"catering to their clients needs"
That's what you gotta do. I guess it just depends on which kind of band your typical client is. I've never once had a band come in and want their record to sound like the killers, franz ferdinand, jet or modest mouse.
I've always thought that a big part of what the underground music scene does, is rebel against what ever is mainstream. And right now, those bands mentioned above are pretty darn mainstream. People here don't want to sound like that. They're past it, maybe 3 or 4 years ago they would've wanted a sound similar to those records. But that was when limp biscuit was king of the hill, and no one knew who the yeah yeah yeahs were. Now they're after something new.
The "indie rock" scene is undergoing a bit of a make-over if you ask me. Now that it's gotten marketed, advertised, used in car commercials, etc. over the past couple of years. It's all homogonized, and no longer indie rock if you ask me.....isn't the indie supposed to stand for independent?
"Many bands are put together by the producer/label and are centered around the singer"............and this is still considered an indie rock band???!
I guess it's the same thing that happened to the punk scene. But still, I have to say there are just a ton of great bands out there right now. And I love being at least a small part of todays music scene.