Word.ws English Dictionary

C86

C86 noun: a genre of British rock music most prominent in the late eighties and early nineties, with a lo-fi aesthetic, unconventional instrumentation and romantic lyrics.

Noun

C86 (uncountable)

  1. A genre of British rock music most prominent in the late eighties and early nineties, with a lo-fi aesthetic, unconventional instrumentation and romantic lyrics.
    • Ralske, who studied jazz trumpet at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, moved to London around the time the whole C86 scene (with bands like the Jesus and Mary Chain and My Bloody Valentine) was thriving.1990, SPIN, page 20
    • From the latest new releases to rare collectables, including indie, punk, grunge, C86 etc.1999, advertisement for, “www.indiemusic.co.uk”, in CMJ New Music Monthly, page 72

Origin of C86

Named after C86, a compilation cassette released in 1986 by NME magazine on which independent rock featured heavily. The album title itself was a play on the labelling and length of blank compact cassettes—commonly C60, C90 and C120—combined with the year 1986.

Questions about C86

What does C86 mean?
C86 means a genre of British rock music most prominent in the late eighties and early nineties, with a lo-fi aesthetic, unconventional instrumentation and romantic lyrics.
What part of speech is C86?
C86 is a noun.

Words near C86 in the dictionary

  1. C4ISR
  2. c4s
  3. C5
  4. C64
  5. C64s
  6. C86
  7. C9
  8. C9'd
  9. C9'ed
  10. C9'ing
  11. C9's

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: C86 (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “C86.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/c86. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.