This book provides an 'insider' view of worlds of popular music. It shows the relationship between music, creativity, ideas and localities by looking at cities, independents, genre, globalization and musician's relationships with each other. Webb examines groups of musicians, audiences and people involved in the music industry and shows the articulation of their position as well as how to understand this theoretically by looking at the city as a centre for music production; the industrial music inspired neo-folk genre; independence and its various meanings as a productive position in the music industry; the globalization of music; and musicians own narratives about working together and dealing with the industry. Utilizing case studies of a variety of different cities — Bristol, London, New York, San Francisco, Berlin — and genres — Trip-hop, Hip-hop, Industrial, Neo-folk — this volume is a landmark in popular music studies.