Indie sleaze is remembered as an attitude—a fuck-it-all embrace of grimy fun—as well as a musical moment defined by the party-friendly indie acts of the aughts: Yeah Yeah Yeahs, M.I.A., CSS. This is accurate but incomplete, omitting the massive amounts of ’80s and ’90s Britpop those kids consumed every night like so many cans of caffeinated malt liquor. History always forgets that it doesn’t exist in a vacuum.
