Electronic Music 101?

Otter asks: "iTunes comes with a sampler of MP3s selected to appeal to the Apple demographic. The one that really caught my attention was a track by Sasha and John Digweed, which has inspired me to learn a bit about electronic music. Unfortunately, I don't know anyone who likes that stuff and my local Tower Records only has Moby (didn't like it),Paul Oakenfold (not bad) and 11,000 'Best of Ibiza' sets. What are the must-haves I should start with? What are the best online communities and places to learn about new artists? Feel free to define 'electronic' as broadly as seems appropriate." I used to shop at Homebass, but they just went out of business, which is sad, as they had one of the most comprehensive selection of electronica that I have ever seen, and most of their tracks had MP3 previews. If you were going to try and turn a friend on to Electronica, what artists, songs, or even specific mixed sets would you suggest? What online sources of electronica are still around.

Comments

Astral Projection

[log0n]

Period.

Re:Astral Projection

[Cryptnotic]

Those are all DJ's who mix other people's music, which sometimes includes Astral Projection or Juno Reactor or other trance creators.

GET THESE FIRST

[metalhed77]

IMO the best of electronica (not cliched, not trendy, everyone will ask you whot hat great band is)

Plaid
Tortoise
Stereolab
Squarepusher

Re:GET THESE FIRST

[zhensel]

Interesting list. I'd have trouble even calling Stereolab electronica ... unless I'm listening to Dots and Loops I suppose. Tortoise is pretty hard to call electronica too since it's all analog with a single synthesizer. I mean, their later albums, especially Standards (haven't heard their remix albums - but I assume they're more electronic) use more electronic experimentation, but it's still normal rock at its core. Well, if marimba is normal for rock. I mean, would you call Revolution 9 electronica?

Re:GET THESE FIRST

[jovlinger]

telepopmusik.

Great stuff. includes the guy from earthing, which too is great stuff. If you like that, then Fila Brazilia is not far behind. However, I recommmend Telepopmusik because it is broad enough to appeal to all but the terminally closed minded.

Re:GET THESE FIRST

[uebernewby]

Plaid, Tortoise, Squarepusher & Stereolab all fall within a similar genre - this guy doesn't seem to know yet what he's going to be into. Here's a somewhat broader primer-for-quality-electronic-music(tm):

• Aphex Twin: freaky beatfuckery. If you like this, move on to stuff released on Warp Records, Rephlex Records, Planet Mu, Skam, etc
• Ritchie Hawtin's "Concept": fairly accessible minimal techno. If you like this, it's time to move to Germany ;-). Anything on Mille Plateaux/Force Inc will be worth exploring next.
• Four Tet: organic instrumental music that just so happens to be made on a computer. Not very beat heavy. Like this? Then get yourself a stack of records released on Domino, Morr Music, the Leaf label, etc.etc.
• Luke Vibert aka Wagonchrist hilariously cocky hiphop-esque sampling fests. Bits taken from old easytune records, some jazz, some downright weird stuff that's guaranteed to put a cheeky smirk on your face. If you find this amusing, you'll like a lot of what comes out on Ninja Tune.
• Kit Clayton somewhere between Aphex Twin and Ritchie Hawtin, it's techno that keeps your brain occupied while your ass is bouncing on the dancefloor. Again Mille Plateaux/Force Inc will have stuff you'll like, but Shitkatapult 's pretty good for this as well, as is Kompakt. Not to mention a veritable army of American boys with powerbooks.

For more commercially viable electronics, there's quite a few pointers elsewhere on this page.

electronica

[BoneFlower]

Oakenfolds Tranceport is a masterwork, hands down. His other stuff is OK but simply does not measure up. Darky is awesome, but recordings of him are tough to impossible to find. Christopher Lawrence, Frankie Bones, Eiffel 65.. Apoctygma Berzerk and VNV nation for the darker electronic music... I could list more, but these are a good start.

bands

[designBureau]

The original.... Kraftwerk, and the best electronica band out there right now, Boards of Canada

Brian Transeau & DJ Rap

[mcowger]

AKA BT:
good albums:
Movement in Still Life
ESCM (Electric Sky Church Music)
Also, R&R (Raresides & Remixes is cool)

DJ Rap:
Learning Curve

Both are unbelievable CD's. Both are somewhat experiemntal/progressive, but well worth the purchase.

Two Words

[URoRRuRRR]

Aphex Twin

While I think his best work is in his music videos, anything on selected ambient works or Come to Daddy is incredible.

Re:Two Words

[troc]

The KLF
Orb
The Grid
L garnier
JM Jarre (no really)
Transglobal Underground
Members of Mayday

*shrug*

Problem is, what kind of "electronica" do you want?

Just dancy stuff (Carl Cox), Weird ambient stuff (Orb, KLF, Sven Vath), old fashioned stuff (Kraftwerk, JM Jarre), Trancy stuff (anything Goa-esque) or even stuff like Depeche Mode or the synth bands of the eighties (New Order etc etc)

hohum

Troc

Re:Two Words

[Lemmy Caution]

Alec Empire. Atari Teenage Riot. Shinzuo. All from the digital hardcore thing. Hardcore punk intensity in electronica (although Alec Empire also does incredible jungle, d+b, and ambient works too.) For cerebral electronic minimalism, the entire Raster Noton can't be beat, and check out Ryoji Ikeda and Plastikman.

One of my favorite Aphex Twin works was a piece he did with mu-Siq called "Mike and Rich - Expert Knob Twiddlers." Skillful goofy fun. kid606 is intense and often funny. Also, check out Amon Tobin.

Current fave act, though, is the Polysics. Amped-up digital-punk-wave descended directly from Devo, and they're from Japan. Woefully underappreciated.

Re:Two Words

[mgblst]

and dont forget the classic 'analogue bubblebath' works, especially the first. Some of richards stuff is hard to listen to, some is absolutely fantastic!

Re:Two Words

[Tom7]

My vote is for "... I Care Because You Do", which was trend-setting but not trendy.

Problem #1: Tower records...

[UserChrisCanter4]

Or any chain-type music store. Electronic music, outside of big names like Moby, Daft Punk, and so forth, are not going to be commonly found in those stores. It'd be the same as if you were searching for local, small-time rock or rap artists. It's simply not the market they're targetting. Or, to put it in /. terms, it'd be like walking into Circuit City and asking to see a selection of motherboards and cases; it just isn't their market.

There are a couple of good ways to find electronic music you like:
1) local, privately-owned music shops. Be they one-off or franchises, these places have a lot more lee-way in what they order, and especially, the market they want to target. If you live in a particularly large city, you can probably find a shop that specializes in electronic music, or at least one that keeps a large stock of it.
2) This is an especially useful technique: go clubbing. Seriously. Go to a club that plays more electronic-type dance music and just listen. Talk to the DJ if it's a small club (but not while he's working). Alternately, flip on your local Top 40/Alternative rock station around midnight on a Saturday, as most of them have live club feeds, and they'll typically announce names of artists being played. It may not be an authoritative list, but it's a good place to get started and to learn what genres of electronic music you like/dislike.

Abstract techno greats

[Hagakure]

autechre - broken beats and strange melodies - otherworldly. my second favorite "techno" act.

aphex twin - the granddaddy of abstract techno, you can hear him on mtv these days but he's still got style.

kraftwerk - okay, really the true fathers of techno. anything they've touched is good, but start with man machine or radioactivity

squarepusher - drum-n-bass, dub, electronic freakout. budokhan mindphone is an easy favorite for its chilled out dub stylings.

panasonic - cold analog minimal thumps and pops, great for any mood. will destroy your head, so be careful. these guys are what i reach for when i want my thump to thump.

pole - nu-dub, reggae thumps and echo produced by this madmans laptop

kit clayton - see pole, except put it in a blender with some magic mushrooms. kit clayton's style is crazy, dubbed out techno with familiar sounds used in new ways. a true great.

Re:Abstract techno greats

[ozbon]

Tori Amos? Electronic music? Bwahahahahaha.

Actually, I'm amazed no-one's mentioned the godfathers of most electronica - Yello (Nasty site with flash). They've been around for years, and most of the stuff you hear now is still influenced by them.

Albums of choice are probably Stella, Pocket Universe, Zebra, and One Second - but they're my faves, not necessarily anyone elses.

Also, Oakenfolds OK, try to get the Sasha & Digweed mix album "Communication" - that rocks. Moby varies between good and awful - look for Everything Is Wrong, avoid Animal Rights.

Hope that helps.

Re:Abstract techno greats

[spongman]

UK top-selling dance track of '98...

House Music/DnB Music

[artlu]

Hey. I think the Genre of music you would like would either be of a House music nature or more of a drum and bass nature. For house music start with some awesome albums specifically Dance Factory by Louie Devito (He did all of the NYC Underground Volumes) also check out DJ Irene. If you liked metal music and just got into this electronic genre try some DJ Venom.

I write for the online magazine Kludge Sound so check that out as I review a lot of albums in this genre for them.

As for the drum and bass/trance genres are concerned. Bad Boy Bill (Bangin the Box Vol.5) is house music and some scratching, but hardcore is an artist called DJ Shadow *highly recommended* and like you mentioned earlier Paul Oakenfold is always good.

Other than that just check out your favorite dance music on cdnow they should have a good list! Aj

Re:House Music/DnB Music

[moongha]

Eh? Are you suggesting that DJ Shadow & PAul Oakenfold are D&B?

I sincerely hope not.

To be honest, the variety of dance music (avoid calling it electronic music or electronica if you can) is so huge that you're not really giving us much to go on.

Most of the people on here are recommending the more trendy/alternative style of artist (ie. the ones you don't tend to here in clubs) such as Aphex Twin, Autechre, Plaid etc. which are fine but probably not what you're looking for after mentioning Sasha & John Digweed.

Half of the problem here is that the level of acceptance and understanding of Dance music in the US is pathetic.

To be honest, I'd get away from the idea of buying a single artist/album since this has a lot less relevance in Dance music. There are tons of Dance producers that make one fantastic record and everything else they do sucks. So mixes are the best way to go.

For you, I would recommend any of the Clubbers Guide albums from the Ministry of Sound. Don't know how difficult it is to get hold of them in the US though.

Re:House Music/DnB Music

[TomV]

To be honest, I'd get away from the idea of buying a single artist/album since this has a lot less relevance in Dance music. There are tons of Dance producers that make one fantastic record and everything else they do sucks. So mixes are the best way to go.

I'd definitely endorse this, if only because it's (mostly) how I finally got the hang of dance music. In fact, I'd argue that, withthe amount of remixing applied to the tracks on the good comps, i tend to think of the DJ as the producer nowadays.

OK, there had been individual artists I'd liked (and in the UK at least there's been an electronic side to 'pop' since the early 1980's) but as the explosion took off from about 1987 onwards, there were just too many artists, in too many narrow, blurred subgenres, to work out what to try next.

But remember, with dance music comes DJ culture. Individual records aren't quite so important, the combinations, the synergies, become a big part of the fun. And in DJ culture, you don't look for artists you trust anymore, you look for a DJ you can trust. My DJ history, like a lot of people's, I suspect, shares with the submitter the 'Sasha & Digweed / Oakenfold' start. in my case I got S&D's original 'Renaissance' comp from he library (i was bored, i'd listened to most of what they had already, it was a triple in really flash packaging) and liked it, asked some of my dancy friends for hints, and got played Oakenfold's Goa Mix (Paul Oakenfold had produced The Happy Mondays' "Thrills, Pills and Bellyaches", so I was definitely up for heaing some of his other work, and the Goa Mix is still, to my mind, a total masterpiece, if you can find it).

That's all I neded really. I now knew that I could trust these 3 DJ's, that I'd probably like their other mixes, other stuff by the artists on their mixes, and that I'd also probably like their remixes of other people's stuff. In which case I might like other stuff by the artists they'd worked with.

Believe me, that's plenty of degrees of freedom to work with. On the Kevin Bacon Game Principle, you should now be able to follow your trusted 'guides' to pretty much anywhere. Via stuff you stand a good chance of liking. It'll even get you out as far as Madonna (via William Orbit), Motorhead (via the Orb and the KLF), Pink Floyd (via Blue Pearl) and all points west.

Which also reminds me - since the DJ / Remixer / Producer role is all a bit of a continuum, there's a good chance that some of the 'non-dance' stuff you like is produced by someone who's also a name in the dance / electronica side of things. Oh, and a lot of stuff is on small, specialist labels where you stand a very good chance of liking several labelmates.

So dive into the documentation basically - gorge yourself on production credits, tracklists, remixers, record labels, then dive inand play the Bacon Game.

TomV

oh, a quick p.s. to the direct parent, Disc one of Oakenfold's Global Underground - Oslo mix is pretty DnB if you count LTJ Bukem as DnB, which I do ymmv, although granted in general you think Oakenfold, you think Trance, and Endtroducing DJ Shadow was pretty DnB by the standard of its time.

three words

[Edmund Blackadder]

Paul van Dyke

Re:three words

[Phil Wilkins]

trance is shit

Re:three words

[supermoose]

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what somebody who has taken a first-year art course sounds like. Moving along - postmodernism, and how to make irritating, sweeping generalizations about complex trends.

Don't like Moby now?

[quistas]

Boy, I hope you've got Tivo, or you're going to hate him after another couple commercial breaks.

-- q

Re:Don't like Moby now?

[Chris Pimlott]

The stuff on Animal Rights is understanbly not liked for adverts, because it's shit.

The track Alone is good, and I could easily imagine that as the background music for an advert. But you're right, man that album was terrible...

Heh..like asking ppl if they prefer GM to Ford

[Eol1]

2 cents:

Orbital - Orbital
Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works
Underworld - Beaucomp Fish
Mono - Formica Blues

Any thing by Portishead, Massive Attack, Viennia Scientists, Tricky, LTJ Bukem.

Re:Heh..like asking ppl if they prefer GM to Ford

[Carlos Laviola]

Great list. My favorite genre in Electronica is mostly what people call Trip-Hop -- stuff by Air, Portishead, Massive Attack, Kruder & Dorfmeister and others. There is a great directory of Trip-Hop artists called World of Trip Hop. Check it out.

Artists of varying subgenres

[ashpool7]

BT (The man, period. I'm not kidding :)
Underworld
Way Out West
Chicane
Hybrid
William Orbit
Orbital
Robert Miles

All are good enough that you can go to your local record store, pick up any regular album, and be happy with it.

Re:no offense but...

[Trillian_1138]

Implying that not knowing electronica means you can't listen to electronica is the same reason dumbfuck Linux elitists have kept Linux from being as popular as it might be.

The only way someone can get into a subject matter is to (surprise surprise) get into the subject matter... I'm going to take a guess and say you were not, in fact, *born* knowing about electronica, what bands are 'cool', where to get their music, and why others shouldn't be allowed to listen to it. At some point you did, in fact, have to *start* listening to it, conceivably without much knowledge about the subject.

If you want to actively ruin someone else's experience with a genre, then go ahead. But don't be a jerk about it.

"no offense" my left foot. You were tyring to politely exlude the questioner, eh?

Trillian
_______

VNV Nation

[xRizen]

rules all! Awesome lyrics, awesome sound. I don't even really like electronica, but VNV makes my soul smile.

Digitally Imported

[!ramirez]

Digitally Imported, I think, is a good place to start learning about electronica in general. It's internet radio, so it does kind of require a broadband connection, however it lets you listen to various artists without spending time randomly downloading/pirating MP3s, and it gives you (what I consider to be) a relatively wide spectrum. Also, electronica stations are in abundance on Shoutcast, check them out for links and info.

Another personal favorite is Massinova, which is a pretty small webcast station. Try them out, I'm almost always listening if I'm in front of my PCs.

Re:Digitally Imported

[micahjd]

Lately I've been running streamripper on Digitally Imported, then sorting the resulting MP3s by artist and listening randomly. When I find something I like, it's easy to find more of it, either on di.fm, or on CD.

There are several different ways to categorize electronic music. Everything2 has some interesting views on it. Some of my favorites:

• VNV Nation
• Apoptygma Berzerk
• Ian Van Dahl
• Paul Oakenfold
• Paul Van Dyk
• 303 Infinity
• Kosmonova
• Infected Mushroom
• DJ Doboy
• Blank and Jones

Digitally Imported

[kwishot]

www.di.fm

The greatest for streaming.
If you're looking for a good collection...a lot of the good ones have already been mentioned.
Aphex Twin, Crystal Method, etc. Also there have been some pretty good soundtracks in the recent past (Matrix & Fight Club come to mind).
If you don't mind stretching your definition of electronic, you could try some good industrial (older KMFDM or Stabbing Westward, for example).
-kwishot

Based on what you said you liked...

[FreshGroundPepper]

I'd start out with these:

DJ Tiesto - "Summerbreeze"
BT - "Movement in Still Life" or "Ima"
Oakenfold's "Tranceport" is a classic
George Acosta - "Next Level" or "Awake"

Also, if you don't have Sasha's Xpander EP, it is IMO his best work (and I really like his stuff), Northern Exposure (which he did with Digweed) is also at the very top of their music as well.

Some others worth considering:
Dave Ralph
Dave Seaman
Chemical Brothers
The Prodigy
Boards of Canada
Ray Munns
Orbital
The Crystal Method
Underworld

A lot of people are recommending these:
Aphex Twin
Square Pusher
Q-Burns Abstract Message
Autchere

While all of these are very good bands, I don't think that they are particularly accessable to someone who is new to Electronica.

Electroacoustic

[ScottBob]

Forget all the techno/electronica/house/doof-doof/etc. stuff they call "electronic music" nowadays. Look into electroacoustic music, the kind of electronic music that university music professors and electrical engineers have been doing since the mid 1950's (racks of punch cards fed into mainframes). Good starting links are SEAMUS and CSounds.

Re:Electroacoustic

[Phil Wilkins]

If that's the route you want to go, you should check out the OHM box set. An excellent collection of early works, including a very readable booklet. Beware though, this stuff is not for everyone.

Stuff you should check out

[BlueCalx-]

There's a difference between seminal/influential/whatever and *really good* recent stuff. So I'll differentiate between the two, and hopefully you can sort stuff out.

