home I house I garage I acid house I hard house I nu nrg I techno I trance I goa I progressive house I rave (hard core) I jungle I drum and bass I tech step or two step I atmospheric or intelligent I dark jungle I dub I dancehall I breakbeat

Genres

Treason : A form of music that grew out of Disco, the genesis of which was the Ware House club in Chicago and a pair of DJ's Franky Knuckles and DJ Ron Hardy who produced their own remixes using tape decks and Roland TR-909 drum machines.

Epitonic : House emerged from the nightclubs of post-disco America, especially the predominantly gay, African-American clubs of late '80s Chicago and New York. Soon, however, the music took root in most urban hubs worldwide, from London to L.A., San Francisco to San Paolo, Montreal to Manchester. House is dominated by its telltale, hypnotic "four on the floor" (straight-ahead unsyncopated beats) drum sounds, deep bass loops, and synthetic textures, often also incorporating jazz and world music elements to promote the positive groove. Today, Chicago house is characterized by its deep and tracky sound, New York house by its harder edge and soaring diva vocals, and San Francisco house by its funkier British style. .

Harder House History of hard house (under rants). 2 min mono samples of the charts. 

Treason : A form of music that grew out of Disco, the genesis of which was the Paradise Garage. It is charicterised by its use of sampled piano stabs.

Treason : House music with the tb-303 sound with lots of resonance. Pioneers include DJ Pierre. Came into its hight in the late 80's.

Hard NRG: UK Hard House is typically characterized by a stomping kick drum, and a progressive bassline.  You often find plenty of rhythm and percussion, mixed in with some vocal samples.  The synth leads tend to be quick and catchy, the kind of things that get you up and moving.  Some people trace the current UK Hard House style back to "Hard Bag" or what was known as "Hand Bag".  You often find these tracks on Tripoli Trax, or Tidy Trax... and many of the tracks by OD404 (Superfast Oz and Dom Sweeden) on Kaktai Records.

Treason : The first time I heard this I though... what dose NRG stand for?"  Duuuuhh!

Hard NRG: Nu-NRG, on the other hand, is usually a bit harder.  The kick drums are hard hitting, and the basslines are driving.  The synth leads are often raw sounding, sometimes distorted stabs, mixed with 303's.  There tends to be fewer vocal samples in general.  Usually you find a major breakdown in the track, which ends in a large snare drum build and an explosion of energy.  And of course The Hoover... but more on that later.  Most Nu-NRG traces itself back to Hard Trance or even Acid Trance.  This style can often be found on labels such as Nukleuz Blue, Mohawk/Aztec,  DIP and early Tinrib releases. End Quote.

Epitonic :Techno was originally spawned in American urban centres, notably Detroit, before being exported to England in the early '90s. The techno scene grew quickly in most of Europe, especially Germany, Belgium, and England, where club kids embraced the hard, driving sounds and rhythms that borrowed from '70s electronic innovators like Kraftwerk, and late '80s electronic pioneers like Meat Beat Manifesto, New Order, and Nitzer Ebb. Early '90s techno artists like Orbital, Cabaret Voltaire, and The Prodigy have enjoyed considerable commercial success, while the likes of Adam Beyer, Cari Lekebusch, and Steve Stoll lead the new underground revolution. Techno is -- and always will be -- future music. End Quote. 

Epitonic :Trance, along with drum and bass, is one of the newer additions to the dance music family tree. It developed out of early '90s techno, and has since split off into two distinct strains -- psychedelic (or Goa) trance and progressive house. The up-tempo, heavily electronic, swirling sounds of psychedelic trance can be heard booming from sound systems along the coastline of south western India, particularly Goa -- hence "Goa trance." Meanwhile, progressive house (a lighter derivative) is the music of choice in the both the burgeoning U.K. indoor club scene and the sun-drenched beaches and clubs of Ibiza. You cannot discuss progressive house without mentioning Sasha, John Digweed, Paul Oakenfold, and Nick Warren, all of whom have attained pop-star status in their native England.

GOA

Treason : I'm not sure exactly what this is, I think it is like trance but harder and with dablas.

Progressive House

Treason : See the definition for trance.

Treason : A British movement that started in the late 80's and spread to Canada New Zealand and Australia (USA?). Was associated with the designer drug ecstasy. A Rave is a party in which Hard Core music is played and commonly ecstasy is consumed. As ecstasy became illegal the Raves where raided by the police. To prevent this the venue was held a secret until the last minute. Rave music or hard core music was characterized by heavy use of sampler technology and drum machines.

Treason : A progression from rave sometimes with reggae influences. Comes from the term "urban jungle" or the James Brown album "Into the Jungle Groove" depending on who you ask.

The Electronica Primer : Jungle originates from London, England. The real roots are from 1989, the genre evolved during 1990-1992 from the breakbeats used in Hardocore Techno to become a serious Electronica genre in 1995 when artist records from 4 Hero, Goldie and A Guy Called Gerald came out. Timeless from Goldie is the innovating track from 1995: 21 minutes of music:  In these years, a distinction between the dance and listening jungle grew, just like in Techno and Breakbeat. The term comes from a James Brown compilation Into the Jungle Groove with the classic breakbeat in Funky Drummer on it. The genre could be described as speeded-up breakbeats with a slower bassline. The speed of the drums varies from 140-170 beats per minute; the bassline is - sometimes - half of the speed of the drum. The drums have the breakbeat 1 2 33 4, which means that the 2 and 4 are snare or kick drum `on the floor', while the 1 sometimes and the 3 hardly always are syncopated drums (i.e. off the measure). The bassline is flowing smoothly or pumping energously, originating from dub/reggae.

