(Credits: Far Out / Rough Trade US.)
Tue 2 September 2025 6:00, UK
The humble maraca is a funny little instrument. Liam Gallagher loves them, as we all know. But far more than the shaker of a primary school rhythm section, it was the emblem that started everything for the band Beat Happening.
Of course, the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, is hardly the indie rock capital of the world, so to say it was humble beginnings was perhaps the understatement of the century. But between a student art film named Beatnik Happening, from which they took their name, a ramshackle set of maracas and a thrifted Sears Silvertone guitar bought from a charity shop, it was enough to put a band on the road.
Becoming one of the most lucrative groups to tread the boards of the 1980s indie rock scene, Beat Happening whipped up a firestorm within the heights of their albums, starting with their self-titled debut and ranging from the critically acclaimed Jamboree in 1988 to Dreamy in 1991. It was, put simply, a mishmash wonderland of lo-fi heaven.
The trouble is, for a rock and pop landscape so saturated with high-octane sonics, with tinny synths transforming into grungy guitars at the turn of the decade, the mainstream wasn’t exactly calling out for the brand that Beat Happening offered. Their sound was undeniably popular within certain circles, but this didn’t necessarily always translate into the heights of mainstream, leaving the band one that was criminally underrated.
Given all that would come afterwards, whether it was My Bloody Valentine or Mazzy Star, you can’t shake the feeling that Beat Happening would have been better suited to this space and could have had a better crack at long-lasting success within this heady landscape of sonic contemporaries. Releasing a series of compilations over the course of the 2000s and 2010s reminded everyone of the exact greatness they were able to cultivate, with their most recent, We Are Beat Happening, having hit the airwaves in 2018.
But there was something also so deliciously ‘80s about the appeal that Beat Happening harboured; an allure that felt so vintage but cutting-edge and fresh at the same time. That was the exact culture that the decade bred in a nutshell. Something that felt honorary of all that came before, but equally blazing forward into the future.
Although Beat Happening could hardly be chalked up to The Beatles, it has a similar kind of cultivated vibe in terms of a band that forged a new path for not only themselves, but an entire musical canon as a whole. These obviously reached very different points in the stratosphere, but the point remains the same: rock wouldn’t be what it is without the Fabs, indie wouldn’t be the same without Beat Happening. They’re as equal as each other.
Whether it was the riot grrrl movement and Bikini Kill or Kurt Cobain, the tantalising reach of Beat Happening extended its touch into all corners of the canon, to affect the music of the 1990s in ways that most definitely would hit the bullseye of the zeitgeist, regardless of the fact that they never quite achieved it themselves. Therein lies a case study in the power of the underdog. And just think – none of that might have happened if it weren’t for a maraca.
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