Some of the most important albums - to me at least - include the following:
Big beat/breaks/whatever: The Chemical Brothers - Dig Your Own Hole, The Crystal Method - Vegas, Fluke - Risotto
Trance: BT - ESCM, Paul Oakenfold - Global Underground New York, Sasha - Global Underground Ibiza (by far the best of the GU series, imho)
DNB: LTJ Bukem - Logical Progression (the first volume is my favorite), Roni Size Reprazent - New Forms
Turntablism: DJ Shadow - Entroducing, UNKLE - Psyence Fiction
Acid House: 808 State - Newbuild
Downtempo: Anything by Fila Brazilia, Coldcut, DJ Food, etc. Also, DJ Cam - Mad Blunted Jazz.
IDM: Aphex Twin - ...i care because you do, Orb - Ultraworld, Orbital - The Middle of Nowhere -or- In Sides, Boards of Canada - Music Has the Right to Children, Autechre - Tri Repetae++,

Newer stuff:
Prefuse 73 - Vocal Studies and Uprock Narratives is a wonderful experimental hip-hop/glitchy album, if you're into that sort of thing.
Dntel - Life is Full of Possiblities is the most utterly beautiful downtempo/IDM album I have heard in the past several years. It gets my highest recommendation.
Fennesz - Endless Summer if you're into very static-laden, glitchy, abrasive noise with a kinda eerily nice melody to it at times.
Just got into bands like Akufen, an experimental house group fraught with these amazing breakdowns; and Phonecia, a weird IDM-style rhythmic... thing. It's good too. :)
Matmos is worth checking out if you're into the stuff way out in left field. They did the production for Bjork's most recent album. Squeaky sound effects abound.
I also saw Telefon Tel Aviv, an indie band on the Hefty label, open at a recent show, and they were amazing. Check out their album too.
Finally, The Avalanches - Since I Left You is, in my opinion, the most stunning turntablism album of the past five years or so. 900+ records all sampled, with minimal scratching, into this completely amazing mix that has reaffirmed what you can do with a bunch of seemingly unrelated vinyl.

Most of this stuff isn't specific *dance* music, but IMHO the best of electronica isn't stuff you want to shake your booty to. This might be a little bit scatterbrained, but if you start picking up albums that seem to float your boat genre-wise you shouldn't have any big disappointments. If you want more recommendations that are more specific to what genres you'd like (trust me, I have *lots*), please feel totally free to email me.

Re:Stuff you should check out

[EvilBob]

Agree wholeheartedly on the Avalanches point, it is really fantastic music.

I also haven't seen mention of a few newer names who I also find very interesting:

BT - albums ESCM and Movement in Still Life, the vocal tracks in particular on these cds are amazing.

Delerium - Had a few tracks (e.g. Silence) that have been remixed for mainstream airplay. Quite enjoyable to listen to, nothing particularly energetic in there.

Lamb - This is, like The Avalanches work, just incredible music to hear, however I'm not sure how to classify it. Lamb have three albums I'm aware of, one self titled, Fear of Fours, and what sound. I recommend all three, however I still find the first the most involving. You can check one of their tracks from their latest album on their website here.

Re:Stuff you should check out

[dietz]

Turntablism: DJ Shadow - Entroducing

I would like to point out that this album is not, in fact, turntablism at all. It was done pretty much entirely on a sampler.

For some real turntablism, though, I highly reccomend the DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist albums Brainfreeze and Product Placement. You'll probably never be able to get your hands on an original this late in the game, but you should be able to score convincing bootlegs on eBay or download them off of P2P services.

I also reccomend both volumes of "Live at the Futureprimitive Soundsession".

Here are some of my favourites

[ParisTG]

In no particular order:

Nash The Slash - get some of his music linked from nashtheslash.com

Kraftwerk - some good stuff

Komputer - British version of Kraftwerk... similar style

Vangelis - Some GREAT stuff... Chariots of Fire, Direct, Theme from BladeRunner, Theme from 1492 (I think)... highly recommended!

Mike Oldfield - more great stuff... Tubular Bells!!

Skaven - from the mod scene... find some of his music on mp3.com or modarchive.com

Purple Motion - same as above... available on modarchive.com

Necros - same as above... modarchive.com

Enya - made some good stuff

Jean Michelle Jarre - some great classics here

Pink Floyd - not exactly electronic, but still great :D

Tangerine Dream - more great classics

There are more in my collection, but I can't recall them all at the moment. Let me know if you want me to check :).

Re:Here are some of my favourites

[nomadic]

Finally, someone suggests the originator of the whole genre. A lot of people who consider themselves electronica fans seem to believe that the music began in the 90's...

I mean, if you want a FOUNDATION you've got to start with Tangerine Dream, Kraftwerk, and Mike Oldfield...

Re:Here are some of my favourites

[_Sprocket_]

Jean Michelle Jarre - some great classics here

In 1986, Jarre performed a public concert in Houston, TX. It was appropriately called Rendezvous Houston and used the city skyline as a backdrop - at one point the fireworks, lazers, and spotlights seemed to set the skyline ablaze. The music was excellent. Jarre's performance was great - some of his electronic instraments have definate crowd appeal, and Jarre himself is an excellent showman.

The Final Redezvous had an amazing emotional impact. It had origionally involved a solo sax piece that was to be played by astronaut Ron McNair from the orbiting Challenger. Instead it was played by Kirk Whalum and became a poignant tribute to the lost shuttle and its fallen crew. The entire crowd of over a million was silent.

The solo is found on the Rendezvous album and is tittled, simply, "Ron's Piece".

Re:Here are some of my favourites

[darkonc]

Jean Jacques Perry was one of my favorites (from the mid-late '70s). I loved his "Moog Indigo". It actually took me years to realize tha one of the tracks was actually 'Turkey in the Straw'. If you can find his music, I'd highly recommend it.

Re:no offense but...was written by a poser

[Curious__George]

Exactly how does your miserable self worth go up by keeping your knowledge or appreciation of art form to yourself? Sharing knowledge or opinions now makes one a "sellout"?

I doubt that you were born with an intrinsic knowledge of anything (none of us are). Therefore you are advocating barring the door only after you are safely inside. What an intellectually dishonest position!

Like all art forms, there is no "right" or "wrong". It is a matter of personal preference. All the questioner is asking is for opinions on the starting points recommended by others.

We agree on one point however. If your personality (as your post reveals volumes about) is representative of the "community" I would rather we all stay out. Something tells me "the community" is smart enough to know that it is you that is driving down property values.

Mixing 101? Try music appreciation. : )

[Burning1]

Seriously, I think your first step should be to check out some of the free music archives...

I'm sure a couple of slashdotters are going to hate me for this, but http://www.mp3.com/ is a great place to start.

You'll find a huge number of different artists at varying skill levels, and no cost. It'll give you a chance to look at a wide range of styles (something that even a well stocked music store may not be able to do.) Additionally, you'll find many bits of information available regarding what a particular artist used for a song, what inspired him or her...

Turn your ear on... Search through the archives... My personal favorites?

• Minister
• Kahr
• Bassic

Outside of free MP3s, there are a large number of great artists. Consider looking for CDs from The Chemical Brothers, Prodigy, Micronaut, Lords of Acid, The Hive, and BT (I love BT : )

Also, don't forget inspiration from gaming. System Shock 2 had some killer music, as did Need For Speed 3 and Decent 1 & 2 (CD editions. Yes, I even have a copy of the D1 Mac CD because I loved the music.)

Some great gaming inspired music can be found at (he's going to hate me...) Putzi's site, and places like remix.overclocked.org.

Best of luck.

a laundry list

[OctaneZ]

There are many great Electonic bands that span many genres, electronic is not just dance.
Bands to check out:
A Guy Called Gerald
Aphrodite
The older Daft Punk albums are great
Groove Armada

The Classics:
Lo-Fidelity Allstars
The group that brought electronic to the masses The Crystal Method
MC 900 Ft Jesus (sorry couldn't find a better link)
The Prodigy

For a more layed back sound check out:
Massive Attack

without a doubt check out:
Faithless
Hybrid and absuolutley amazing group
Timo Maas OMG! An amazing artist!

but really just listen to a lot and decide what you like. one great thing about this type of music is there is a lot of collaboration between artists, so you can get some really neat crossovers and sounds.

-OctaneZ

Re:a laundry list

[|<amikaze]

Timo Maas is definately amazing. I've been hooked on their "Loud" CD for about a week now,ever since a friend of mine lent it to me. Great great music.

Streaming audio

[Vireo]

Maybe you'd want listening to online mp3 broadcasts... Almost all online radio stations have forums to discuss what's on air and such; pick up a station you like and you'll see what's playing, and what other listeners like. I suggest:

DigitallyImported (probably the most popular; trance, hard trance, house)
Massinova (eurodance / trance site in which users decide what will play next, with a moderation system for the tracks...)
SomaFM (oops, killed by CARP -- had good Drum'n'Bass)
Tag's Trance Trip (trance -- wait, off the air due to CARP)
XTC Radio (trance and prog house)
Philosomatika (goa and psytrance)
Bassdrive (drum'n'bass)
Xanu (Chillout and lounge)

Re:Streaming audio

[jheinen]

Going to Tag's redirects you to the RIAA site.

Hijacked?

Infected Mushroom

[samzklub]

Infected Mushroom is my favorite goa trance group. Their tracks are available on mp3.com.

Domu

[SirSlud]

This guy breaks up beats, and adds really really lougy jazzy fusiony hooks to them.

Awesome stuff. Also, Aphex Twin, Ninja Tunes stuff, Squarepusher, Plastik Man, etc .. for the cut'n'paste to drill'n'bass sounds.

Techno

[InsaneCreator]

If you are into a bit harder/techno rythms you should check out DJs like Umek, Chis Liebing, Valentino Kanzyani, Sven Vaeth, Jeff Mills, Takkyu Ishino, Simon Digby, Ben Sims... There were a lot of their sets available on Audiogalaxy, but that's not much help now, I guess.

Off the top of my head...

[HRbnjR]

and in no particular order...

Nick Sentience
Timo Maas
Jan Driver
Mauro Picotto
Son Kite
Ed Rush & Optical
RAM Trilogy
Juno Reactor
Sourmash
Laurent Garnier
Nick Warren
Bassbin Twins
Dieselboy
Paul Oakenfold
Fatboy Slim
Armand Van Helden
Josh Wink
CJ Bolland
Prodigy
Daft Punk
Chemical Brothers

It's A Shame...

[Trinity-Infinity]

I'd suggest you point iTunes to the stream at Tag's Trance, but the CARP legislation got in the way :(

me!

[deceptakahn]

I humbly suggest - me! Im a dj and producer in dallas, tx, and ive got all sorts of mixtapes and tracks ive produced for download.

check out http://www.deceptakahn.com for mp3s and the like.

AudioGalaxy and SoulSeek

[Aphelion]

AudioGalaxy used to be great for electronica. A lot of the stuff that got released on AG never quite made it to store shelves, since a lot of electronica only made to vinyl or went straight to clubs. You could subscribe to groups for certain genres, clubs, or DJ's and get music automatically. I really can't overemphasize the importance that that one program had to the electronica scene (which also revolves around getting the newest tracks each week.) Unfortunately that's no longer the case and a good replacement hasn't really been decided on. For now it seems that most of us are trying SoulSeek, which is an eletronica-only p2p network. There's actually a really great selection there, and it's still a rather tightly-knit community. Find a genre you like and join its respective chat room. I recommend starting in the "House music lovers" room and browsing users' files there.

daft punk, crydamoure

[HanzoSan]

anything from daft punk or the crydamoure label, aphex twin and plaid are good too

Might I Suggest

[Myriad]

Of course all music is subjective, even within a particlar classification, being a huge electronica/industrial fan may I recommend the following:

VNV Nation: particularly "Standing", "Savior (Vox)" and "Rubicon" - very club/dance but with an edge
Covenant: examples include "Figurehead", "Dead Stars", and "Go Film" - generally a little darker than VNV, but still will an up beat.
Cyber Tec or C-Tec: a Front 242 spinoff, good tunes include "She Left", "The Lost" (a personal fav)
Claire Voyant: "Majesty", "Love the Giver" (which has a GREAT remix by Eskil Simonsson's)
----The rest are just group names, I can add song titles if anyone wants...
Beborn Benton
Evil Toys (aka TOY)
Wolfsheim
SPOCK (well Back on Mars anyway)
Elegant Machinery
And One
Apoptygma Bezerk (older stuff preferably)
Project Pitchform (industrial sound) X Marks the Pedwalk
Cobolt 60
Delerium
Funker Vogt (not one of my favs, but they have some good tunes.)
Haujobb
Mentallo & the Fixer
Nitzer Ebb
ReWork
Velvet Acid Christ (good!!)
Wumpscut

None of these are in any particular order, but are a good overview of groups that I like. As always YMMV. If anyone wants some song titles lemme know...

Schaeffer, Stockhausen - electronic music 'roots'

[bodyborg]

Just to give props to the forefathers I will mention that what we consider "electronic music" which should really be called electronic *dance* music is in large part due to the efforts of two major figures in mid 20th century. There was a sort of competition (but not really) between France and Germany. The research in both countries was funded by the national radio broadcastin corporations of each contry.
Franc's Pierre Schaeffer believed in mixing (called sampling today) sounds and making new sounds by tweaking existing sound/music via tape splicing/cutting/reverse taping and so forth which became known as musice concret (or concrete music). 1948 RTF (Radiodiffusion-television Francaise) broadcasted Pierre Schaeffer's Etude aux Chemin de Fer whiched marked the beginning of studio realizations and musique concrete.

Germany's Stockhausen worked largely with pure electronic devices that generated noise/music. The german school believed in pure electronic devices and sounds generated by analog devices. This effort was lead by Karlheinz Stockhausen and one of his seminal works is Microphonie I and II. His effort began in 1951 with the establishment of a Studio in Cologne -- NWDR (Nordwest Deutsche Rundfunk).

Later on these electronic music researchers collaborated with many others including each other. There was some work done prior to this in the 30's by for instance John Cage but it was largely tweaking around with a newly invented device called the tape recorder and prior to that many others had invented/devised novel 'electronic instruments' but no one had made it a life long effort to create a genre of music the way these two men and others who came after them did.

For info on earlier electronic instruments check out www.obsolete.com and for the bleeding edghe research on current electronic music research (using sound as particles as opposed to waves!!)
please see the the create Project's 'Pulsar Generator' at UCSB:
http://www.create.ucsb.edu/htmls/code.html

cheers.
T

Trance != electronic music

[Jonny 290]

Here's teh lowdown. Oakenfold is fucking glowstick waving stadium trance. Micro cancelled a gig in Tulsa last week because "there weren't enough people there." Terry Mullan has a 40 percent cancel rate.

The presence of MDMA and K at massives attract stupid frat boys and sorority girls who get mashed up and raise their hands to people who shouldn't be making 300 bucks a night, let alone 15,000 like Oaky.

Here are a few links for background information on drum and bass, arguably a deeper, more exciting genre than Eurotrance, and definitely the most diverse genre out there.

Ishkur
Dogs On Acid
Drum and Bass Arena
And here's a pretty good atmospheric drum and bass mix by yours truly.

Re:Trance != electronic music

[Davorama]

You are missing out on what trance is really good for - coding music. While I'm sure you're on the mark for the live experiance, nothing beats the stuff for drowning out office gossip, bringing up the heartrate and focusing the mind.

Re:Trance != electronic music

[Izeickl]

Trance IS electronic music, just because you may not like it doesnt throw it out of the genre. While I like Drum & Bass also, the technical difficulty is far less, if you listen closely to tunes from each type, you can hear that -good- Trance has far more to it than -good- Drum & Bass.

Re:Trance != electronic music

[Jonny 290]

I'll put Photek, Roni Size or Mocean Worker up against any trance out there. Even Goa, which sounds very complex, is built up out of very repetitive 303 lines. I honestly don't see any trance artists out there hand-tweaking every bass drum, snare, and hihat sample that they use...and I know for a fact that every drum and bass producer does that, myself included

I should have titled this as "Trance Electronic Music", as the point that I wanted to communicate was not that it's NOT electronic music, but that electronic music is not JUST trance.

I don't view "complexity" as the measuring stick for a genre's legitimacy. If so, then Bogdan Raczynski and Autechre on their LP5 album own every other producer out there. :)

Re:Trance != electronic music

[mosch]

yes, because 'Hey Baby, hey baby, hey baby, yeah baby' is less repetitive than good trance.

trance works by creating a pattern, then modifying elemnts of the pattern at varying rates. clearly this is a strategy that doesn't work if you don't repeat things. go listen to an album by infected mushroom or growling mad scientists and then try to honestly tell me that there is no such thing a great trance music.

Re:Trance != electronic music

[Jonny 290]

No, largely trance works by having the most heart-rending breakdowns and cartoonish emotional pseudo-journeys to get all the rollin kids to raise their glowsticks in the air.

MODs, S3Ms, XMs, oh my.

[Dan Crash]

Instead of sipping from the cup of lukewarm techno that is most modern electronica, I'd suggest diving into the 16-bit wonderland that was and is the MODscene.

Back before there were MP3s or computers fast enough to play them, there were MODs -- 4 channel music files that began on the Amiga, and contained their own samples. MODs encouraged experimentation in electronic music on a level never seen before -- you could download a MOD, load it up in your tracker, and start coding a new song using the samples already there.

MODs branched out from their 4 channel beginnings into multiple channels and a variety of new extensions like .S3M, .XM, *.ULT, *.IT., and the more powerful the tracking software became, the more people were drawn to the scene. It was the online equivalent of jazz clubs in the '30s. I think it's one of the great secret stories of the web.

Then RealAudio hit. And after that, MP3. Online music aficionados began to follow a different path, and MODs, like BBS culture, slowly died. The MOD culture is still around, eclipsed but not forgotten. I'd suggest starting with The Kosmic Free Music Foundation, arguably the most prolific and influencial modgroup of that era. You could also check out the Hornet archive or the Modarchive. Either Winamp or XMMS should play them.

_________________________
Check your karma. It's changed.

Re:MODs, S3Ms, XMs, oh my.

[Eil]

I second this. This is how I got into Electronica to start with. (A Born Slippy mod remix is how I found Underworld) I've still got all of my old favorites on disk and ready to be played. Here's a short of some of my old-school mod favorites:

Wonderful Theme II
Makina
Abandon
At the Top
Bad Gun
Barnyard Rave
A Better World Remix
Capital Punishment
Celestial Fantasia
Under Blue Sky ...And Tears Apart
Catch That Goblin!
Johnnys Guardian
Rave Two
Faraway Love
Feats of Valor
Good Disco Beat
Bytes
Pinball
We have to try...
Get Ready 4 This
Check the Sound
Discovery
Beyond Heaven
Flight Over the Earth
I Need a Drink
Jump and Run
Interphase
More Than Meets the Mind
Kiss Me You Fool
Kingdom of the Sky
Colors of Neptune
Pawn
Misery
Pusher '99 South Park Mix
I Can't Ever Face...
Unreal2 Scirreal Mix
Apollo 440 TAD Rmx
Virus of Pain

(Sorry for the lack of artists, I ripped these straight from a playlist... These titles should be enough to find the files in the archives mentioned in the parent post, though.)

Though, if you're going to play mods, you might as well go all the way and make them sound good as well by using Modplug instead of Winamp. I *think* XMMS comes with a mod input plugin based on Modplug code, but if not, you can download it from the xmms site.

