Industrial Isolation and Cultural Self-Exile: The Formation of an Independent Music Scene in Montreal

This chapter examines Montreal’s contemporary independent and experimental music scenes in relation to the perceived sense of cultural and industrial isolation felt by local independent music makers between the 1980s and the early 2000s. This chapter argues that the work of micro-independent record labels such as Constellation Records and DAME and other small-scale scene infrastructures were instrumental in breaking out of industrial and cultural isolation by nurturing the activities of their own artistic communities while creating connections and bridges with similar scenes in North America and Europe. These efforts contributed to foster greater dialogue and collaborations between the Francophone and Anglophone factions of the scene during the 2000s, and helped establish the aesthetic and logistical elements that became associated with the contemporary Montreal independent music scenes.