go unheard, we hope that the talent and heart of hundreds of artists like Broadcast will be recognized before it is forgotten, and that, in the future, the appreciation of greatness will not depend on the occurrence of tragedy.

Broadcast – “Echo’s Answer”