Cheers and happy listening.

Re:MODs, S3Ms, XMs, oh my.

[OnyxRaven]

i'm absolutely amazed. I havent listened to an xm or it or s3m or whathaveyou in a long time. Future Crew, Triton, KFMF, god theres a HUGE selection of great stuff out there, though I dont know whats actually out there still.

Time to break out the couple cds I have left of music. I have archives of dreamcatcher99/00, most of the old hornet archives, and kfmf archives 1996-2000.

Catch that goblin (Purple Motion of Future Crew if i'm not mistaken), Unreal2 (a demo from Future crew, it was abso-friggin-lutely unbelievable), and Interphase are ones I recognize immediately, though my guess is I have many of the others around heh.

Re:MODs, S3Ms, XMs, oh my.

[raygundan]

Ah, MODs. This is how I really got my start into electronic music-- pulling MODs down to my trusty Amiga 500 over a 1200bps connection to a BBS system somewhere. And then carefully recording them off to cassette for playback in my trusty station wagon.

It was a really cool thing to be a part of, and I'm glad somebody else remembers it!

One track in particular I wish I hadn't lost in a hard drive crash was a beautiful exercise in frogger-ish noises and gradually accelerating tempo. If only I knew what it was called.

OMFG YES

[Tokerat]

Also of honorable mention:

Harry Diamond
BK (Ben Keen)
Lisa Lashes
Anything else off the Nukleuz Label
Bad Boy Bill
Richard Humpty Vission
BT
UFO
Anabolic Frolic
DJ Irene (the new Photosynthesis CD is incredible)
George Acosta
DJ Venom
DJ Sonik
Lil Sue
DJ Entropy
DJ Necromancer (awsome up-and-commer)
DJ DB
Felix Da Housecat
Danny the Wildchild

And if you enjoy live performing artists, DO NOT MISS:
Obis Cygma
Skylab 2000
Cyrrus
SPACEGIRL (absolutely incredible)

There are a million others I should mention...

Also check out Bangin' Tunes for all your latest UK hard style needs... I buy most of my vinyl from them (I spin mostly those genres). Good stuff to be had.

Orbital

[sulli]

Start with The Middle of Nowhere, then get The Altogether and The Brown Album. Good start for me a few years ago, and it can be for you too. (Also on my iPod at the moment: Kruder & Dorfmeister, The K&D Sessions.)

Re:Orbital

[WasterDave]

Noooo! Don't start with Middle, it's wank. The official shit Orbital album. Brown, definately. Insides, definately. Snivilisation, very definately. Then maybe The Altogether (get "The Altogether 5.1" on DVD, it kicks arse), Green, the Orange one with remixes whose name I can't remember and it's at my mate's house. Then the Middle of Nowhere. In that order :)

K&D are cool. Check out "Suzuki" by Tosca (The D in K&D), and G-Stoned by K&D.

Dave

Re:Orbital

[Phil Wilkins]

The Orange one is 'Diversions', and it's a US only collection of ep and compilation tracks from between the brown album and snivilisation.

Re:Orbital

[sulli]

I'll agree that I don't listen to Middle as much now, but for the newbie it's a nice choice. Fave at the moment is the B side of Altogether. Need to get Insides and Snivilisation... off to Amoeba later today.

Essential Dance Music

[szyzyg]

It's not exactly the most undeground site in the world, but the quality of the music and info is first class - the BBC Radio 1 website covers the UK's #1 modern music station. During the day it plays very mainstream material, but at nights a load of specialist shows come on including a lot of dance music.

Pete Tong's friday night show is considered something of a trendsetter, while shows like Gile's Petersons Worldwide, Mary Anne Hobbes Breezeblock and the Unstoppable Annie Nightingale explore other parts of the music. This week they're also spending the weekend at the love Parade in berlin - so expect lots of tough teutonic tech trance.

But! Best of all - Radio 1 is the home of the Essential Mix - every week they give over 2 hours of airtime to a featured DJ who gets to play what they like, without any Ads or jingles to get in the way. These shows are legendary, search on your favourite p2p network and you'll find them. The BBC even somewhat encourages taping of the shows - they used to get tape inlays published in major Dance music Magazines like Mixmag and Musik. If you can't find those then tracklistings.org have a fairly complete archive of who played what and when.

But... if you want to stay legit then Radio 1 has started storing the shows for a week so you can go in any time and listen to what you missed - it's all in real audio.... but don't balk just yet - Radio 1 was one of teh BBC stations participating in the OGG test earlier this year - so maybe if you e-mail the right people often enough then you'll get it back.

Other online dance music places I'd recommend are Groovetech which for me is mainly a place to buy vinyl, but they feature a lot of radio shows, extended samples and interviews. LiveDJs.com used to be good, but has kinda died out - I even played a few gigs there. Epitonic has a neat feature for newbies - they have little streams which basically introduce particular genres of music - they also have quite a lot of free tracks to try.

On the Musical recommendations side - I'm big into breakbeat right now - look for artists like Hybrid, BT, Plump DJ's or compilations like Y4K. I'd love to point people at a .ogg of a CD mix I did on www.djsnm.com - but the last time I put a direct link from slashdot I almost exceeded my Bandwidth limits.

I've been a DJ for years, I plyed old school raves in the UK, evaded police and escaped with my record collection.... and I still play the latest stuff now I'm in San Francisco. Come out to An Sibin (1176 Sutter at Polk) on Monday nights and catch my weekly gig.

Re:Essential Dance Music

[Tet]

During the day it plays very mainstream material, but at nights a load of specialist shows come on including a lot of dance music.

Yep, and including virtually NO rock. In days gone by, Radio 1 used to play a good cross-section of music -- mainstream chart stuff during the day, and then a wide spectrum of everything else in the specialist shows at night. These days, however, it plays a wide spectrum of specalist dance oriented shows. There's no rock, no metal, no goth, no industrial, in fact, none of the music I like :-( I'm not expecting a lot. but at the moment, the Radio One rock show consists of a single 2 hour show after midnight on a week day, and even that only really plays mainstream "nu-metal" type rock...

Re:Essential Dance Music

[Alex]

An excellent post - one thing.

John Peel - The man is a legend - he plays everything from punk to folk to trance, has been at Radio 1 since it was founded in the 60's and is literally a walking encyclopedia of music.

Listen to his real audio streams on the BBC website,

Alex

Re:Essential Dance Music

[szyzyg]

Rock is coming back... yep Mary Anne Does her rock show, and there's Steve Lamaq's evening sessions which covers plenty of rock. There's also now a specialist Punk show called the Lock Up.

I used to be a hge rock fan, listening to Tommy Vance and Alan Freeman every week, I kinda stopped all that when I started DJ'ing.

What about

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

The Laziest Men on Mars? :P

Tim

Some of my favorites

[krogoth]

I've been listening to electornic music for a little more than a year, and I have a list of favorite artists:

Airscape
ATB
Cosmic Gate
Blank & Jones
Cosmic Gate
Das Licht
DJ Sonix (might be hard to find)
DJ Tiesto
Ferry Corsten
Cosmic Gate
Gouryella
Kamaya Painters (Mainly Endless Wave Albion Mix and Far From Over)
Paul Oakenfold (Look for his Essential Mix in China)
Pfaffendorf
Cosmic Gate
System F

You should also listen to the Essential Mix on BBC Radio 1.

Trance, house, breakbeat, etc.

[Aphelion]

Tastes in electronica range as widely as tastes in any kind of music. There's mostly house, trance, and a bunch of other stuff like breakbeat. In my experience, first-time listeners like trance more than anything else, since the high frequency synths and such probably remind them of pop. Personally, it gets old after a while, and you'll start getting into house, which is made, instead, with drum machines and the like.

Trance is mostly trance and hard trance. Some great hard trance producers include Cosmic Gate, Svenson and Gielen (Gielen also being known as Airscape), and Tiesto. DJ's include Ferry Corsten and again Tiesto. If you like ambient, soothing trance you want to look into Delerium and, maybe if you are looking for a little sophistication, Dave Seaman.

For house, there is straight house (Different Gear), deep house (John Creamer & Stephane K), tech house (Mauro Picotto), and hard house (all of the above except Different Gear.) DJ's include Danny Tenaglia and Deep Dish.

Eventually, it's interesting to expand your tastes to breakbeat (check out System F and BT) and other subgenres. Also believe it or not, Paul Oakenfold's new album Bunkka is practically all breakbeat, so pick that up if you can.

Good luck finding what you like.

HELL YES

[Tokerat]

I'm going to Energy in RI to see venom in a few weeks. I've already seen him liek 20938475203984765203948567 times but it never gets old.

"IIIIIIIIIII want aaaaaction to-night! Saaaaaaaaatis-faaaction to-night!"

hard style. it 0wnz.

Re:HELL YES

[Tokerat]

I'm all over Pleasurehead too

Branching out

[dietz]

Orbital's In Sides

Orb's Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld

Things on the Ninja Tune label (try DJ Food's "Kaleidescope" and Herbaliser's "Very Mercenary")

LTJ Bukem's Logical Progression (Volume 1, which isn't labeled Volume 1, but Volume 2 isn't it, obviously :)

Aphex Twin (Selected Ambient Works 85-92 and Richard D. James album)

I mostly listen to more experimental/IDM stuff now, but those are some more accessible classics that have really stood the test of time for me.

Of course, I can't stand trance (i.e. Sasha and Digweed/Oakenfold) so my opinions may not be worth much to you. But if you like Sasha+Digweed and Oakenfold a lot, just keep your eye out for things marked "trance". That's the specific sub-genre of electronic music that you're listening to.

Watch the videos here.

[URoRRuRRR]

Here, you can watch them online... (QT format, sorry Taco, I think they ARE worth it tho')

The video for Windowlicker, a commentary on rap videos that times in at 11 minutes

The video for Come to Daddy, perhaps the finest music video ever. It has a deep meaning to it too, about the media

Boy, that site is gonna go down quickly. They're worth it tho'. (and legal, I believe)

Re:Watch the videos here.

[SpatchMonkey]

These and other videos are also available on Warp Records' website, in various different formats:

ANTI-POP CONSORTIUM - ANTI-POP CONSORTIUM IN LONDON PROMO*ANTI-POP CONSORTIUM - APC AT WARP PARTY _ 09/11/01*APHEX TWIN - APHEX TWIN AT SONAR 2001*APHEX TWIN - COME TO DADDY*APHEX TWIN - DONKEY RHUBARB*APHEX TWIN - DRUKQS CLIP*APHEX TWIN - DRUKQS PLAYER*APHEX TWIN - ON*APHEX TWIN - VENTOLIN*APHEX TWIN - WINDOW LICKER*AUTECHRE - AE CONFIELD *AUTECHRE - BASSCADET *AUTECHRE - SECOND BAD VILBEL*BEAUMONT HANNANT - UTUBA*BROADCAST - PAPERCUTS*JIMI TENOR - MIDSUMMER NIGHT*JIMI TENOR - OUTTA SPACE*JIMI TENOR - SUGARDADDY*JIMI TENOR - TAKE ME BABY*JIMI TENOR - TOTAL DEVASTATION*JIMI TENOR - YEAR OF THE APOCALYPSE*JOHN CALLAGHAN - I'M NOT COMFORTABLE INSIDE MY MIND*LFO - TIED UP*NIGHTMARES ON WAX - AFTERMATH*NIGHTMARES ON WAX - FINER*NIGHTMARES ON WAX - LES NUITS*PLAID - EYEN*RED SNAPPER - IMAGE OF YOU*SABRES OF PARADISE - WILMOT*SEEFEEL - FRACTURE*SPEEDY J - SYMMETRY*SQUAREPUSHER - COME ON MY SELECTOR*RED SNAPPER - SOME KIND OF KINK*TORTOISE - SENECA*VINCENT GALLO - HONEYBUNNY*WARP RECORDS - DAVE SLADE PROMO*WARP RECORDS - THE 7 YEAR GLITCH

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Here goes...

[jcsehak]

I LOVE all these albums.

House:
Armand Van Helden- 2future4U or Killing Puritans
Fatboy Slim- You've come a Long Way Baby or Halfway Between the gutter and the Stars (don't ignore the master)
As far as DJs go, Danny Tenaglia- Global Underground 010 is great. I don't listen to a lot of DJ mixes though. They get kind of repetetive for me. Good to dance to, but not to put on in the living room. Fatboy Slim's Big Beat Boutique CD is an exception to this though. Man I'd love to see him live.
If you can find it, get Archigram's single Carnival. Just got it, love it. I first heard it on Pete Tong's radio show, which airs friday night 6-9 in England. But I listen to it over the web at bbc.co.uk/radio1. I'm pretty sure they archive the show each week so you can listen to it anytime.

Drum & Bass:
Everything But the Girl vs. Drum & Bass. EBTG's album "Walkiung Wounded" is really good too. That's where the singles that are remixed on the former come from.
Photek does some of that remixing. Great, but i can't recommend a specific album.

Experimental:
Boards of Canada- In a Beautiful place out in the country
Land of the Loops- Bundle of Joy. Kind of a cross between electronica and indie rock.
Funkstorung- their remix of Bjork's Allis full of love is unbelievable.
While you're at it, don't forget Bjork. Homogenic and Vespertine are pure genius.

Downtempo:
Theivery Corporation- Sounds from the theivery hi-fi
Nightmares on Wax- Carboot Soul
Kruder & Dorfmeister- The K&D Sessions
Peace Orchestra- Peace Orchestra
Joshua Csehak- A Day for Nyla (yeah, that's me, link in my sig. Hey, I can't help it if I think it kicks ass)
Massive Attack- Mezzanine. But the track "Better Things" off of Protection is maybe their best track ever.
Air- Virgin Suicides. Also, Moon Safari. Their other two are really good too though.

Hip hop:
I just can't leave out Missy Elliott's "Supa Dupa Fly." If you're thinking about delving into hip-hop, get it without hesitation.

Simply mindblowing:
William Orbit- Pieces in a modern style

That should get you started. Just pick a genre you feel like listening to and buy. Or download, as the case may be.

on good music

[UserChrisCanter4]

I usually don't try to get into arguments over "good" vs. "Bad" music, but I'd simply like to voice my opinion on the subject. As the old adage goes, opinions are like assholes, blah blah

When one talks about good vs. bad music, one isn't speaking in the same manner as they are about good vs. bad software o good vs. bad electronics or so forth. It's a matter of opinion.

Who am I to say that, for example, The Ramones are better than Britney Spears. I'm just one guy who prefers the former to the latter. Now, I could have a hojillion music critics and punk fans support me in my opinion, but it means naught to the next fella, if he prefers upbeat pop lyrics.

Perhaps this person enjoys top 40 electronica. I enjoy it too, sometimes. Just as I sometimes prefer a 90 minute Action movie to a 3 hour long Oscar-winning period drama, I sometimes prefer some Daft Punk to DJ Esoteric So-and-So (note how I omit the name, as you probably think DJ esoteric so-and-so is crap compared to This other DJ So-andso. It's not you personally, it's simply the rules of discussing music online). Even though I might readily admit that the former pales in comparison to the latter, sometimes I'm just not in that mood.

Your points on international shipping, though, are quite valid. Ditto for the song issues, although I have a friend who insists on driving to the huge-ass record store to purchase his imports at ~$30/cd prices because he considers it part of the "experience". To each his own.

Re:soulseek ( for linux)

[OctaneZ]

There is a python based linux client available at:
http://www.sensi.org/~ak/pyslsk/

I have not used this service, only puttin git out there for you to try and decide for yourself.

shop vinyl!

[acm]

If you wan't to get into underground 'dance music' (my preferred term for the genre, although it rules out downtempo and the like), you gotta shop records!

Groovetech has thousands of audio/video broadcasts archived from the sets of many big and small name DJs. They also keep a healthy selection of vinyl that you can sample and purchase.

Tweekin Records is my favorite place to shop for vinyl. They're based out of San Francisco, update their site w/new records weekly, and have MP3 audio samples of all their records.

Satellite Records, based out of NYC, is another good place to preview and order records. All their samples are in real audio.

Re:shop vinyl!

[Phil Wilkins]

Seconded on Groovetech, for shopping and listening.

Juno's good for checking out new tracks. More releases than Groovetech, but only 30 second clips.

Betalounge is very good for mixes and live sets. Nice variety, and no shit trance.

A good binary newsgroup...

[antdude]

alt.binaries.sounds.mp3.dance

A good place for those types of music.

Re:Electronic Music P2P

[dimator]

I hate it when wine doesn't work on something I really want to run. It mostly runs, but I can't set the download directory without it crashing.

One band not mentioned yet.

[jchawk]

KMFDM is awesome! They have a kinda hybrid techno / industrial sound and is a great starting point into electronic music because unlike many of the other suggested artists they have plenty of vocals.

I'm certainly not knocking any of the other suggestions, because I listen to many of them, I'm just suggesting KMFDM from personal experience. They are the band that started the ball rolling down the Electronic music hill for yours truely.

I would recommend to first buy some of the newer albums. One of the best to give you an idea about KMFDM is the album that has a bunch of symbols for the title, a skull, a bomb, and some others. I will just call it "The Symbols" album. You'll know it when you see it.

Give it a listen and if you like it dive into some of their other albums. Glory, Light, What do you know Deutchland, Angst, Nihil, XTORT, Agogo, Adios, Attak are all wonderful albums. I own just about everything KMFDM has ever produced and I can honestly say I love every song.

If you dig them, they are an excellent bridge into some of the more experimental stuff like Aphex Twin.

Hope this helps. If you want to talk further please email me at my slashdot username @ the listed URL above.

Yeah Baby!

[HRbnjR]

Anthony Pappa
Cevin Fisher
Peace Division
Eddie Amador
Peshay
Mr Scruff
DJ Dan
Stretch N Vern
Leftfield
X-Cabs

Some thoughts, and Sasha-centric recommendations

[twilight30]

Well, nothing too sophisticated here, but the label Global Underground has put out some good work over the last three years or so; it's not been quite so fantastic of late, however.

If you want to ease yourself in, I'd suggest using a p2p client and downloading some Essential Mixes (The link goes to the BBC's Radio One dance music page). Recommendations, tracklistings and flamewars from plenty of users at the Essential Mix discussion site. Personal favourites I would recommend:

• Sasha - GU009 San Francisco
• John Digweed - GU014 Hong Kong
• Sasha - GU013 Ibiza (My #1 Desert Island Disc)
• Sasha - Airdrawndagger - to be released 05 August, though you can probably find bootlegs over the net. My most treasured recent possession at the moment. Takes a while to get into it, but truly a great find once you're acclimatised.
• Sasha & Digweed - Northern Exposure 1 & 2
• Sander Kleinenberg - NuBreed 004(5?) - GU's up-and-comer label. IMHO, the best of the NuBreed series
• Paul van Dyk - Vorsprung Dyk Technic - Avoid his more recent releases; they're cheesy as fuck. These disks, however, are top-notch.
• Chemical Brothers - Any and all of their discs, including the Heavenly Social remixes
• Way Out West - comprised of Nick Warren and Jody Westerberg (sp?). Warren's own work is also superb and consistent.

