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What
Emo, short for "emotional," is a subgenre of punk. Instead of addressing the social and political themes that characterize the majority of punk and hardcore, emo focuses on personal angst and introspection. The music, too, tends to be moodier. Emo began as a reaction to what had become hardcore's signature in the '80s: straight-ahead power-bludgeoning. Here's a crude analogy: If punk were literature, emo would be its poetry.
When
Many people think that if a band has "emotional lyrics," it is automatically an emo band. However, the style has a pretty distinct history. Emo came out of the mid-'80s hardcore punk scene in Washington, D.C. In 1984, Guy Piccioto (later of Fugazi) formed proto-emo band Rites Of Spring. The following few years saw an emo explosion in D.C., where the band Moss Icon was arguably the first band to capture the emo sound.
Who
Emo is comprised of several different styles. There's the younger generation of emo/indie rock bands like the Promise Ring, Rainer Maria and the Get Up Kids, who can be grouped with old-schoolers Sunny Day Real Estate on the softer, melodic side of emo. Then there's the "emo screamo" contingent. Emo screamo includes hardcore emo bands like the female-fronted Coleman that took the personal to the extreme with vocalists' throat-punishing screams, asylum-style convulsions and chaotic music played at breakneck speeds. There are also bands that swing between the soft and the hard, like Moss Icon. These bands make up the greater part of emo--vocalists would whisper, sing and scream while the musicians played a similar game of dynamics. Bands like Merel, Piebald, Rye Coalition and The Sleepytime Trio often incorporated anti-social aspects into their performances, turning their backs on the audience and sometimes bursting into sobs.
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For a more in-depth survey of emo, check out What the heck is emo, anyway?
