Image: Wikimedia Commons

emo

Derivative of post hardcore rock music with emotional, introspective lyrics

Also known as emo rock

Instance of: music genre
1
Sources
1.Stated in Rate Your Musicrateyourmusic.com/genre/Emo/
View statement on Wikidata ↗
Subclass of: punk music
, alternative rock
1
Sources
1.Stated in Rate Your Musicrateyourmusic.com/genre/Rock/
View statement on Wikidata ↗
Founded: 1984

Overview

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia · Read full article · Text CC BY-SA 4.0

Emo is a genre of rock music that combines musical characteristics of hardcore punk with emotional, often confessional lyrics. It emerged as a style of hardcore punk and post-hardcore from the mid-1980s Washington, D.C., hardcore scene, where it was known as emotional hardcore or emocore. The bands Rites of Spring and Embrace, among others, pioneered the genre. In the late 1980s, Maryland bands Moss Icon and the Hated adopted and reinvented this sound, putting less influence on its punk roots. In the early-to-mid 1990s, their influence led emo to be adopted by alternative rock, indie rock, and pop-punk bands, including Sunny Day Real Estate, Jawbreaker, Cap'n Jazz, Mineral, and Jimmy Eat World. By the mid-1990s, Braid, the Promise Ring, American Football, and the Get Up Kids emerged from Midwest emo, and several independent record labels began to specialize in the genre. Meanwhile, screamo, a more aggressive style of emo using screamed vocals, also emerged, pioneered by the San Diego bands Heroin and Antioch Arrow. Its derivative form pop screamo achieved mainstream success in the 2000s with bands like Hawthorne Heights, Silverstein, Story of the Year, Thursday, the Used, and Underoath.

Overview

All data

31 statements · 23% with external sources · numbers in brackets are citations

Country of origin: United States
Different from: Emo subculture
Social media followers: 139,242(May 24, 2023) subreddit: emo
Native label: Emo

Data quality

statements

23%

externally sourced

Source last edited September 27, 2026. AIDB refreshes this page daily.

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AIDB. (2026). emo (Q10926). Retrieved from https://aidb.si/e/emo-Q10926