I would also suggest looking at related artists. Dance music encompasses a lot of styles, and cross-pollination goes on all the time. Massive Attack are another excellent act; all of their albums are great. One non-dance music act I love has to be Spiritualized. Though they don't really do dance music per se, they have an ethos and sensibility that matches well. Perfect morning-after music.

I've been lucky enough to see nearly all the acts listed above, and yes, they are all better live. Best of luck!

Aphex Twin

[Rura Penthe]

While it has been said numerous times in comments thus far, I cannot recommend Aphex Twin highly enough. Aphex Twin is actually the work of one man (Richard D. James) and runs the gamut from soft and beautiful (Xtal off Selected Ambient Works 85-92) to acid metal styling (Come To Daddy off Come To Daddy) to abstract noise (almost anything off Selected Ambient Works Volume II). aphextwin.nu is the website for all things Richard D. James, but be sure to pick up the Richard D. James album (contains Girl/Boy song, most likely his most popular song ever), Selected Ambient Works 85-92, Come To Daddy (if only for Flim), and I Care Because You Do (once you ease yourself into his more abstracted music you will likely enjoy Ventolin, Start As You Mean To Go On, and more).

You also could consider picking up some of his singles such as On, or even look for some of the work he has done under other names (Powerpill was a group name he made up when he did a Pacman remix that many people have heard).

Obviously I cannot recommend Aphex Twin highly enough, so don't take my word for it, check out his work! Full albums are difficult if not impossible to find on the net so sample individual tracks when you can find them prior to buying.

Some I see missing

[Davorama]

Nobody has mentioned DJ Tiesto. Great stuff. I didn't see Sandra Collin's Tranceport album. That, or Oakenfold's Transport are the two best mixes I've heard.

While not *the* best, I've always liked the Ministry of Sound mixes. There's one by Roger Sanchez in particular that's a very well done blast from the past of 70's and 80's tunes. Being an old Police and Specials fan newly into trance music I have a soft spot for this one.

Re:Orbital, Leftfield and Moby Are Highly Recommen

[displague]

Underworld's "everything, everything" DVD is the absolute best thing available...

recommendations

[discogravy]

anything by aphex twin, there's a recent "classics" collection,
anything pre-"confield" by autechre (I would recommend "Amber" or "Tri-repetae++" or "Incunabula",)
anything post-1990 by Coil, --check out their best-of collections "Golden Hair: A Guide for Beginners" and "Silver Voice: A Guide for Finishers"
everything by Squarepusher (check out "Budokhan Mindphone") and plaid (try the peel sessions EP).

nobukazu takemura "sign" EP. A 2-CD EP, with the 2nd CD containing the awesome animated video for the song "Sign".

Anything by Matmos (like the new live album or "A Chance to Cut is a Chance to Cure"...made entirely from samples of plastic surgery.)

Almost anything by The Orb (UFOrb, Cydonia, Orbus Terrarum, Toxygene are all excellent) and Orbital's "the box" EP or "Snivilisation" albums are best (although everything except their new one is top-notch). If you EVER get a chance, catch Orbital live; it is an experience not to be missed. They headlined Lollapalooza for a reason (same year as Tool, too.)

"Stay Down" or "Virus With Shoes" by 2 Lone Swordsmen

"Fear of Fours" by Lamb

check some of the online resources like lomechanik.net and consider downloading some tracks from soulseek or a similar service.

As far as a lot of the Warp artists go, their Peel Sessions stuff is GREAT! (aphex, autechre plaid all come to mind). Warp used to be fantastic but has recently been putting out SHIT (Gallo's album comes to mind).

Avoid Josh Wink like the goddamn plague (ditto Moby). Also, check out Autoplate Records a free web-only record label. Some good stuff for free. :)

The many flavors of electronic music

[philam3nt]

Defining a 'best' in electronic music is like defining a 'best' in rock....Electronic music has the most sub-genres of any music type I know of. Nevertheless, there are the major categories, but keep in mind that often the most talented artists do not confine their music to one type alone.

The most well known word for electronic music is probably techno, however techno != electronic, rather it is a type of electronic popular earlier in the 90s, while electronic music was growing more mainstream. You'll most often hear (for subgenres):

Techno | Trance | Drum n' Bass | Breakbeat | House | Jungle | Industrial | Ambient | Chill

often used with the modifiers 'hard', 'acid', or 'progressive' as in hard house, or progressive trance. In a lot of ways, these are self-explanatory...hard means that the music is rougher, and is usually faster paced; drum n bass consists of drum beats and heavy basslines.

Everyone here will try to tell you the best artist to listen to....but I can tell you for sure that I know no two people with the same taste in electronic music. You really have to discover for yourself the kind that interests you most. I suggest listening to some generic online radio if you want to know the mainstream electronica, most of which is a carryover from europe's tech-pop eurotrash trance. That's where you'll find the names most people will refer to you.

However, the best way to discover electronic music is to support your local scene. I would list true local websites, but being low-budget community supported as they are, I wouldn't subject them to the bandwidth of the slightest slashdotting. You can, however, find your nearest real record store (good electronic comes out on analog lps for real djs) and they will be happy to direct you to flyers and websites informing you of local happenings. Go out and hear some of your best local djs, and truly experience the music for yourself (many djs of different styles will play in the same night) - that will be the fastest path to knowing your interests. Also, once you find a dj you like, find out his/her influences, and that will point you to some excellent (lesser-known?) artists.

Some of the best cuts are the hardest to find, but there's a ton of great music out there. I wish you (all) luck, and PLUR!!

Re:The many flavors of electronic music

[mosch]

fuck PLUR, i just want bangin' music.

Hrmm...the best are obviously...

[fluxrad]

Many will argue over what the "best" electronica albums are but almost anyone who knows anything about the subject will invariably have these albums in their collection (most of it spans "techno" since this is the most main-stream type of electronica).

Must Haves:

Chemical Brothers - Dig your own hole (This album basically popularized techno!)
The Crystal Method - Vegas
Daft Punk - Homework
Paul Oakenfold - most of his work is overrated but he's mixed some good stuff.

Aside from those must haves, some artists I would definitely recommend checking out are:

The Prodigy
Underworld
Aphex Twin
Propellerheads
Portishead (more trip-hop but pretty good beats)
Massive Attack (see above)
Trance Control
DJ Dan

Alot of people will tell you to get this DJ or that DJ, but really you can pick whatever you want, to taste. Most people think Oakenfold is the best DJ ever...but then again...most people I've heard say this have also said, "Oh my gawd! Dave Matthews is like, totally hot, and stuff" in the same sentance. After the above, you've got a pretty well rounded collection that will take you a bit further into whatever it is you like. Remember, each of the genres (Trance/Techno/Jungle/House/Break Beat/etc) have their own set of "must have" albums and artists, so take what most people tell you with a grain of salt.

shoutcast

[StandardDeviant]

Easy, assuming you have a machine that can play streaming music decently (hook your soundcard into a decent stereo if possible, anything other than those crappy little $5 made-in-china speakers most computers come with).

Just head over to Shoutcast.com and start listening. They've got eight sub-categories of electronica. Keep a notepad handy and write down any songs you like (picking a station that streams the song titles is handy ;-)). You may also want to dip over into the Industrial section, as a lot of Industrial music is synthetic. Then, go to your local CD shop and buy what you liked. Telling the store manager that the reason you're buying the CDs is becuase you heard the music on the net might not hurt either...

Really, this is what streaming radio is all about to me, fostering communities of listeners for genres that don't get much or any radio play. I've probably learned of fifty new bands I like in the past six months alone just by browseing through Shoutcast a lot..

Somebody already posted a good list of traditional electronica, and I'm not totally familiar with drum and bass enough to give you band names (that's my second favorite electronica genre after a first place tie between trance and ambient), so here's a short list of good electronic Industrial bands:

• VnV Nation -- without question one of the best bands I've learned of in the past year. Hard to find in the States, originally from the UK. Excellent music and songwriting.
• Front 242 -- Sort of the Kraftwerek of electronic Industrial. 80s and early 90s... Their "Headhunter" song is a classic.
• Funker Vogt, Assemblage 23, Wumpscut -- If you like any one of these three, you'll probably like the other two. They do have unique styles, but I've yet to meet somebody that didn't end up liking all three.
• Apoptgyma Bezerk -- I haven't heard much of their stuff, mainly remixes and Kathy's Song, but it's pretty good stuff from what I've heard of it.
• (mainstream, but it has to be mentioned) Bjork's Homogenic album is a masterwork of electronic music. Pluto is probably in the top five of my favorite songs.

Good luck, and happy listening! There's a whole undiscovered world of electronic music that most people have never heard, so you've got months or years of discovery ahead of you.

This will probably get drowned out, but...

[Phexro]

Orbital - "In Sides". Try to find the earlier release with the 28-minute long version of "The Box". It's awesome.

Juno Reactor - "Bible of Dreams". Absolutely amazing IDM.

Propellerheads - decksanddrumsandrockandroll. Great DNB. Also, try to find the track "Props Got Mo' Skills" from their "Bang On!" CDS. It was recorded live with a turntable, a sampler, and a microphone. Great.

VNV Nation - "Standing/Burning Empires". This was a limited edition, and is hard to come by, but their best release. Their most recent, "Futureperfect", is good, but S/BE is the best. Great live show, too.

The Moog Cookbook - any release. These guys are great, they cover songs with classic synths. Pretty eclectic stuff.

Keoki - "Ego-Trip". Great DJ-mix stuff.

Most of the other recommendations I've seen have been quite good, so listen to them. Personally, I've gotten bored with the crap Electronica/Techno these days, and have turned to Industrial/EBM music. Some notable artists/albums you might enjoy:

Front Line Assewmbly - "Tactical Neural Implant". Widely regarded as their best album. I prefer the earlier (& harder to find) "Gashed Senses & Crossfire" or "Caustic Grip". Their more recent "Implode" is also very good.

Delerium - "Poem". Mellow, ambient side-project of Front Line Assembly. Very very good.

Contagion - "Contaminent PCB". Good EBM.

Front 242 - "Front By Front". Classic EBM.

Einsturzende Neubauten - "Silence is Sexy". Ye Olde Industrial. Older relases had lots of noise (aka Avant Garde or Experimental) elements & were mostly in German. More recent releases like SiS & "Ende Neu" are less harsh and feature some tracks in English. A seminal Industrial act.

Chemlab - "Burn Out at the Hydrogen Bar". One of my all-time favorite albums. Has lots of distorted guitar power-chords, stay away if you dislike that sort of thing. The earlier "10 Ton Pressure" was more electronic, and can be found on the "Magnetic Fields Remixes" release, since it's been out of print for a decade.

Mentallo & The Fixer - "Burnt Beyond Recognition". Fabulous release. Their other releases can't even approach the awesome power of this album.

Suicide Commando - "Mindstrip". A recent release, very aggressive EBM.

Well, that's probably enough, since I'm drifting wildly off-topic. Oh, and make sure you go to Metropolis Records, they release huge amounts of Industrial/Electronic music.

Re:This will probably get drowned out, but...

[elmegil]

Some other classic stuff that is great:

The Orb (any release, but especially the first one, Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld). Make sure you get the 2 CD version (dunno if the 1CD is still floating around, but it was an edited-down US release). The Orb helped define ambient dance.

The Future Sound of London (again, any release, but Accelerator and Lifeforms are among the best). They do a harder trancey but still ambient thing.

I don't really have time to do little summaries for everything I have, but here are a bunch of others:

A Positive Life, Natacha Atlas, Air Liquide, Banco de Gaia (older stuff), Biosphere, The Black Dog, Bleep & Booster (good luck finding them), Brother Sun Sister Moon (similar to Portishead), Chemical Brothers, Coldcut, The Crystal Method, Jack Dangers/Meat Beat Manifesto, Dimensional Holofonic Sound, Divination or anything else by or with Bill Laswell (massive Bass), The Herbaliser or anything else on the Ninja Tune label, Haruomi Hosono, Tesuo Inoue, Howie B, The Irresistable Force, Kruder & Dorfmeister, DJ Shadow, Plastikman, Portishead, Renegade Soundwave (In Dub in particular), Scarab, Tweaker (a guy from Nine Inch Nails), Young American Primitive.

my music

[GoatPigSheep]

http://www.mp3.com/scottyp

Electronic Music

[Mister Transistor]

If you want to start with early historical electronic music, the very first (even before Kraftwerk) was Walter Carlos's "Switched On Bach" series of albums. One of the others in the series was called "The Well-Tempered Synthesiser" and another was called "4 Seasons" or "Sonic Seasonings" (something like that, it's been 20 years since I have seen them).

These albums were masterworks of Symphonic music done with very early Moog synthesiser technology. The synths of the day were totally separate modules in little boxes conntected by jungles of patchcords. The Moog Carlos used was not even capable of playing chords (monophonic), so by using multi-track tape recording technology, each instrument's part was added to the total mix. An interesting side-note, Walter underwent a Sex change operation and is now known as Wendy Carlos. She (now) did the soundtrack for the movie "Tron" by Disney.

Also in the '70's was Mike Oldfield. He is also a virtuoso and can (and does) play about every instrument in the orchestra, and makes heavy use of synthesizer and procesing technology. He's best known for the Soundtrack from "The Exorcist", "Tubular Bells". He's not that well known in the U.S., but he's released about 24 albums thru the present.

Another electronic virtuoso is Vangelis. He, like Mike Oldfield is a one-man show. He writes, performs and engineers everthing himself. His music was some of the early work that started the "New Age" type music. He's also done a few very good albums in collaboration with Jon Anderson from Yes.

Newer stuff of interest would be some of the Demo albums from Telarc, "Time Warp" by Erich Kunzel and "Bachbusters" by Don Dorsey, a fitting tribute to the earlier "Switched-On Bach" forbearance, with 20 years newer and better technology. These albums in fact are COMPLETELY synthetic, the sounds were digitally generated in a wave table synthesizer, digitally mixed and mastered to CD, and digitally recovered and played back in your system, it only becomes analog at your D/A converter for the first time!

Finally, my other fave would have to be Alan Parsons. He's brilliant. I'm sure you've heard of him. His original claim to fame for having done the Mixing and Engineering of Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" album. He also engineered Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat". His work with "The Alan Parsons Project" was an interesting mix of modern electronic technology, smooth rock, and symphonic style. He was one of the first people to use a Vocoder (early speech synthesiser) and all of the recordings he did were in fact full digital recordings, mastered on a Sony PCM-1610 digital tape machine. "Heart" and Peter Gabriel also used this for their masters, BTW, that's why they sound so good!

Some nifty non-mainstream artists

[antibryce]

Aphex Twin
Autechre
Squarepusher
Mouse on Mars

Simply put, these are some of the most innovative and unique electronic artists. Check out some stuff by Karl Stockhausen, for a glimpse at some neat electronic music from long long ago (early 60's and 50's)

If you want to make your own music

[GoatPigSheep]

get jeskola buzz. It's the best free music program for pc's, and you can even write your own effects and synthsizers for it if you wish.

Places to go, music to listend to

[Traa]

For starters, you are unfortunatly a little late when it comes to the internet radio stations that so often have good electronic music. The RIAA is in the middle of killing the free internet radio stations. Some of my favorite internet streams used to be over at SomaFM where among other music I was introduced to music from Tranquility Bass, Future Sounds of London, Aphex Twins and Orbital. I would prolly not have CD's by all these bands if it wasn't for da internet stream.
Not all streams have disappeared, Digitally Imported Radio is one of the finest that is still there. Offering Trance, hard-trance, Eurodance and hard-house. For more streams check out shoutcast a collection of online music streams.

To be introduced to Electronic music you should try to find which genres within electronic you like best. Some genres are (from mellow to really fast):
- Ambient
- Trance
- Down Tempo
- Trip Hop
- Acid Jazz
- Eurodance
- House
- Garage
Several of these genres are not per-se electronic but will contain lots of modern sound influences.

For the real electronic junkies there is also what is known as scene music. This will not appeal to most people out there, but please try it and check out the rest of the scene.

DP

[Phil Wilkins]

3 if you count the storming live album.

Tried resisting urge to post.

[juuri]

DJ Shadow: Why he isn't getting mentioned more here I dunno, it probably has to do with the huge bias towards more traditional electronic being shown here.

Talvin Singh: Hello people? This guy is fricken amazing, please do yourself a favour and listen to some of his stuff. His layering and production values rival Orbital but he comes at things from a different angle all together.

Cornelius: He wrongly gets accused of being almost JPOP just because of where he is from, Fantasma and Point are both fine pieces of work.
In addition his stuff is so light (while being complex)... it's almost the opposite of Aphex Twin subject matter at times.

If you are looking for something a bit more mellow any of the United States of Ambience compilations are wonderful. And for those that have trouble letting go of the desire to hear lyrics and guitars try something like Amon Duul... guitars/lyrics and some eletronics similiar to Eno in places.

Tortoise

[Phil Wilkins]

DJED off of Millions Now Living is an exercise in live band and sampler. While it's not 'traditional' electronica, the ethic is pretty much the same.

The second remix album is definately a classic.

ps

[juuri]

I hate myself for leaving out Future Sounds of London.

I suck and bow down to the wonder that is Dead Cities.

VNV is EBM

[Trepidity]

Or at least used to be (their newest album has a bit of electronica, or at least dance, influence in it). EBM is a dumb genre name that stands for "electronic body music," and was originally something akin to "industrial dance" -- think Front 242. Nowadays the genre loosely can describe anything from industrial with a beat (Front 242 still, Funker Vogt, :Wumpscut:, etc.) to synthpop with a harsher edge (VNV Nation, Covenant, Apoptygma Berzerk, etc.).

And yes, VNV is great. But if you like their style of music, I'd suggest looking for other EBM (some of the bands I mentioned above are a good place to start), rather than the repetative vocal-less nonsense that is "electronica".

On explaining electronic dance genres

[Tokerat]

Ok, in case you haven't gathered, there is more techno/electronic music out there than you will EVER know what to do with. It's a vast sea, with many little-known corners, and often times much bias from listeners. I can name 5 junglists right now who will show ultimate resentment for anyone who goes near Happy Hardcore, but that's another story :-). This is not a definitive guide to all electronic music, many focused on the dance aspect. You will not find things here like Big Beat (Chemical Bros. and Moby), Dance ( Which is for drunken frat boys who don't like trance), Ambient (ahhh Aphex Twin, my hero), or others. This is what is the main focus of most of todays' underground dance culture is (as least as I see it).

