Howdy to all!

I've got a general question, but I thought I'd pose it to the DT community since he's my favorite musician.

My buddy and I were discussing a theory on how music movements begin/emerge in one city (e.g. grunge emerging in Seattle) over another. We thought that perhaps there is either a pioneer band that inspires other bands and creates a community/movement. Then we thought, perhaps, there is already an existing community through which the sound evolves and becomes epitomized by a couple bands.

The final theory we had combined these two: if either a band or community of bands surpasses some threshold of a following (e.g. there's enough people coming out to the shows or there's enough venues supporting this new sound), then the community gains sufficient momentum to keep growing more quickly. An analogy, albeit a negative one, would be a virus outbreak. If the virus isn't contagious enough, people get over it before spreading it too far. If it becomes very contagious, then it can spread more quickly to more people.

Hopefully I explained that clearly enough. What thoughts are there on this?

Every virus needs a carrier - like some outspoken music journalist (with talent to invent and spread catchy genre-names).

Indeed. To go along with the analogy, even if there is a carrier, the virus needs to be sufficiently contagious and transmittable. To relate back to the problem, even if there is a music critic, the music itself must be appealing to a large group of people to become a movement. So, how does a music style become 'contagious'?

The purpose behind my post is to get some real-world examples about the phenomenon of a music movement. Does it seem that there is a single 'pioneer' band that people gravitate towards? Or, is there a community of bands that refine the style and lend credibility?