About

Chuoline is a music blog and zine. In the future, paper copies of the zine will be sold on this site!

What is the blog/zine about?

Chuoline is all about indie pop, twee, anorak, neo-aco, jangle, and J-indie music! The list might seem daunting, but they are all very similar to one another (except J-indies, which is specifically indie music from Japan. I will be focusing on Japanese indie pop though). This blog and zine is my way to express my love for this music, and share it all with you.

Examples of bands I might write about are Red Go-Cart, Fantastic Something, Flipper's Guitar, The Field Mice, Pizzicato Five, Hey Paulette, Language of Flowers, Strawberry Story, Debonaire, Another Sunny Day, Plus-Tech Squeeze Box, The Cannanes, Close Lobsters, 800 Cherries, Pervenche and advantage Lucy.

"Idk anything about those genres!!! Where should I start?!?!"

It's okay if you don't know, because indie pop is a niche genre. Most people start out by listening to the better known bands like Belle and Sebastian and The Field Mice. This chart that I stole off Reddit is good to pick through for getting started.

As for J-indie stuff, it's a pretty broad scene but I would again reccomend the popular bands like Flipper's Guitar, advantage Lucy and Pizzicato Five to get started. Again, see this other chart that I also stole, this time from Discord, for some gateway drugs picks.

What does "Chuoline" mean??

"Chuoline" is the name of a train line in Japan. I took from the title of Smiley's compilation "Early Spring in the Chuo-Line" just because I thought it sounded nice. Also, I find the idea of listening to indie pop on a train journey very romantic.

Who writes the blog/zine?

I do :) I go by "Hannaway" (my surname), but I have the usernames Janglelover and Nintentoad (WORST USERNAME EVER!!!) online.

If you are for some reason interested, you can read more about me on my profile page

How often is the blog updated?

There is no schedule, but I will try to update the blog as often as I can.

How do I access the zine?

I will make the zine available for purchase directly from this website soon. It will be a pyshical paper copy, and will be mailed directly to you. The price will be as small as possible, but please remember that you will have to pay postage fees depending on your location. Please stay tuned for more information. I will make PDFs available too for accessability :)