When you need to find what you want, here is a guide:

MAIN GENRES
These are the main styles of electronic music. They're almost like "root genres". You'll see what i mean in a minute.

• Techno - Machine-sounding beats. Characterized by extreme repetitiveness and synthetic-style, techno hails from Detroit (time/artstis escape me right now...tried...perhaps CarlCox? No?) Averages 120-160BPM
• Trance - This is the biggie these days, and sadly some woudl say, the way most people find electronic music. Trance can be heard on the radio. Recent anthem blowouts include Darude - "Sandstorm" and (the name of this artists escapes me at the moment ) - "Castles in the Sky". Paul Oakenfold, Paul Van Dyk, etc. Characterized by mostly progressive melodies, well layered and defined sounds and textures. Lots of reverb is used to give that "open space" feeling. Averages 125-152BPM.
• House - Started in the Warehouse in Florida, this genre consists of a tight loop with a 4/4 beat, usually a very catchy bar with what are known as "hooks", or sounds that make it easy to dance to. Alot of times house music will vary alot durring a breakdown and then tighten up and loop for the main beat. Bad Boy Bill, Richard Humpty Vission, Felix Da Housecat, DJ Venom, etc. (can you tell I'm a house head at heart?). House is conforable at an average of 133-155BPM.
• Hardcore/Gabber - A very dark and pounding genre, this is catagorized with loud, deep bass stabs instead of kick drums, which are often compressed to give that kick-bass-kick-bass feel with only one sound. Gabber and Hardcore tend to be more dark and evil sounding, sort of the heavy metal of electronic music. Omar Santana, Noize Creator, Delta 9, Mike Hellfish, The Producer, and anything off the Deathchant label (get the Best Of Deathchant '94-'00, it's astounding). Averages from 165-210BPM, with Gabber tending to be the faster selections.
• Happy Hardcore - Ok, I'm breaking a rule here but Happy Hardcore is enough of it's own genre to get a mention. Happy hardcore is the extreme opposite of Gabber/Hardcore. Instead of being dark and evil almost to the point of satanic, Happy Hardcore is very very bright and happy, definitely to ludicrous and annyoingness at times. Also relies on the feeling of "panic" (just listen, you'll get it). There are some amazing Happy Hardcore tracks, but some are absolute cheese. Happy Hardcore also incorporates a lot of breakbeats, as it is an offshoot of the great Jungle/Happy Hardcore split up that happened around 93-94. Anabolic Frolic's Happy 2 B Hardcore series is the best Happy Hardcore compilation to date, I HIGHLY recommend. Averages at 175-200BPM.
• Jungle/Drum 'n Bass - Whereas other genres all follow a 4/4 beat pattern as a general rule, Jungle and Drum n Bass follow more of a shuffled "boom, click, boomclick" feel, almost like Hip Hop only faster. The difference here is with the fast paced breakbeats come deep, slow, flowing basslines which serve as leads. Thus, "drum n bass". Some Jungle/DnB is very dark, such as Tech Step, some of it is lighter, such as Drum n Bass in it's true (to itself) form. Other kinds are more Ragga influenced. Dieselboy, DB, Ed Rush & Optical, Dom & Roland, DJ Dara, LTJ Bukem, just to name a few. Average 175-190BPM
• Breaks - Breaks are new but they're old as well. Breaks are like slow jungle with more house-style elements, the Roland TR-808 drum machine sounds, etc. Breaks are generally slower and more geared as kind of a chill out sound. I'm not familiar with any breaks older than say 99 or so, but I can name DJ Baby Anne as one fo the best Breaks DJs I've heard. Average 130-157BPM

I'm sure I've forgotten a few, if anyone would care to add/correct me feel free, we're here to learn about it (no flames plz!). Now, on to GENRE PREFIXES!

GENRE PREFIXES
This will help you find out exactly what the hell deep chill 2-step acid electro garage trancecore is supposed to be :-D

• Acid - the lead lines will change over time, this isnt' straight looping. May contain a lot of squelchy synths (a.k.a. tight bandpassing) and filter sweeps. Often times designed to have that "completely created with analog synths" sound. Spacegirl does acid trance, for example.
• Deep - Usually refers to deep thought, invigurating and artistic sounds, often slightly experemental. More traditional musical principals are used. May have a strong emotional vibe to them as well. Often used in conjunction with "Chill". DJ Innana.
• Chill - Relaxing, mellow beats. Often times the back room at a rave wil feature a DJ spinning Chill genres, such as Deep Chill House. Makes for a relaxing atmosphere. Often times -20BPM for any genre applied to.
• Dark - Evil sounding. Possibly scary basslines and 1960s sounding vocal clips. many times meant to be a pounding, relentless beat.
• Happy - The most glaring example being Happy Hardcore, this is a plain mood setter. This music will attemt to be uplifting, maybe attemt to accomplish this using a slight "cheese" factor.
• Hard - almost every genre has a "hard" form, such as Hard House, Hard Trance, Hard Breaks, etc. The kick drum/bassline is much more prominent and thumping with such a style, the lead lines are more grabby and "hookable", and it tends to be all around rougher around the edges.
• Electro - Once again a more analog sound, this tme however it's more focused on the drums and percussion, a very "classic synth" style emerges. Not much for sampling, unless it comes from other electro.
• Tribal - A more native-style sound, almost like the rhythmic dance used by African tribes and what have you. (A better definition?)
• Inteligent - Supposedly "smarter" than the genre's norm, tracks adhereing to an Inteligent sub-genre attemt to be more creative than the typical anthem, often times succeeding.

I'll admit and A) I dont' know everything and B) I'm tired and making mistakes now. If anyone would liek to fill in some blanks I was wondering about myself:

• 2-step, garage, and others need defining.
• Any other corrections/additions would be appriciated. Eventually this is going to become a FAQ so help me be as accurate as possible!

most of these terms are used loosely and most music can be defined a number of ways by a number of standards. I do hope, however, this helps a bit.

Re:On explaining electronic dance genres

[Anonymous Coward]

"time/artstis escape me right now...tried...perhaps CarlCox? No?" Techno was started by Kevin Saunderson, Juan Atkins, and Derric May. They are known as "the legends" throughout the electronica world. To say they were from Detroit would not be a inaccurate, taking in to consideration the amount of time, blood, sweat, tears, joy, and soul they have put into Detroit. However if you are referring to the residency of the legends, Kevin Saunderson was in Belville, MI. along with Juan, and Derrick when it all started. The legends created techno, however, they had inspiraion, from the music of Kraftwerk, aswell as a some other select few eighty's rock-bands with Roland 909's.

Re:On explaining electronic dance genres

[jedrek]

2-step / garage

I'm not going to define because I have *no* rythm and even talking about 4/4 and 4/3 and so on will have me looking like an ass. Anyway, in layman terms, 2step is a form of house (what my dj friends tell me) that's really big in the UK right now. Borrowing from hiphop, R&B and ragga it is to England what hiphop was to the states at the beginning of the '90s - something fresh and new (even though it's been around for a couple of years). Started pretty much by the DJs of London's pirate radio stations (and there are a few dozen? hundred? of those) it's seeping into every form of British music. 2step/garage can also be split up into 2step - which is usually lighter and more vocal and garage which is usually grungier and more ragga.

Of course, I could be talking out my ass.

A sampling of performers: The Artful Dodger (All About the Stragglers is my favorite album of the last 2 years), So Solid Crew, Shanks and Bigfoot, Craig David's 'Fill Me In', MJ Cole.

Re:On explaining electronic dance genres

[dietz]

Inteligent - Supposedly "smarter" than the genre's norm, tracks adhereing to an Inteligent sub-genre attemt to be more creative than the typical anthem, often times succeeding.

It should be noted, while we're talking about it, that the oft-used "Intelligent Dance Music" moniker was actually created by none other than Brian Behlendorf, head of the Apache project, in 1993.

He named the mailing list "IDM" after Warp's "Artifical Intelligence" compilations.

After I read that, I don't feel so bad using the term anymore. It was (as far as I can tell) never intended to be as pompous as it sounds.

Re:On explaining electronic dance genres

[ebbomega]

2step: NOT HOUSE
Why? Because house is definitively a four-on-the-floor beat. (Boom-tik-Pah-tik-Boom-tik-Pah-tik) and 2-step is definitively not (Boom-rest-tah-rest-rest-boom-tah-rest). 2-step garage or "garij" (the stuff popular in the UK now) is NOT house in any way shape or form, it simply implements a 2-step with the speed-garage hoovers, which came from Speed Garage and not Garage, which is a close cousin of house, having evolved from The Paradise Garage in NY around the same time Chicago House was coming out of The Warehouse in Chicago.

Re:On explaining electronic dance genres

[Transcendent]

trance[]control is what got me hooked on trance. One of their first tracks they every put up was "Atomic Dance Explosion". It's not the best track ever recorded... but it got me hooked.... A year later I was supprised to see their CD in a local music store. It's kinda cool that a group that started off givin away free music (and still does all the time) sells records globally and makes a lot of money... Take that RIAA...

A CD that I wanted to mention was PsychoTrance 2000 by DJ Dfuse (i think). I bought that a month after starting to listen to electronic music, and it is still my favorite CD to this date. (The graphics on it kinda got me into 3D design with 3dstudio max, heh). It's great progressive trance. ::sigh:: just a glowsticker who wants to be a DJ... (...almost got a job as one... ah well)

Re:On explaining electronic dance genres

[Tokerat]

Ahh yes I have that Winstons track in my collection (MP3).

4/4 Signature, yes, 4/4 beat, no. Someone told me the correct beat is a 4/3, but I dont' really know from formal musical terms anymore, that's long forgotten with my childhood piano lessons. You are correct, however, in assuming that I meant no kick drum every quarter note.

Re:On explaining electronic dance genres

[Tokerat]

Sattelite never has what I want in stock but nonetheless it's a good place to go and listen.

Other online vinyl:

• Bangin' Tunes - A ton of the latest from the UK, in Hard House, Trance/Hard Trance, Acid, Psy, etc.
• Big Bang Records - A rather large selection. I never use it but I probably should.
• SLAMMIN' VINYL
• Subsonic Underground - Owned and operated by Simon Apex and his wife, for all your Happy Hardcore and Nu-NRG needs.
• Breakbeat Science NYC - DJ Dara + DJ DB = Massive Jungle/DnB store. Sadly, no online previews.

There are probably hundreds more. If you live in New England, check out the Growroom in Amherst, MA, Sattelite has a shop near Newberry St. in Boston, and in Hartford, CT, the Spiritual Emporium has a good selection too (dont' let that blonde girl behind the desk give u attitude! ;-) )

Re:On explaining electronic dance genres

[Tokerat]

I know. Late night, lots of beer, we've been over this. (see other replies).

The "F" in Funk, is for the flavor that us Chicago niggaz know how to bring... - Bringin' the Funk (CZR & Ito)

Well, while we're at it

[shepd]

I'm really, really, really looking hard for some decent Canadian electronica (partly because I'm a nice patriotic guy, and partly to fill my CRTC/SOCAN obligations, if you must ask).

Anyone here have any reccomendations? Preferrably online, but hey, anything's good.

Thanks!

Also new to this kind of music.

[x136]

Thanks to a conversation that went something like this:

"I need some new music."
"What kind?"
"I dunno, surprise me."

I've been getting into music like this. I'm liking it. While most of my favorites so far have been mentioned by others (Aphex Twin's Richard D. James, Boards of Canada's Music Has The Right To Children, etc.), I haven't seen my top favorite mentioned. Boulderdash's We Never Went to Koxut Island is an absolutely awesome album, IMO. The songs "Headless in a Topless Bar" and "Dregs of Tar" are just... Wow.

(Be sure to try the Iris plugin for xmms, with the Background color Random on beat option set, and the output plugin set to the OSS driver. Fullscreen, obviously. ;))

re: Massinova

[MO!]

I've found Massinova to be by far the best, with Tag's a close 2nd (too bad he went off air). The best thing about Massinova is that the site has a full list of all artists and songs they play. I've done alot of hunting for additional tracks by certain artists after hearing one or two from Massinova. I've not been disappointed yet.

Also, although they refer to themselves as Trance, they really play a bit more than just that genre.

Since most everything else I can think of

[shepd]

Has been mentioned, here's a couple that haven't been:

Arling and Cameron.
TRS-80
And a bonus one: Adult (have fun finding it!).

Machinae Supremacy

[eddy]

Here's something you can get gratis, don't know if it's electric enough for you though. Machinae Supremacy. Take the Oggs.

For those wondering, it's a mix of electric/rock and C64 SID-nostalgia :-). Veeely najs.

Artists you have to listen to!

[cheezus_es_lard]

Ferry Corsten
Cosmic Gate
Blank and Jones
DJ Tiesto
Paul Oakenfold
DJ Jean
DJ Taucher
Paul Van Dyk
Yves DeRuyter
Timo Maas
Alex Morph
Johan Gielen
Kai Tracid

These are all trance.

And of course, the 'electronica favorites'
fatboy slim
the chemical brothers
the crystal method
the dust brothers
etc.

have fun!

Re:Artists you have to listen to!

[stox]

I see that we have extensive lists of the artists of the past 20 years, but electronic music goes back much further than that. May I recommend a oen to start with? Morton Subotnick would be a great example. A DVD of his work from 1969 and 1978 was recently released, "Volume 1: Electronic Works". This is some of pioneering work in multi-channel sound reproduction.

The 2 greats

[MadFarmAnimalz]

1. Jean-michel Jarre (but stick to his old stuff; go for Magnetic Fields, Oxygene, Rendez-Vous, Revolutions, etc.)

2. Vangelis (ALL his stuff. ALL of it. Especially ALbedo 0.39)

Detroit

[Phil Wilkins]

Most people seem to be concentrating on UK and European acts, but you should be aware that there is a strong American undergound that deserves exploration and props. In particular, the stuff from Detroit has influenced many of the more mainstream artists mentioned elsewhere (and yes, in this context, Warp is considered mainstream).

In rough historical order: Juan Atkins, Derrick May, Kevin Saunderson, Carl Craig, Underground Resistance, Jeff Mills, Robert Hood, Red Planet, Anthony Shakir, Rolando, Alan Oldham, Eddie Flashin Fowlkes, Scan 7, Drexciya, Sean Deason, Octave One, Keith Tucker, Aux 88, Jay Denham, Claude Young, MoodyMan, DJ Bone, Recloose, Teknotika, Adult., DJ Assault, DJ Godfather.

Honourable mentions have to go to Richie Hawtin, Basic Channel, Orlando Voorn, and numerous others I've missed.

check the DEMF archives at groovetech

read Dan Sicko's book, Techno Rebels

browse http://music.hyperreal.org/lists/313/index.html

Free your mind, and your ass will follow!

listen to it live! (sort of)

[startled]

"Live" is a bit odd with a lot of electronic music, but I didn't really "get" a lot of the music until I'd spent a good amount of time at clubs and raves. Now, the tricky part is that there are plenty of shitty clubs that aren't about the music, and plenty of raves that suck.

If you're local to anywhere that has a lot of this sort of stuff, try to see if you can find what's really good there. For example, in San Francisco I like Spesh, and any of the looq crew that spin at 111 Minna, and sometimes at the DNA Lounge. BTW, Jondi and Spesh have a CD out that I highly recommend; "We Are Connected" is a good album and that particular single found its way into a Digweed mix. They're great to go to in person because the audience is more interested in the music, and less into going someplace to "be seen".

If you're not anywhere you can see stuff live, you can try to track down some decent webcasts of the stuff if they're still around after the RIAA and CARP fucked them over. It's a great way to experience the myriad genres and hear a lot of music for free. Stanford's radio station webcasts at a not entirely acceptable bitrate, but has good shows and a schedule up to boot. They have DJs in studio fairly often, and on Summer and Winter solstices have 24 hour marathons.

Well, I'm excited for anyone getting into this sort of music, because for me it was a really amazing time when I was discovering it. There's so much good stuff out there (although some of it's stagnating now, but that's another rant).

Try Industrial

[detritus.]

Try looking into Industrial. I particularly have taken a liking to bands who combine electronic music with guitar riffs, after being into modern rock/metal for many years.

These artists/albums remain my favorites:

Nine Inch Nails (Downward Spiral, Pretty Hate Machine, The Fragile)

KMFDM (XTORT, Nihil, Symbols)

Ministry (Psalm 69, The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste)

Front Line Assembly (Implode, Epitaph)

Rammstein (Herzeleid, Sehnsucht, Mutter)

Hope that helps!

Modulations

[Phil Wilkins]

If you get the opportunity, check out the documentary film 'Modulations'.

HOUSE MUSIC DID NOT START IN FLORIDA

[szyzyg]

It was the Warehouse in Chicago.... a Glaring mistake in an otherwise excellent post

Re:HOUSE MUSIC DID NOT START IN FLORIDA

[Tokerat]

HOUSE MUSIC DID NOT START IN FLORIDA

BAH F*CK what did i do that.... i f*cking know that.....

It was liek 3:30 in the morning... f*cking everyone in house is from Chi-Town.

-1 Overrated.

Kompressor

[calvran]

KOMPRESSORMUSIC crushes inferior forms of music! Nothing can withstand attack of fear synthesizer!
http://www.kompressormusic.com

Synthpop, EBM, industrial

[Trepidity]

If you're not into the whole "electronica" scene, there's still plenty of good electronic music out there. I concentrate here on music with vocals, as that's mostly what I listen to.

Synthpop is basically synthesizer pop. For mainstream examples, think New Order and a host of other 80s pop. Less mainstream synthpop ranges from "darker" music with goth-influenced lyrics to the happy sort of stuff you're used to from the 80s.

Industrial is heavy, distorted electronic music. It may have real instruments (most often guitars), but there will generally be much electronic treatment of both the instruments and often the vocals ("treatment" usually consists of various sorts of distortion).

EBM stands for "Electronic Body Music" (dumb genre name, I know), and is sometimes called "industrial dance". It's essentially a mixture of Synthpop and Industrial. There's incessant arguments over what is and isn't EBM, but pretty much anything from industrial with a vague beat to synthpop with a bit of a harsher edge can fall into the category, depending on who you ask. But the classification isn't really that important anyway.

Some good bands (almost all of these are European, as there's very little of a "scene" in North America) include:

[I'm concentrating on EBM here, as straight industrial tends to be less electronically-oriented]

VNV Nation - Their earlier albums are industrial-leaning EBM, while their newer stuff is very bombastic uplifting synthpop. One of the best out there. Some good songs: Standing, Further, Darkangel, Epicentre, Joy, Kingdom.