 The Electronica Primer

Treason : A progression from jungle. in which the speed of the track is usually between 150 200 BPM and sometimes 250. Sometimes  the breaks are sped up samples from segments of Funk R and B or Hip hop tracks. There are also fully sequenced beats. Another characteristic of some drum and bass is a dark fascination with apocalyptic sci-fi films. Goldie had a hit with a track called  terminator in the early 90's. There are sometimes modified prose passages from such films incorporated into the tracks. Drum and bass encompasses a smooth acid jazz style to a hard industrial grinding dance style.

The Electronica Primer : Many people call the genres overall Drum `n' Bass. Because these instruments are frequently used in music, this name is too general, but somewhat ironical arrogant as well. Further, there is a third element which is characteristic for Drum & Bass, that is the strings. To explain it, here are three characteristic samples with description from Demon's Theme, a track by L.T.J Bukem from Logical Progression. First, there are strings, which are not violins, but some continuous electronic sounds, which also contain some wind instrument. L.T.J Bukem gave these introduction sounds a pastoral character. Listen: . It is atmospheric, space orientated, like the cd covers which L.T.J presents us. Then there is the bassline. It is very different from the straight forward house bass. There is som dub or reggae influence in it. To say it as one feels it: the bassline flows. Listen: . It does not pump, as in the hard Club House (Gabber or Hardcore). The third and most pronouncing element is the drum pattern of fast breakbeats. The drums differ from House in speed and pattern. The house pattern is 1 2 3 4, while the breakbeat is something like 1 2 33 4. Listen: . In most of the tracks, there is only one rhythm; if there are more, the loud and fast Jungle breakbeat overrules the others. After the drum, the bassline is added again and the Drum `n' Bass continues for at least seven minutes. Sometimes the bird calls. And there is one moment of silence, after which the sound continues. It is addicting, once you got used to it (which can take some time). Jacob's Optical Stairway, better known as 4 Hero, is a nice alternative to learn to listen.

Tech step was invented by DJ Trace when he remixed a track called "Mutant Jazz" by "T. Power" and "MK Ultra" this new version was called "The Mutant". Tech Step is an sub genre of drum and bass that is characterized by its beat. The tech step beat can be considered as a variation of a straight snare/"kick drum" beat in 4/4 time with the second kick (on the 3rd beat) delayed by a sixteenth. This is the emphasis of the tech step beat though there are many variations. Tech step beats can be very complicated with many percussion events other that the straight tech step beat.

The Electronica Primer : Twostep and Jump Up Steps refer to the dance floor variant of Jungle. Hardstep has an overdriven bass sound, which is sometimes off beat (syncopated). Techstep uses drum sounds in a Techno way. Aphrodite produced an overdriven bass sound, very well suited for the dance floor. Listen  to A Woman That Rolls from Aphrodite. This is called Jump Up as well, because that's what you want to do on the dance floor. Twostep or " Step has the very characteristic snare drum on the 2 and 4, hence the name and further only one shifted bass drum after the 3: 1 2 34, in Primer notation. Listen:  to Die's Slide Away from Planet V, the best compilation from early 1999. This style becomes dominant in 1998/1999 and stimulates, thanks to the simpleness, combinations with House, e.g. Twostep Garage which is Garage House with the Twostep rhythm in place of the House bass and clap.

Atmospheric or Intelligent

The Electronica Primer  : The track, called Demon's Theme, laid the framework for the atmospheric genre, for which Intelligent jungle and Artcore are other sometimes used names. The music is funky. Although there is much more, Bukem's Good Looking Records produced the best Intelligent Jungle. There are three series, Logical Progression (straight drum `n' bass), Earth (smooth, subtle) and Progression Sessions (mixed, like the live DJ sets).  

Dark Jungle

The Electronica Primer :  In 1992-1993, spin-off from Hardcore Techno, there were some were the underground styles called Darkcore and Darkside. There were very furious and heavy soundscapes used, where the Intelligent genre used light strings. In the late nineties, Ed Rush and Optical made un updated version of Dark Jungle, with heavy soundscapes, like fog sirens, deep bass and smart beats.

Treason  : An electronic form of reggae typified by the use of lots of echo effects on the drums. Got its name from acitate or dub plates that are cheap soft test prints of vynal that this form of music was commonly available in.

Treason : An electronic form of reggae, characterized by Jamaican style rap I always think of shaggy when I hear this term.

Epitonic : Breakbeat is -- and always will be -- one of the most dominant forms of dance music. You can trace the movement back to the days when James Brown, Curtis Mayfield, and Isaac Hayes ruled, through the electro explosion led by Afrika Bambaataa and the Soul Sonic Force, up to the present day nu-breaks movement engineered by Adam Freeleand et al. The early '90s rave boom in Europe was built on it, the West Coast is obsessed with it, and drum and bass (to some extent) grew out of it. Breakbeat gained popularity in the U.K. through seminal tracks like "The Phantom" by Renegade Soundwave, "Papua New Guinea" by Future Sound Of London, and later "Bombscare" by 2 Bad Mice. In the late 90's the commercial success of bands like Fatboy Slim, Chemical Brothers, The Crystal Method, and The Prodigy has both attracted the attention of the major labels and has made the music available to a much wider audience. Many believe that it is this genre that will break electronic music in the U.S. End Quote,