THE term “underground music” tends to conjure up particular images for some people – grey, moody and counter-culture. Frank Zappa preferred to define it by suggesting that “the mainstream comes to you, but you have to go to the underground.”

With that in mind, there’s something wonderfully eye-opening about the distinctly non-snobbish, cross-community “Yellow Movement”.

Originally started as an in-joke between two funk collectives, Colonel Mustard And The Dijon 5 and the Mickey 9s, the community now encompasses a wide range of artists and genres from punk bands to Britpop revivalists to hip hop MCs.

While attending the single launch party for riot grrl punk duo The Twistettes last week, The National was lost among a sea of yellow T-shirts in the packed-out crowd.

The Twistettes don’t personally brand themselves in yellow through merchandise or album sleeves but, as “part of the movement”, they were greeted with it by default.

Vocalist Jo D’Arc describes the band’s acceptance by the movement as a “buzz”, which shows the humility and inclusive nature of those involved.

“Over the years we’ve been frustrated by the arrogance and big-headedness of some people involved in music,” she says. “With bands like Girobabies and Colonel Mustard that’s not an issue. The acts involved are varied but all of them impart an element of social commentary, highlighting the awful situations we’re in as people.

“However, the overall point is to cultivate positivity and madcap daftness. Everyone goes to each other’s gigs and has got to know each other.

“The yellow helps to flush out that grey a wee bit.”

This positive ethos is colourfully conveyed by “Colonel” John Thomas McMustard and David “Dijancer” Blair who describe the community as “a creative movement to affect positive change and spread happiness and joy, all while wearing yellow, the colour of sunshine.”

That might sound hippy and cult-esque at first hearing, but the yellow tribe’s foundations appear to be built on friendship and a serious love for music first and foremost.

“In becoming a collective we can combine forces to help each other and promote each other’s music,” says McMustard.

“The most important component are all the beautiful people who come along and support us. People that come to our gigs will dance, sing, jump around, laugh, meet new people and sometimes end up on stage with us.

“We want people to be silly, to embrace their inner child. Combine this with a rock n’ roll attitude, camaraderie and mutual respect and we have a potent combo.

“For us it’s an attitude, a state of mind. We know we’re the underground but the underground is getting bigger – we’re more like topsoil now.”

If the aim of this musical collective is to be silly, then Saturday’s crowd certainly got the memo. Although there was no crowd-surfing on yellow dinghies in sight (a common sight at Dijon 5 gigs), there was plenty of crowd participation and ridiculous dancing.

Artists as diverse as reverb-heavy grunge foursome The Van T’s and rapper/spoken word artist Erin Friel demonstrated that the crowd would engage with anything thrown at them, and display an overwhelming enthusiasm for music regardless of shade or disposition.

This is a salient point in regard to the movement as a whole. What unifies the fans and practitioners of these various genres is an independent spirit and mutual respect for musical artistry.

McMustard is especially supportive of this DIY principle that has become such a trademark of the Scottish music scene in recent years.

“You can wait around hoping someone else will do it for you or get the finger out and do it yourself,” he says. “The beauty of the scene is the hunger, desire and raw talent that you can witness in venues where you can still look into the whites of people’s eyes.

“There are great local acts like Gerry Cinnamon, Hector Bizerk and The LaFontaines, as well as various Yellow Movement acts, that are selling out bigger and bigger venues and deserve to break through. Hard work and determination show Scottish unsigned acts are doing it for the right reasons. It’s a great time to be involved in music.”

Witnessing the Yellow presence at recent festivals like Loch Lomond Boat Party, Audio Soup and Doune the Rabbit Hole suggests that such a noisy movement can only remain underground for so long.

At Mugstock Festival, there was even a “Yellow Movement” stage and there are upcoming nights planned that will be devoted entirely to artists involved.

“We’ve got our second club night in the Record Factory on September 4 and plenty planned in 2016,” says Blair. “The future’s bright, The future’s yellow. Peace, love and mustard.”

Colonel Mustard And The Dijon 5 launch new single These Are Not The Drugs (You Are Looking For) with a party weekend launch in Drygate, Glasgow on October 16 and La Belle Angele, Edinburgh on October 17.