Apoptygma Berzerk - Their earlier albums are goth/industrial/ebm hybrids, while their newest one is barely synthpopish trance (a common trend; I guess industrial/ebm is getting less popular these days). Some good songs: Non-Stop Violence, Starsign, Deep Red, Eclipse, Unicorn.

Kraftwerk - Okay, so they're not really synthpop, EBM, or industrial, but they heavily influenced those genres, especially with their industrial (in the original literal sense of the term) instrumentation. And if you're interested in electronic music at all, you at least have to give them a listen. Some good songs: Radioactivity, Pocket Calculator, Boing Boom Tschak, The Robots, The Model.

Beborn Beton - Synthpop, with a darker yet optimistic tone. Some good songs: Deeper Than the Usual Feeling, Hemoglobin, Winter, Another World, Phoenix.

Einstürzende Neubauten - One of the original industrial bands, with the home-made industrial implements to prove it. Their earlier stuff is rather legendary, though a bit inaccesible and very noisy. Their more recent stuff alternates between melodic ballads and noisy clanging pieces, though the instrumentation is still all things from sheet metal to large mechanically-operated flutes. Some good songs include: Was Ist Ist, Zebulon, Sabrina, Salamandrina, Newton's Gravitätlichkeit.

Front 242 - The original EBM band. It's sparse industrial with a beat. Some good songs: Headhunter, Quite Unusual, Body to Body, Im Rhythmus Bleiben, Circling Overland, Welcome to Paradise.

Deine Lakaien - Very melodic synthpop, with the occasional noisy EBM song thrown in. Some good songs: Kiss the Future, Mindmachine, Down Down Down, Return.

Funker Vogt - Aggressive industrial-oriented EBM, with distorted vocals on every single song. The choruses are very catchy and easy to dance to though. Good songs: Killing Fields, Gunman, Nuclear Winter, Funker Vogt, Black Hole, Subspace. :Wumpscut: - Industrial/EBM with a very bleak worldview. Good songs: Totmacher, Deliverance, Embryodead, Sag Es Jetzt, Concrete Rage.

L'âme Immortelle - Industrial/EBM that alternates between distorted male vocals and beautifully clean female vocals. Very good. Some good songs: Tears in the Rain, Epitaph, Gefallen, Judgement, Forgive Me.

Assemblage 23 - Probably the best American EBM/synthpop band. Somewhat similar in style to VNV Nation, but a bit darker. Some good songs: House on Fire, Disappoint, Bi-Polar, Naked, Purgatory, Awake.

Blank - Italian EBM with heavily layered industrial-influenced but catchy music. And even better, you can download 192kbps full mp3s of both their albums from their official site (add a few legal mp3s to your collection!). I'm not going to bother listing good songs, because you can just go get them all and decide for yourself.

Cat Rapes Dog - Amusing (but possibly offensive) lyrics in an EBM/industrial format. You'll probably need to find some lyrics sheets to understand them all, but they're worth it. Some good songs: Don't Wanna Work, Things I Hate, Trojan Whores, The World Is Good and Nothing Bad Ever Happens, Dead Boys Don't Say No, Capitalist Punishment, Eating People is Fun.

Wolfsheim - Very, very good darkwave/synthpop. Some good songs: Heroin She Said, ...Scars Remain..., Lovesong, Künstliche Welten, Once in a Lifetime, Youth and Greed, The Sparrows and the Nightingales.

There's of course lots more, but that's about all I have the inclination to type up at the moment, so that should serve as a good start if you're unfamiliar with the genre.

no offense but...

[Phil Wilkins]

...you're an elitist retard who's only in it to feel superior.

If you had any real passion, you'd share the love.

Re:soulseek

[mshiltonj]

bah forgot to link.

SOULSEEK

There must be something wrong with the download link. I tried to download it, but the file was in some unknown '.exe' format. What is that?

Someone should let SoulSeek know that that applications packaged for online distribution should be in one of the standard ('.rpm' or '.tgz') formats.

Hibernate

[Cplus]

One of my favourites is hibernate. Definitely worth checking out, expect an album soon.

Velfarre CD's

[BitwizeGHC]

If you can, get your mitts on a Velfarre CD. This is a selection of music from the DJ's of Velfarre, Tokyo's hottest nightclub (often considered to be the best club in the world). The music is mixed techno, eurodance, R&B, jungle, etc. Real dancy stuff, high-energy, sounds like the kind of music that comes pumping out of a DDR machine. But REAL fun to listen to.

Re:no offense but...

[uebernewby]

electronica (crappy american term btw)

Actually, I like the term. That is to say, I've always interpreted it to mean 'anything that's done on a computer'. Plus, probably, some synths and samplers, though that's by no means necessary.

It's a neutral term that doesn't tell you anything about the music it describes except from how it was made, which is good, IMHO.

I vastly prefer it over things like 'post-minimalist soundscape techno', 'retro-rave-intelligent-dance-music' or crap like that.

Disagree and agree at the same time

[ebbomega]

Okay, while I understand your latest trendy-attitude "Oh, I'm so hardcore because I know so much about techno/house/electronic music/german country twang... but whatever... Why use this post as flamebait for music elitists instead of actually taking the chance to EDUCATE someone... tell them to download the oldschool KLF or Orb or Messiah or Jam & Spoon circa 1992 Age of Love remixes and whatnot, instead of telling someone who's showing a general interest in it to shut up and just be another part of the masses.

To the original poster, I'm sorry I missed out early in this discussion because it's an important one. Paul Oakenfold and countless other "superstar" DJs (Keoki exempt) are what many tend to think of as sellouts and big on crowd-pleaser music, and as such are heavily looked down upon by most "oldschool" trance enthusiasts.

If you like Sasha/Digweed, I highly recommend checking out some of there solo work. A big anthem around 1998 was Bedrock's Heavent Scent (Bedrock = John Digweed, btw) and might be along the lines of what you're looking for. While you're at it though, I suggest you check around the web for Electronica music guides and primers, where they'll tell you a lot of the history behind it.... basically, there's a few major genres of electronic music:

1) Techno. The most easily confusable one since everybody tends to refer to all Electronic music as "techno" rather erroneously. It's mechanical and synthetic music. Definately NOT for the masses, on the basis that it's a very subtle art that bends on this razor thin line between "Nothing to it" and "Bloody Brilliant". It originated in Detroit in the mid-80's and developed into a very driving-moving genre. I recommend Underworld, Jeff Mills, and Richie Hawtin.

2) Trance. Typically what most people listen to in the mainstream these days. Comes from Europe's readaptation of softer techno tracks. Very floaty, emotional music. Originally a subspawn of Techno that's designed to put you in a "trance" (hence the namesake). I recommend Orbital's Halcyon & On & On and Age of Love - Age of Love (Watch out for Stella Club Mix) as quintessential Trance tunes.

3) House: Probably the oldest of all electronic music next to Electro. Came out of The Warehouse club in Chicago (Originally "Warehouse Music" and then got abbreviated) is a lot more organic-sounding and disco-based than its detroit counterpart. Similar styles arose out of the Paradise Garage in New York, a gay disco club (which created "Garage" music, a close cousin to house which has since become bastardized into "Speed Garage" and the, IMHO, godawful UK "Garij"). Frankie Knuckles is the best to look up for this. His Whistle Song is probably one of the more definitive Chicago House tracks. I also recommend Marshall Jefferson and Eddie Amador.

4) Breaks: The most famous of the genres, even though you wouldn't think it. A breakbeat adding a more downtempo feel to it. From the oldschool electro breaks (Herbie Hancock, Harold Faltermayer and many other Jazz-Musicians-turned-to-synthesizers) to the newer Hip-Hop (duh), Big Beat (Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim), Chemical Breaks (Crystal Method), Miami Bass (Who Let the Dogs Out), and of course, Booty Breaks (aka Ghetto Tech... DJ Assault is the MAN), show a lot of variety within the genre itself.

Anyways, those cover a lot of electronic music and they don't even touch on some of the more popular subculture-driven genres (Jungle, Hardcore, Minimal Tech, and not to mention the unending plethora of UK Anthems). So I hope this helps start you off. Again, look up this stuff... it's tough sometimes to find some really quality music these days what with the inundation of crowd-pleaser music that has been kicking around electronica within the last few years. Good Luck!

Re: Pandora's beat-box

[lunatech]

To save a certain unnamed site mentioned below some killer slashdot-effect bandwidth, I present to you that site's exceedingly popular antecedent, Professor Lunatech's Electronica For Dummies, which was originally sent as an email to the NWR (North-West Raves) mailing list on Thu, 24 Sep 1998 21:07:11 -0700 (PDT).

Another important item (posted to NWR on Mon, 13 Sep 1998 18:33:08 -0700 (PDT) ) was a list of Top 100 DJs In The World, adjusted for hype and cobbled together in response to the ever inane, almost exclusively talent-free and over-inflated annual Mixmag Top 100 DJs list, which exalts people like Oakenfold, Sasha, Digweed, etc. IMHO, such charlatans no longer do anything to further turntable art and culture (if they ever did at all, that is), other than to dilute its hard-earned significance. Admittedly, this list contains a slight north-western North America slant. Nonetheless, it also contains all the necessary world-renowned acts of any actual worth.

After this, I strongly recommend EPITONIC.COM, where you will spend days, if not months edumacatin' yo-self. SHOUTCAST.COM will also provide you with more music than you can shake a stick at in terms of streams. To download, nothing beats SOULSEEK.ORG in terms of the users' geekily-high encoding rates and unbelievably pedantic album/track-naming schemes.

While it's all downloading, check out the grand-daddy of them all: HYPERREAL.ORG.

One word of warning, however: electronic music is virtually boundless and can take most of your lifetime to discover. I started listening some 13 years ago, and to this day I simply cannot keep up with all of it. Good luck!

Well, I asked my resident guru on IRC...

[Xenex]

...and this was the reply:

"If the guy is interested in "electronic music" and Sasha/Digweed, why the fuck doesn't he just go and buy a copy of Northern Exposure or something? It's got both of them doing DJ stuff, and it's an hour long."

So, there. I assume this 'Northern Exposure' CD is on Amazon or something somewhere.

Personally, I'd listen to some trip-hop from Portishead or Supreme Beings of Leisure if I wanted to hear something eletronicish, but that's just me...

I prefer the cheesy Stuff

[ebbomega]

"But, Rob Gee... isn't that kinda fast?"
"Kind of fast... IT'S FUCKING FAST!!!!!"

It's about Sex, Drugs and Gabberhouse.

"Start the War, Cuz we are on the Floor.
It's never seen before, Army of Hardcore...
HARDCORE!"

"I need no thanks for killing scum!"

And of course, my world would not be complete without the Horrorist....

"What did you just give me?"

Oh, and Atari Teenage Riot and Disciples of Annihilation rock my world.

HAWDCOH MUTHAFUKKA!

REAL Classics

[ebbomega]

Age of Love - Age of Love (Watch out for Stella Mix)
LA Style - James Brown Is Dead
KLF - Last Train to Trancentral (Live from the lost Continent)
KLF - 3am Eternal
KLF - What Time Is Love
KLF yeah you get the idea
Messiah - Thunderdome
Prodigy - Out of Space
Orbital - Halcyon & On & On
Misjah & Tim - Access (Original Vocal Mix)
Phuture - Acid Traxx
Frankie Knuckles - The Whistle Song
Jeff Mills - The Bells
Herbie Hancock - Rockit
Hardfloor - Acperience (sp?)
Timelords - Dr Who
Apotheosis - Oh Fortuna
Project One - Roughneck
Atari Teenage Riot - Speed
Tokyo Ghetto Pussy - Into Another Galaxy
The Shamen - Destination Eschaton (Hardfloor Vocal Mix)
Cybernaut - Hydrophonix
Opus iii - It's A Fine Day
Sunscream - Love U More

And of course, the synthpop craze delivered some awesome electronic tracks:
Pet Shop Boys - West End Girls
Pet Shop Boys - Being Boring
Depeche Mode - Enjoy The Silence
Erasure - Ship of Fools (The Orb's remix)
New Order - Touched By The Hand of God (Biff & Memphis Mix)

And for UBER-classic mode, check out Kraftwerk and Jean Michel Jarre, together undisputedly form the parents of Electronic Music.

Don't leave out psytrance

[Ride-My-Rocket]

Psytrance is essentially trance on acid -- it ranges from ambient to trance with totally wacked-out effects in it. What's more, psytrance "DJs" don't usually spin records -- it's all digital mixing. I prefer psytrance (also called goa) over trance, because it's usually faster and eschews a lot of the house-y aspects of trance -- there aren't really many "anthems" to speak of, it's a bit faster and it can get downright goofy sometimes.

http://www.isratrance.com
http://goablaze.org/p l.shtml
http://www.hallucinogenic.de/
http://www .microdots.org/
http://www.psynews.org/

suggestions

[shd99004]

Aura - The Source of Trance
DJ Fairlane
TbO & Vega
303 Inifity
Cynic Project
Holymen
Trance Culture

These can all be found over at www.mp3.com

Re:suggestions more

[shd99004]

Ayla
Paul Oakenfold
Sandra Collins

Hybrid.. my personal favourite.

[Chicane-UK]

My very favourite group for electronic music.. Hybrid produce some amazing work. Right now they have two albums out, and are working on their third.

Look out for the albums titled "Remix And Additional Production" (here) and "Wider Angle" (here) - as I say, both are absolutely great albums and I cannot reccomend them enough!

One up: Industrial & Noise

[hubertf]

A few more styles and bandnames from the harder electronic corner:

* Industrial: Rhythmic, but no beat.

Bands like Winterkaelte, Axiome, M$ Gentur, Folkstorm, Rasmussen, Haus Aragna, Genocide Organ, Asche, Morgenstern.

* Noise: no rhythm, no beat. Just pure noise. :)

Bands: Masonna, Government Alpha, Einleitungszeit, Merzbow.

* Drum'n'Noise: very beat-oriented, but lots of distortion.

Bands: S.I.N.A, Mono No Aware

Not that much difference ...

[pyramid termite]

... as evidence of that, I offer the Csound Book's list of recommended listening. Yes, Stockhausen and Subotnick are there, along with Nine Inch Nails, Aphex Twin, The Future Sound of London, Kraftwerk and DJ Shadow. The people involved in the electroacoustic scene, if that's what you want to call it, are not snobs and don't seperate themselves from electronica as a whole. Maybe you don't listen to it, but they do.

Re:Not that much difference ...

[ScottBob]

Well, I didn't mean to come off sounding snobbish, it just seems that as of lately most electronic music is the same repetitive beat stuff that they ship in institutional size cans to raves. Actually, I'm a big fan of Kraftwerk ever since they first came out. You can thank Man Parrish for putting the Kraftwerk sound into more mainstream music. As far as NIN goes, my introduction to the modern techno scene came through collecting all the old Amiga MOD/MED files I could get my hands on. The guy down the hall had some NIN pumping on his stereo, and, thinking he had a new MOD I didn't have, I ran over... "Yo, dude, what's that you're playing?" and I have been hooked ever since. And I was delighted when the CSound book listed these bands as recommended listening. But people seem to forget about Raymond Scott, who gave the world electronic music in the first place, as well as the music for cartoons.

The Best Online Community for your Electronic Fix

[Hangtime]

www.cluboxed.co.uk
or go straight to the board here
http://pub129.ezboard.com/bglobalunderground

This is the home of the GU series along with the rest of Cluboxed series of records. In addition to having all the information about each album it supports a thriving communitity of enthusists who are at the bleeding edge of the scene. Goto the messageboard and you will see what I mean. An extremely diverse communitity dedicated to reviewing the newest and best in the world.

HT

Noises and experimental

[Rosmo]

Also, if you are into abstract ambient noise whatever soundscapes, try these bands:

Lustmord: Metavoid, Purifying Fire, Where The Black Stars Hang, Heresy, Paradise Disowned, twenty minute songs of sounds fading in and out, like being submersed in some odd form of liquid, very trippy.

Black Lung: Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars, The Depopulation Bomb, The Psychocivilized Society, Unconfortamble Questions for Comfortable People, also nice ambient sounds

Also, just to list a few other bands with experimental sounds not mentioned yet:

Necrophorus: Gathering Composed Thoughts, Underneath the Spirits of Tranquility

Brothomstates: Kobn-Tich-Ey

Panacea: Low-Profile Darkness, Twisted Designz, Phoenix Metabolism

Needle Sharing: My Kind Came First, Mono Brutal

Tarmvred: Subfusc, Onomatopoeic

Venetian Snares: Doll Doll Doll, Printf, Making Orange Things

Micropoint: Anesthesie International, europhonie

Imminent Starvation: Human Dislocation, Nord, North LP, Ethyl LP

Converter: Blast Furnace, Coma

Mlada Fronta: Fe2 O3, High Tension

Hypnoskull: Fast Forward / Burnout, Electronic Music Means War To Us

Mike Patton

Downside to The KLF

[wowbagger]

The downside to The KLF is getting any of their older albums - sure, you can get The White Room, Chill Out, or their Best of, but that's it.

Anybody got a good location for getting the other KLF albums?

Kraftwerk

[Goonie]

It's mentioned in passing in a couple of posts here, but if you want to know where all this stuff came from, you've really got to check out "Autobahn".

Also, if you want to explore some of the roots, you might check out Mike Oldfield's "Tubular Bells", which is fascinating stuff even if it's a fair way from contemporary electronica.

Re:Electronic Music

[farrellj]

A good overview of earlier electronic music. You did miss Tangerine Dream, who had to build most of their ealier synths from scratch.

As well, Wendy Carlos has always been Wendy, it is just in the days before feminism helped women become able to publish in their own right that the record company didn't think that men would be synth music done by a women...So on Vinyl, Wendy became Walter. Here is the relevent part of Wendy's FAQ:

Q: Why do some of the old LP's have a different name on them?

A: Please be assured that these are all Wendy Carlos albums, and were so when they were first completed. But-- to cut to the chase, in those less enlightened times strong selfish opinions were voiced (synthesizers are a "male" enterprise, don't you see...?). I was flabbergasted to be denyed fair credit (the first S-OB's had no cover credit at all, in fact, just: "Performed on the Moog Synthesizer," creating another misconception: that the Moog synth did it all. CBS signed our instrument, not us, to a contract -- talk about getting no respect...). Well, politically incorrect fears and dissembling perpetuated a fictionalized identity including faked pictures, for 10 years (grrr...). I naively let them run amok, forced to hide from the public until 1979, when fed up, I pulled the plug on the whole mess. Yes, a depressing tale -- old "news" by now. People can be cruel.

