In the mid 70s, punk music emerged in the UK as a social and cultural phenomenon. Reflecting the hopelessness of an uncompromisingly modern, young audience with a common revolutionary mentality, punk music articulated political views, opposition and controversy as a response to the over-romanticizing of flower-power rock of the early 70s. Moreover, punk rock music was the means for the colossal social attack on the British monarchy and nationalism. Being exceedingly irritated by the British system and highly-politicized, UK Punk groups influenced a whole generation with their effortlessly contagious outbreak of violence and impassiveness against commercialism and political correctness.

Promoting nonconformist ground-breaking sounds with minimal instrumentation, anchored by explosive guitar riffs, military drum tempo and chaotic lyrics, punk groups quickly became a massive cultural fact which greatly impacted the young generations. Through punk rock music, young people found a way to express themselves. The Do It Yourself (DIY) ethic was mainly reflected in distinctive clothing, hairstyle and artwork to convey a new radical ethos generated from punk groups. By opposing to the production values of pop music, punk rock soon became something that anyone could do. People did not have to be pretty, neat and trendy in order to perform punk music. The important thing was to be able to get up on stage and play punk rock.

Soon, the hardcore punk music produced the US punk scene in the East and the West Coast. US punk groups were less controversial than their UK peers, but they satisfied the need of a substantial audience in the States for unusually hard, not easily absorbed and utterly anti-mainstream music. The underground punk movement of the 70s in the United States produced scenes that either evolved from punk or applied its DIY ethics to an utterly dissimilar music, sheltering punk’s legacy in the alternative rock and Indie scenes.

Indie music is the abbreviation of the term “independent music”, which was used to describe autonomy from commercial record labels and a DIY approach to recording and publishing. Opposed to the definition of commercial record labels, which own their own distribution channels, independent record labels do not rely their financing on international licensing deals and distribution agreements.

The punk rock era produced a turning point for independent labels and the DIY ethos considering the emergence of a plethora of independent labels. Indie music evolved in the garages of the US and the UK, where young people were figuring out what they really could do with their guitars and electronic equipment. Singing with a pissed-off voice and being focused on the DIY ethic grind that punk music offered, these self-asserted Indie groups transplanted the actions of the proto punk bands into a new kind of music. Separating themselves from their cultural customs through their appearance and music, Indie groups influenced greatly the popular movements of the 70s.