On the other hand many female authors have used male pseudonyms, especially if it was believed their writings might be received "more eagerly" with a male image in front of it. Think of George Sand, Sig-O to composer Frederic Chopin, and many more up through Alice Sheldon, the writer whose excellent SF novels were credited: James Tiptree, Jr. A few men have recently written us in (threatened?) outrage, insisting we should perpetuate the folly, and still refuse accurate album credit, "to maintain consistency" (once wrong, always wrong?). Unbelievable cheek (proof we haven't come so far?). Arrgh! Please feel free to bop a few heads for us...

Here's a few I haven't seen mentioned much yet

[orbital3]

Alot of the stuff people have mentioned here is great, but here's a few that need mentioning. Prolly some repeats here, but I'm not reading through 500+ comments to make sure I'm not duping... This probably won't get read either because there's already so many comments, but what the hell...

Hybrid - Wide(r) Angle - I never ever ever get tired of this CD. The only recent work that I've completely and utterly fell in love with. You may know their song Finished Symphony from the Untracked level of SSX. Please please please, check it out. Their album has seen a couple releases, first Wide Angle, then a 2CD set called Wider Angle. I dunno which is more available, but Wide Angle is just a subset of Wider Angle. Either is fine, as most of Wider Angle is just some live stuff, though there are a couple extra studio tracks.

Plaid - P-Brane EP, Double Figure, Rest Proof Clockwork - Awesome IDM that I've just recently come to love. It's not as hardcore and much more pallatable that most IDM, so it's a great starting point for the genre. Especially check out the P-Brane EP; it's small, cheap, and 4 of their best songs.

Necros, aka Andrew Sega, aka The Alpha Conspiracy - Started out ages ago in the tracker scene. Amazing stuff, most notable Point of Departure and Mechanism 8 (which is actually in Unreal Tournament, I've recently discovered). He now goes by The Alpha Conspiracy and has a proper CD and all which you can sample at mp3.com. Amazing artist who worked from the ground up, and definitely deserved to be checked out for that reason alone.

Air - Moon Safari - A fantastic mellow sound... this is by far their best album, but check out their other stuff for good measure. Tracks of note: Sexy Boy, All I Need, Talisman.

Chicane - Behind The Sun and Far From The Maddening Crowds - Behind The Sun is the newer and better of the two, but both are great. Looks like FFTMC might be going out of print? Doesn't show up on CDNow and has limited availability on Amazon. Get it while you can. Again, a more mellow, laid back sound, but even better than Air. Tracks of note: Saltwater, Leaving Town, Red Skies.

Ayumi Hamasaki - Ayu Trance - She's a well known pop artist in Japan, and some of her original tracks are good (Whatever, Evolution) but more appropriate to electronics are the plethora of remixes of her music, most notably the Ayu Trance collection. M (Above and Beyond Remix) is friggin awesome.

Dune - Expedicion - Again, by far their best album, but I don't see it on CDNow OR Amazon, but it's prolly the best happy hardcore I've heard, though Scooter's really good too, which leads me to... (Tracks of note: Million Miles From Home, Electric Heaven, Hardcore Vibes.)

Scooter - ...And The Beat Goes On - I really don't know how this album compares to their others, but it's pretty good. Tracks of note: Fire, Move Your Ass

Faithless - Reverence, Sunday 8pm, Outrospective - Mixed bag of stuff, but the good stuff is really good. Tracks of note: Insomnia, God Is A DJ, Evergreen.

Future Sound of London - anything... FSOL is somewhat of a classic... they've been around a while, so they have plenty to check out. Papua New Guinea, Landmass, Expander (remix).

Hooverphonic - Blue Wonder Power Milk - Not sure how to describe them, and I'm getting tired of describing groups :) but their somewhat classic too... Tracks: Battersea, Eden, 2Wicky.

Lamb - Lamb and Fear Of Fours - Kinda a mix of electronic and alternative, with a very unique sound. The vocalist has a very unusual sound which you will either like or hate, but give them a shot. Tracks: Softly, Lusty, Gorecki, B-Line.

Utah Saints - Utah Saints and Two - A rough, sample-based sound, but worth checking out. Most known for their remix of the Mortal Kombat Theme, but that is far from their best work. Tracks: Ohio, Something Good, Techknowledgy.

Sneaker Pimps, Gus Gus, Freefall, Beam and Yanou, Mr. Oizo, Technique, Etienne De Crecy.

Stuff that's been mentioned but is worth mentioning again:
DJ Shadow/UNKLE - I have a love/hate relationship with DJ Shadow... either his stuff is incredibly good or incredibly boring, but it's more than worth it for the good stuff. He actually uses drums for more than just background, constantly mixing the beats up, making any DJ Shadow piece noticable. Midnight In A Perfect World hooked me to him instantly and Fixed Income and You Can't Go Home Again from his new album The Private Press hooked my gf. Notable tracks from UNKLE (his other project with... someone whose name I can't remember right now) are Lonely Soul, Rabbit In Your Headlights.

Orbital - plenty of stuff to check out besides their well-known Halcyon + On + On. Midnight from Orbital, Lush3 and Monday from Orbital 2, The Box (check out part 2 of the 28 minute version from the single!), The Girl With The Sun In Hear Head, hell the whole album from In Sides, Know Where To Run and Style from The Middle Of Nowhere, and Funny Break and Doctor from their new The Altogether.

Aphex Twin - Windowlicker, Come To Daddy, all the ones people have mentioned.

Paul Van Dyk, BT, Crystal Method (Vegas is much better than their new album), Adam F, Carl Cox.

For mixes, go with DJ Tiesto, Paul Oakenfold, and Armin Van Buuren.

That was soooo much more than I intended to write, and doesn't even scratch the surface of what's out there, but this should be a great starting point.

Re:Electronic Music

[Robotech_Master]

Oldfield is awesome, though it's worth noting that Tubular Bells was not originally written for The Exorcist; its producer (or was it director?) listened to it and liked it so much that he adapted the music for the soundtrack. Oldfield did get to write a fully original score for the movie The Killing Fields, though. Oldfield also wrote the song "Family Man," later covered by Hall & Oates, and his Tubular Bells was remixed into the X-Files theme for the movie soundtrack. He also wrote an album called "Songs of Distant Earth," based loosely upon the Arthur C. Clarke novel of the same name, which was one of the early uses of multimedia on an audio CD-ROM. My personal favorite Oldfield album so far is Tubular Bells 3.

Speaking of Alan Parsons, it's also worth noting that he did the score for Ladyhawke

Plastiq Musiq.

[13Echo]

I am a big fan of the Plastiq Musiq stuff, produced by Joy Electric front-man Ronnie Martin. It is a different kind of sound... YOu either like it or you hate it.

Joy Electric is at www.joyelectric.com
Soviet ia at http://www.sovietmusic.net/
PQMQ label is at www.plastiqmusiq.com/

Most of the stuff is more synth-popish that what you might be looking for though.

Electronic Music is not a genre.

[_aa_]

I've stated this many times, but I'll state it again because noone seems to understand.

Electronic Music is not a genre. It is a method of recording music. All your favorite hip-hop, country, jazz, and calypso songs are probably recorded using electronics. This is because very few artists use 100% accoustic instruments and record directly to a steam operated wax press anymore.

An Electronic Musician is a person who creates music with the aid of electricity. This would include; Dolly Parton, Nelly, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Britney Spears, Jerry Reed, MC Hammer, Frank Sinatra, Mettalica, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, Weird Al Yankovic, Fats Domino, Marky Mark (and the Funky Bunch), The Beach Boys, and Primus. This is because each one of these artists (or groups of) undoubtedly used electronic microphones, electronic guitars, and electronic recording equipment.

I dispise the act of grouping artists and music into genres. It encourages seperatism and stereotyping. Group A likes country, and Group B likes rock & roll, so they sit on oppisite sides of the cafeteria, regardless of the fact that the fundamental elements of the music they enjoy are the same. They seperate because one genre has a twang when they sing and the other uses a distortion effect on their guitars.

Very rarely can an artist labelled as one genre be accepted into another genre, if at all. No examples come to mind. Of course there are artists that don't neccesarily fit into any genre, but of course Music Critics will quickly invent a genre just for that artist if he/she is succesful enough.

Re:Electronic Music is not a genre.

[_aa_]

As an amature musician whose creative output would be classified as "Electronic Music" by (i assume) your standards, I find it offensive that I would be associated with the Aphex Twin, Moby, and Paul Oakenfold, simply because the tools I use to create music are similar to theirs. Charro and Joe Satriani both play guitar, but i don't think anyone would ever associate those two.

So I say this... N'Sync is certainly not a group that is welcome in the Electronic Music genre. But BT (Brian Transau) is very talented and well respected electronic musician. He produced N'sync's SMASH HIT "Pop". William Orbit, another respected electronic musician, produced the entire Madonna - Ray of Light album. How come these songs are not considered (by the majority) to be "Electronic Music"?

I'll tell you why. Because your genre classification system is WRONG. It is bad for music, and it is bad for all art in general.

And as for your suggestion that "Electronic Music" is music that is purely synthetic or entirely electronic, I point out that 90% of artists that you might consider to be "Electronic Musicians" will use accoustic instrumentation in their recordings.

Re:Electronic Music is not a genre.

[_aa_]

your 'simple coil magnet' is a transducer which generates an electronic signal from the magnetic field movement when the string vibrates. this signal then travels via a copper WIRE (sound can not travel through wires, but electricity can) to an amplifier of some sort, which takes that electrical signal and amplifies it and then sends it to (the exact oppisite) 'simple coil magnet' which vibrates a cone witch makes pretty music. Personally, I don't see how you can get much more electronic than that. You can make a distinction between digital electronic (sampler, computer) and analog electronic musical instruments (hammond organ, electric guitar, analog synths), but they're all still electronic. Some examples of non-electric musical instruments 4 u:

Accoustic Guitar (no microphone)

Violin

Dulcimer

Snare Drum

Flute

Cowbell

Digeridoo

The Human Voice (but one could argue that since our brains use electrical signals to control our muscles, any instrument we play, including our own voices, are electronic. But we'll just skip that.)

Harmonica

Tamborine

Thank you for replying.

HEH

[_aa_]

I don't listen to music, I listen to "MP3s selected to appeal to the Apple demographic".

Re:Electronic Music

[vanyel]

Don Dorsey also did one called Beethoven or Bust that was quite good, and I would add Isao Tomita and Jean-Michel Jarre to the list, though I'm sure Tomita offends pure classical lovers by doing electronic renditions. His Snowflakes Are Dancing album is especially quite good however, and is what (showing my age) turned me on to electronic music originally.

Robert Miles

[TufelKinder]

I've listened to quite a bit of Robert Miles' (warning: "flashy" site) music and really like it. I don't know why it's so hard to find. I think you can buy it at The Wall, but I can't find a website for the store.

You may have heard Vangelis in movies

[Chris Pimlott]

Specifically, Vangelis did the soundtrack for Blade Runner as well as Chariots of Fire (whose theme became quite famous back in the 80s).

He's done a lot of other soundtrack work as well, but those are two you may have heard already without knowing who it was.

the electronic music everyone forgets

[thexdane]

everyone always lists and discusses mindless and well in my opinion crappy electronic music and that's what they always consider that the whole electronic genre. however paul oakenfold and the like aren't the only nor the best form of electronic music out there. so here's some good AND NON-riaa labels, well mostly.

vnv nation - one of the hotest ebm bands out there right now, good beats HIGHLY intellegent lyrics with a lot of meaning and feeling. piro from megatokyo loves them.
covenant- sweedish based band with big bouncy beats and great lyrics.
icon of coil- trancier band on their new album really hard hitting on their original one but still a very high energy band.
apoptygma berzerk- trancy type sythpop from norway, pretty good and rather dancy.
haujobb- drum and bass influnced music that is very catchy and relaxing. side projects are cleen/cleener and a couple others
funkervogt- harsher beat and sampled music that deals a lot with war and uses distorted vocals
fictional- a better version of funkervogt
ravenous- same as fictional
cevin key- from the legendary band skinnny puppy with many side projects including plateau, hilt, download and a couple others.
and one- the kings of synthpop, really catchy and fun lyrics, songs are both good and funny.
phil western- formly part of download, but a great minimalist techno artist who's website is colourspeaks
:wumpscut:- harsh sample oriented dance music influenced by skinny puppy.
wolfshiem- great synthpop band that's depeche mode influenced.
das ich- great german electronic band that sings entirely in german
decoded feedback- very good and dancy sample based band with great lyrics and no they aren't using distortion, tho it sounds like it.
most of these bands can be found at metropolis rrecords

i have however left a couple bands for the last cause they practically started the whole genre and they are also on some riaa labels due to popularity and such

skinny puppy- one of the most influencial bands in the electronic field today and their canadian to boot
front 242- the band that started the whole ebm, electronic body music, about 20 years ago now and still going strong, with music that is even revolutionary now.
frontline assembly and delerium yes these guys are the SAME people, well person now since it's just bill leeb. frontline is a beat, synth and sample oriented music where delerium is more ambient in earlier incarnations and more dancy and female based lyrics in their later releases

as for buying these bands there are several good websites
metropolis-records mail order
isolation tank
storming the base of the alien foe a friend's record mail order service

i hope this helps you out

I second that motion

[Chris Pimlott]

... for a few reasons. First, he is widely considered one of the founding fathers of modern electronica. Second, his music runs a wide gamut, from soft to not-so-hard to very hard and experimental. Last, because most of his music is quite good.

The videos are rather odd though; he has this motif of sticking his own face (in a somewhat disturbing leer) on other bodies -- children, teddy bears, women) and it's can be really strange and not a little unsettling (take a look at the cover of Windowlicker for an example). But they're certainly inventive and interesting.

Bay Area Resource

[Ellen Spertus]

A great place to hear or compose cutting-edge electronic music is the Center for Contemporary Music at Mills College in Oakland, California.

Some Great Bands...

[NiTr|c]

...for electronica, or EBM (electronic body music) are from Germany mostly. I'm an avid fan of this type of music and some of my favorite bands for the sound are:
VNV Nation
Apoptygma Berzerk
Funker Vogt
Wumpscut (one guy but extremely talented)
L'Ame Immortelle
Pzycho Bitch
Pandique (local german band, extremely hard to find)
Neurotic Fish
Beborn Beton
Front 242 (old but also extremely talented)
Icon of Coil
State Of The Union

I'm unsure if all of these bands fall into what you're looking for but I am sure they all use electronic means to produce their music. My favorite of the bunch, VNV Nation, used (mostly) nothing but a PC to produce their entire recent CD entitled Futureperfect. They even provided a list of software/hardware they had at their disposal.

If you're looking for a place you can order the music online, I suggest Darkland Music, or the record label Metropolis Records. Also, under Metropolis's website, they have a list of bands that are signed under them, all of which are electronica/EBM. I hope this helps you out.

Yet another list from yet another random /.er

[raygundan]

My favorites:

Hardfloor
check their classic TB Resuscitation, as well as the rest of their phenomenal 303-driven works (Respect, Funalogue, Homerun, etc...)

Vapourspace
Themes from Vapourspace remains my all-time favorite album ever, period. The whole thing rocks. Some good tracks on Sweep, too.

Plastikman (Richie Hawtin)
The king of minimalism. I would be remiss if I didn't recommend Spastik, a fantastic track. Check out all of his stuff.

Surgeon
It sounds like you're underwater, but it's bang-up good shit.

Steve Stoll
Hyperrealism is an excellent track

Josh Wink
Find the Tweakin' remix of Higher State of Conciousness-- fantastic breakbeatish house.

Joey Beltram
Classic.

Dieselboy
Drum and bass fun.

DJ Zinc's Super Sharp Shooter is a classic D&B track.

There's a million more, but that's what strikes me as favorites off the top of my head from my dusty record bin. Happy hunting, and thanks for posting this article-- I'm sure I'll find some sweet stuff I've never heard digging through everybody else's recommendations.

More Synthpop/EBM, and where to find it

[falser]

Mesh - I have no idea how this band is not more well known (can you spell RIAA?), simply fantastic music across each of their albums. Lots of influence from Depeche Mode. The latest album "Who Watches Over Me" is sure to please just about anyone.

Evil's Toy (now called just T.O.Y.) - they started out as strictly Industrial, but have transformed their music into dancy/EBM in their latest albums.

Covenant - they've been around for a long time now, and are considered to be one of the founders of the EBM genre. Their last album "United States of Mind" is a definite must have.

Icon Of Coil - A style similar to the of VNV Nation but with a much more energetic and dancy feel. This a popular band that gets played a lot in Industrial clubs.

Echo Image - very very upbeat, pop/dancy, and enjoyable. They're brand new and hit the scene pretty hard with their album "Compuphonic".

Some other's to check out:

Cut.Rate.Box
Neuroticfish
The Nine
The Echoing Green
Iris
Colony 5
DeVision
Fictional

Where the heck do you find this type of music? Metropolis Records (http://www.metropolis-records.com) is the label most of these bands are on. They are independent label, with no affiliation with the RIAA as far as I know. You can get lots of info, and check out short clips from the bands. A Different Drum (http://www.adifferentdrum.com/) signed most of the others I listed.

Metropolis runs the BEST CD mail-order service (http://www.industrial-music.com), and carry music from lots of other labels as well.

Unbelievable...

[Quanza]

What I cannot believe in all this discussion is the pure lack of academic insight. Having spent quite some time studying the roots -- and I mean ROOTS -- of electronic music, i'm sad to see so many associate electronic music with just variants of dance/beats, or something loud. Yes, these are genres, but what you list are not "main" genres.

Why has nobody mentioned the core composers such as Karlheinz Stockhausen, Edgar Varese, Pierre Henry, Pierre Schaeffer, or even Max Mathews? What about concepts such as "music concrete", used by well known musicians as The Beatles, Steely Dan, Pink Floyd (maybe even The Who)? These are the real pioneers of electronic music, the real influencers of today's electronic musicians.

Do yourself a favor and search some of those names in Google. You'll be glad you did.

Re:Unbelievable...

[Art Tatum]

Don't forget Vangelis. Albedo 0.39 is a masterpiece. And then there's Klaus Schulze. It looks like people are focusing mainly on schmaltzy dance music instead of real synthesizer compositions. But then, this is Slashdot. :-)

online resorces

[_ph1ux_]

bangingtunes.com
- really good online vynyl resource.

hardnrg.com
- Great forum if you want to find out info - and talk with people about music - mostly hardnrg.. but the guy who runs the site, Morgan, will answer almost any question you have about the music. He has a lot of knowledge on the subject. He is an accomplished DJ, spins all over, owns/runs lotekrecords.com and makes a lot of music. so if youre interested in learning about how electronica is made, what software and hardware are used - how much it costs to make etc... this is the guy to talk to.

Kaneda - thanks for the links!

[Ride-My-Rocket]

I was kicking myself when I was posting those links, since I had once upon a time had the Chaos URL, but forgot both the name and address of it. Thank you _so_ for posting it again........... :)

Derrick Carter Live!!!!

[tomdarch]

You really need to hear Derrick Carter live. His recorded stuff is OK, but his live sets are mind altering.

Actually, I wonder if there is an issue with needing to 'work up to' some music. Would someone who has never heard house before really get what's going on in a Derrick Carter set? Do you need to 'learn the language' before you can understand with some depth?

house vs. techno

[tomdarch]

I want to throw out some ideas. Growing up in Chicago, I'm obviously pro-house biased, but something has struck me about the descendants of Chicago House and Detroit Techno.

It seems to me that house became something about merging the mind/soul and the machine in such a way that the mind/soul was elevated, or reached a transcendent place. In comparison mainstream techno (although certainly not Derrick May, et al) is really about surpressing the mind/soul to the machine - to seek oblivion.

House & Deep House - the real deal

[jgerry]

I have seen lots of comments about House music, but not a lot of information about the VARIETY of house music available. I'm a house DJ myself (still spin vinyl, as most old-skool DJs do) and House Music is all about VARIETY.

House can be very moody and soulful, and I would categorize most of what I play as either dance-oriented or soulful electronic. Disco-style house, very dancy, is still very popular and a lot of people, myself included, will tell you that Disco never died, it just became House. The disco-style house that exists today is actually very sophisticated and the girls on the dance floor LOVE IT, so I play a good bit of it. Happy club girls = happy club owners = more gigs and money for me!

The particular sub-genre of house that I do most is called "Deep House", which brings in vocals, interesting samples, tribal beats w/ congas... All kinds of variety!

For the ultimate in deep soulful house, there's no one better than Dubtribe Sound System, from San Francisco, who have been doing live House and electronica for about 10 years. Their album Bryant Street, which came out I think in 1999, is still one of my very favorite house CDs and it rarely leaves the changer in my car. It's soulful and beautiful, moving and primal, and it's something that you can't hear on the radio hardly at all.

Deep house is still a very underground type of thing, and here in Atlanta, GA, where I live and play, the underground House movement is very very popular. We in the ATL are trying very hard to bring it more mainstream, as deep house is WAAAAY more accessible to your average music listener. It's more song-oriented and somewhat less repetitive than hard house, trance, d&b...

Give it a try!

Dubtribe Sound System -- Bryant Street
deephouse.com
My latest demo [RealAudio]

"Enlightened" music

[LS]

oK, it's in quotes, so don't freak out.

Since the early 90's, electronic music in conjunction with smallish underground gatherings and hallucinogenic/euphoric drugs has spawned a shock of creative music and new attitudes.

There is a lot of "skillful" electronic music out there, but then there is music that is taken to the next level. The amazingly intricate sounds these artists make indicates to me that the complicated machinery between the mind and the media has become transparent to them:

Hallucinogen - Twisted
Orb - Orbus Terrerum
Towa Tei - Future Listening
Fantastic Plastic Machine - Fantastic Plastic Machine
Saafi Brothers - Mystic Cigarettes
Cortex Burn - Dark Ritual [a song, not an album]
Goa Gil - Kosmokrator [DJ Mix]
Tromesa - Psuedomental
Shpongle - Are You Sphongled?
Nortec Collective - The Tijuana Sessions vol. 1
Koxbox - Dragon Tales
Rip Van Hippy - Waking Up Is Hard To Do
X-Dream - Radio

LS

Digitally Imported

[PatJensen]

I listen to a bit of trance and house. There is a cool streaming radio site at www.di.fm. It's Shoutcast and at 128k - sounds pretty good in WinAmp.

Pat

Re:Don't forget nu skool breaks.

[ebbomega]

I made it a specific point not to go too far into subgenres, because, quite frankly, there's FAR too many.

Chicago House, Disco House, French House, Deep House, Acid House, Ambient House, Booty House, Ghetto House, Top 40, UK Hard House, Progressive House, Stadium House, Garage, Speed Garage (Which I happen to be listening to at this moment, interestingly enough... Yay for 187 Lockdown) are ALL subgenres within House alone... and that's just borrowing from Ishkur's Music Guide... there's a crapload more.

Besides, I don't really like NuSkool Breaks that much...

Re:Two Words: Pink Floyd

[ebbomega]

??

Um... no....

Pink Floyd was throwing in synthesizers in otherwise non-electronic music. That's been going on since the 20's. They didn't really do much except make really good synthesizer-involved music.

The first people to really use exclusively synthesizers are Kraftwerk and Jean Michel Jarre.

Amon Tobin

[sammy baby]

A quick glance at the (hundreds) of posts in this thread didn't give up this name, so:

Amon Tobin.

Seriously. The guy can wrap a breakbeat around your head that will leave you wondering if your skull is still in one piece. And they're melodically interesting, too - if your tastes run to jazz, I recommend checking out his album Bricolage: otherwise, start with the more conventionally techno (but still excellent) Supermodified.

Anecdote: I once described the second track on Supermodified, "Four Ton Mantis," as the soundtrack to my nightmares. (if you're interested, the web site for a club called The Spy Bar used to use that song as the background music to a flash movie... anyway.)

Flash Mini-Sampler of Genres

[crisco]

A couple of years ago I came across a Flash app on someone's page that had a huge breakdown of the different genres and their attempt at tracing the lineage and history between the various genres. Even better, it had little snippits of each type, so you could hear the differences as you were exploring them. One of the better uses of Flash I've seen and it would be a good addition to this thread (and give /.'ers something more to argue about)

Problem is, I've lost it. Anyone know what I'm talking about and where it is?

Re:Flash Mini-Sampler of Genres

[whatwhat]

Ishkur's guide to electronic music: http://www.ishkur.com/features/music/guide.htm. Check it out not only for an explanation of every subgenre of electronica, but also for the hilarious commentary.

Agreed

[crisco]

My real introduction to 'electronica' came from MonkeyRadio but sadly, they are down to CARP as well. The stuff they played was more downtempo or triphop but for my job at the time it was perfect, didn't piss anyone off and kept me sane :)

Thanks for the list, its nice to find some streams that fit my moods that aren't subject to CARP.

Electronic Music 101?

[doom]

Let's see, you should start by looking up Leon Therimen, maybe some of the Clara Rockmore recordings, then move on to Edgard Varese ("Ionization" is a fave of mine), then maybe some Todd Dockstander, some early Pauline Oliveras ("Bog/Beautiful Soop" was re-released on CD not too long ago). Oh and maybe some Xenakis and John Cage would be a good idea.

And if you want to start making some of your own, you'll want to get a reel-to-reel tape recorder, a razor blade and some scotch tape. You might lookup the plans on-line for a Therimen. Oh, and lookup a guy named "Moog" while you're at it.

Re:Electronic Music

[doom]

If you want to start with early historical electronic music, the very first (even before Kraftwerk) was Walter Carlos's "Switched On Bach" series of albums.

Electronic music actually started a number of decades before this (e.g. Therimen invented the Theriment in the 1920s, if I remember right).

Also "Switched on Bach", despite it's popularity, is a classic example of the abuse of a new instrument... it uses the Moog to nearly perfectly mimic an already existing sound. Interesting novelty, but artisitically there's not much point in doing this kind of thing...

(On the other hand, her cover of the "What's up pussycat?" theme was just brilliant.)

Re:some psy DJ's still spin vinyl...

[Tokerat]

Bangin' Tunes has what I'm told is a nice, large, and fresh selection of Psy Trance, although I never looked myself. They have excelent 2-min sectioned Mp3s. I buy most of my vinyl from them.

Psy and Goa Trance are two more I forgot....

Re:On the origins of Techno/Electronica

[Tokerat]

No, not really. There is Disco House, which has many samples/stylings of disco. I'm Listening to Bad Boy Bill - bangin in the Box Vol. 5 right now. VERY disco.

Anyone who claims Omar Santana, Dieselboy, or Spacegirl are Disco is smoking more crack than any kandiraver i've ever seen....

Re:Electronic Music

[Mister Transistor]

True, the Theremin was invented way before the other stuff, but have you heard one? It sounds like a wounded cat in heat fighting with a violin, and although it IS slectronic and produces tones, it definitely would not be considered music.

As far as the abuse of an instrument, as in trying to mimic existing sounds, I don't agree. Due to the early crudeness of the Moog gear, it actually had a totally unique sound of its own. I do agree it's an academic use of multitracking technology to do what we use MIDI sequencers for nowadays.

Try a different tack...

[allism]

Instead of going out and downloading a bunch of pirated music (not that you would ever do that, I'm sure) or buying a bunch of music at outrageous prices before you have heard anything off of the CD, try looking at EMusic's electronic section. They have hundreds of electronica artists, and they do a pretty good job of providing recommendations if you like an artist. They do a trial of 50 free MP3s and then it's something like $15 a month, download all you want. You'll definitely want a high-speed connection to take advantage of this site, though - it's pretty addictive.

Industrial music

[Trepidity]

I said I wasn't going to mention the "straight industrial" bands. If I were going to, I'd probably mention Skinny Puppy, Download, Throbbing Gristle, Psychic TV, Ministry, The Tear Garden, Foetus, and Coil, among others.

just how noisy is noise?

[Trepidity]

Hmm, I must have less a tolerance for noise, because I'd consider Asche, Morgenstern, Haus Arafna, etc. to be "rhythmic noise", whereas Merzbow et al are "arrythmic noise". "Industrial" is what I'd call more structured (and usually less noisy) things like Skinny Puppy, Ministry, Foetus, and possibly Coil.

Re:Electronic Music

[fleeb_fantastique]

I wish I had seen this earlier. As it stands, likely nobody will notice this.

The very first historial electronic work of music is not Carlos, but Edgar Varese.

He wrote for theremins in the early 1930's, and wrote the very well known Poeme Electronique for the Phillips pavilion at the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels (his last completed composition).

Varese was very well known for his innovative work in electronic music.

Maybe someone will be able to help me, then.

[Inoshiro]

A long time ago, I found a cassette at a library in Calgary (where I was living at the time) which contained classical scores in synth format. Several tracks were named after planets/Greek gods, and many were famous from movies. I can't remember anything else beyond that, being 13 at the time and relying on the fact that I knew where it was in the rack of cassettes in the library at the time :)

If anyone can point my towards this music, I'd be very happy.

Thanks!

[crisco]

hey thanks, thats exactly what I was thinking of.

Now you can all go check it out and learn what all the sub-sub-genres of electronica.

My top picks

[Adam Wiggins]

Christopher Lawrence
Sandra Collins
Nicholas Bennsion
Adam Wiggins (shameless plug)

neccessary plug

[mosch]

Chaos Existence also sells some really tasty psytrance, and has all-track real-audio preview of a lot of their inventory, and is run by really friendly folks to boot.

As for the best way to experience the music, I have some suggestions.

Some others

[Fjord]

I definitely agree with every one of the names listed I've seen that I recognise. I'd like to say Fatboy Slim again (only saw it once), and emphasis his Better Living Through Chemistry album. The others are good, but that is a great album.

Also, I tend to buy random CDs that are produced by Ninja Tune. If you flip the CD over and see the Ninja Tune label, it's likely to be something special. My favorite band through them is 9 Lazy 9, which is acid jazzy electronica. Chill out room music. But really, don't just focus on one band by them. They have an ear for this kind of music.

House: Artists and Labels

[sawyerslim]

These aren't comprehensive lists, but what I feel is a good grounding in house music, old and new, across the subgenres:

Labels

Afterhours

Cajual

Glasgow Underground

Guidance

Nervous

Crydamore

Artists

A:xus

Armand Van Helden

Cajmere/Green Velvet

Glen Underground

Fiat Lux

Frankie Knuckles

Lego

Little Louie Vega

Danny Tenaglia

Moodyman

I also recommend the following electronic artists:

(!!!)

Carl Craig/Innerzone Orchestra

Caural

Chemical Brothers

Daft Punk

DJ Shadow

Herbalizer

Kraftwerk

Luke Vibert/Wagon Christ

Mr. Scruff

Orbital

Orb

Tortise


That should get ya started...

Re:Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze

[ebbomega]

Exactly, but Kraftwerk (moreso than Jarre) was really the first band to be solely devoted to Electronic Music... they had a complete lack of non-synthesizer instruments, which nobody had done before. Some had _used_ it, which was what I said... Christ, my girlfriend's Dad has a Vinyl from the 50's of Moog Synth recordings.

my 2 cents

[djmonstermo]

General/Electronic:
underworld - dubnobasswithmyheadman
orbital - green album, brown album
leftfield - leftism
the orb - adventures beyond the ultraworld
prodigy - experience
bt - escm
moby - moby
messiah - 21st century jesus
808 state - ex:el
the klf - the white room
primal scream - screamadelica
lfo - frequencies
also:
chemical brothers, lords of acid, crystal method,
fluke, propellerheads, laurent garnier, plastikman


Pop:
bjork, saint etienne, everything but the girl, new order,
depeche mode, pet shop boys

Originators:
brian eno, can, kraftwerk, joy division, new order, david
bowie, jean michel jarre, giorgio moroder, cabaret
voltaire, pink floyd

Ethno/World:
philip glass, delerium, banco de gaia

Ambient/IDM:
autechre - incunabula
future sounds of london - accelerator
squarepusher - feed me weird things
aphex twin - selected ambient works 85-92
boards of canada - music has the right to children

House:
daft punk - homework
basement jaxx - remedy
others:
armand van helden, sven vath, carl cox, chicane,
deep dish, cassius, dave seaman, danny tenaglia, frankie
kunckles, timo maas, faithless, hybrid, erick morillo, dj
dan, scott henry

Drum and Bass:
roni size - reprazent
goldie - timeless
ltj bukem - logical progression
aphrodite - aphrodite
metalheadz presents platinum breakz
also:
ed rush and optical, dillinja, photek, ak 1200,
dieselboy, bad company, high contrast, shy fx

Progressive House/Trance:
sasha - xpander
paul oakenfold - tranceport
paul van dyk - out there and back
armin van buuren - boundaries of imagination
robert miles - dreamland
also:
way out west, tilt, john digweed, bedrock, dj tiesto,
george acosta, ferry corsten, gouryella, armin van buuren

Goa and Hard Trance:
astral prjection, juno reactor, hallucinogen

Downtempo:
massive attack - blue lines
tricky - maxinquaye
dj shadow - endtroducing...
thievery corporation - sounds from the thievery hi-fi
portishead - dummy
hooverphonic - a new stereophonic sound spectacular
morcheeba - big calm
death in vegas - dead elvis
dj krush - krush

Industrial:
front 242 - official version
front line assembly - tactical neural implant
my life with the thrill kill kult - confessions of a knife
kmfdm - naive
skinny puppy - too dark park
ministry - twitch
nin - fixed
meat beat manifesto - 99%
pop will eat itself - this is the day...
vnv nation - empires
also:
throbbing gristle, coil, non-aggression pact

Solid State with Liquid Todd

[Andy Dodd]

http://www.liquidtodd.com/

It's a radio show that is on WXRK in New York from 12AM-4AM Saturday, and a few other stations (K-Rock is the flagship, though). Yes, that's the same station Howard Stern comes from.

Todd plays a very big variety from many genres. Some of it is more "mainstrem electronic" (Like that recent Elvis cover), some of it is definately more "out there"

It's too bad there aren't many good places to learn about the genre - The most accessible ones may introduce you to the genre's equivalent of Britney Spears w/o you knowing it. (This is to satisfy the trolls that say, "you know nothing" - I do know little about the genre. So I'll say this:)

The stuff on Solid State (And DI too) is FAR better than anything played on mainstream US radio, even if it may be mass-market sellout material by the genre's standards. That said, I want to find the lesser-known artists that are regarded by those "in the know" as good.

Re:Groovetech

[bitchx]

I have no problems with the Satelite Staff at the store. I have seen numerous people that do, however. Here are some hints on how to get good service.

1. You can be 1 of 2 people.
a. Aging Wannabe (That's me!)
b. Known

Attempting to be anything else will get you pigeonholed into the "going to listen to a lot, but not actually buy anything. Not worth my time" category.

Way's to clearly delineate yourself as an Aging Wannabe:
1. Look old
2. Ask easy opinion questions and/or obvious "where the hell is x" questions.

Anyone who goes in and asks "I really liked this and this, what do you reccomend" will get VIP treatment. If you go in there and try to be all "Hey, dood, got any slammin choonz in the newies pile" you've pegged yourself into the "not going to buy" category.

History of Detroit Techno

[guanxi]

It's like George Clinton and Kraftwerk stuck in an elevator. - Derrick May


I'm probably not the best qualified, but since nobody else is contributing this:

According to the legend, Detroit Techno started when eclectic radio genius The Electrifying Mojo started playing Kraftwerk in the early 80's. I used to listen to Mojo; he was late night on an urban station, and would play anything from James Brown to Prince to AC/DC, interview the B-52s, and give trippy inspirational sermons to the city's youth.

The story goes, the Belleville Three (Derrick May, Juan Atkins, and Kevin Saunderson (better known as part of Inner City)) heard Mojo and started making their own music, including Clear by Cybertron (Atkins), the 'first' techno record.

By the mid-80's my friends in northwest Detroit were playing house and techno on turntables in their basement. In the late-80's the Music Institute was the epicenter (just ask my cool friends). Since then there's been an explosion of techno and electronica talent in Detroit, most prominently Richie Hawtin (Plastikman) and the more experimental Carl Craig.

Unfortunately, if you had asked most Detroiters in the mid-90's -- apart from the small but loyal group who listened-- they wouldn't know what you were talking about. You couldn't find techno on the radio (Mojo was gone). The DJs were international stars, but they had plenty of privacy at home. In the late 90's, Carl Craig and a promoter put together the Detroit Electronic Music Fest (DEMF). Much to the surprise of many native Detroiters, over a million people came from all over the world to hear it. The vibe (and I don't use that word often) was incredible. It included a truly touching moment when Derrick May stepped on stage and finally got his due from his hometown; he started his set with "The Payback" by James Brown.

Now, most Detroiters are aware, and local popularity has exploded. The city is rich in very interesting music , and the very open-minded scene hasn't been overwhelmed with trendiness.


... Probably more than you wanted to know, but here's a few more links:

History
Techno Rebels, an excellent history (I've heard) in book form, by Dan Sicko.

Someone's thesis that is a history of Techno.

Meta Soul, an interesting site (in design and content) about electronic music, including a Detroit Techno section.


Today
The 313 list, an active list with high signal-to-noise, full of techno geeks.

Record Time, the best place to find the latest from Detroit

The Metro Times, probably the best place for current news on Detroit music (click music at the top left).


You also may not realize how much music originates, even if it's not popularized, in Detroit: Motown, punk (Iggy Pop in the 60's), funk (George Clinton and Bootsy X), and techno.