high_jinx

why do you think it's been so retarded up to this point and how long do you think will take to become as legitimate and powerful a genre as hip hop and rock and roll?

i truly don't understand why this universal method of songwriting and recording hasn't been more embraced than the blips and bleeps of linkin park or the drum machine in chingy's latest single. i went to europe 2 years ago and it had already been huge throughout for a few years. i live in l.a. and have been around to all the major u.s. cities the last couple years since and i still don't see electronica extend beyond a small pigeonhole obscure level of popularity, no bigger than subsections of genre's like rock and hiphop. there's almost zero airtime for it on the radio or cable here, and its very difficult to find new stuff if you're a fan or market it if you make it.

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Glory's Sun

I think alot of it has to do with the fact that in the US everyone is so worried about kids taking ecstacy or whatever. I love electronic and I produce and spin my own stuff. However with the RAVE act and others going into legislature and to be honest the candy kids ruining the scene things don't look bright for the US scene as a whole. Drum and Bass is making a move forward. If you notice alot of commercials are using Drum and Bass now. The US DnB scene has come a long way and it closing in on the european scene. The scene was huge a few years back then promoters started getting greedy and kids started dying. Which by the way wasn't due to ecstacy in most cases. In alot of the venues the promotors would shut off the water so kids would have to buy water. Well a kid buys a roll pil at $20+ then $15 for the ticket they don't have much left to buy water at $6 a pop. I think it's starting to make a comeback now that people are more aware of things and the ecstacy craze seems to be subsiding.. but drugs go with music..always have always will. it's just part of it. I'm happy to see big events going on. Whistle 4 just passed. It was a 3 day event with over 150 dj's including many of the world's best. Will it ever become as big as hip hop or rock and roll?? it is.. it's just underground

don't forget that overseas Electronic is the standard..

irateplatypus

a music genre has limited growth because people are afraid of its link to drugs?

i think question of how long it will take to be as prominent as hip-hop and rock-and-roll takes a backseat to question of whether it will ever become popular at all. even though we often look the same as the people across the oceans... our cultures are very different in many ways. to think: it's popular there... so it's only a matter of time before it's popular here is to gloss over a lot of cultural implications of why some music is popular and other genres are not.

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If you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance for survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.

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Glory's Sun

in the statement that you quoted me I was referring to the big wigs in control of things. I've heard the arguments from senators and governors and mayor's about how electronic music is bad because everyone that listens to it is on ecstacy and that it promotes ecstacy use blah blah. Which is completely wrong of course. Many DnB kids take a no-chemical at all stance.

also, I wasn't saying that just because it's popular overseas that it would be as popular here. I was mearly stating that the scenes are becoming more popular and it has alot of euro flavor. The Drum and Bass realm is the most noted. Europeans used to say that American Drum and Bass was non-existent..now it is getting alot of respect.

kalisto_911

I just went to an AK1200(DnB) show and it was pretty dead but I had a blast and thats all that counts. Having techno "take off" in the US would just lead to Clear Channel fucking it to smitharines (sp?). I like going up to someone and asking if they like electronic and their eyes lighting up like love at first sight because they have met a fellow fan of the oh-so-wonderful music culture of electronica. I also love playing some wierd ass techno and pissing off the tight-asses and making them leave the room for some aspirin and dramamine.

By the way, did ya hear Prodigy just released their new album? It's a blast, go pick it up!

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Glory's Sun

yeah I've heard it.. not as good as some of the older stuff..but they used Reason to make it start to finish.. and since I use Reason..that gives me hope haha


as far as shows go they have been dead lately but alot of it is the promoters.. and the 20 cops waiting outside grrr it also has alot to do with where you're at also

avernus

I take it you guys know The Aphex Twin? He's been into electronica from the early days, experimenting with sound and playing raves in Cornwall in the late 80s. Try out Druqs, amazing stuff.

David

Glory's Sun

yes I'm quite familiar with Aphex.. pretty good stuff whenever I can't figure out what I want to listen to or I'm bored with current stuff

PulpMind

I live in Seattle, and, at least within the city itself, electronic music is just as big as rock and hiphop. almost. but saying "electronic music" is kind of lame, because there's just as many genras of electronic music as non. EDM as a whole is maybe as big as rock, but DnB is about as big as rockabilly. House as big as hard rock. you get the point.

I don't feel like writing my essay on why americans are mostly ignorant and closed minded, but that accounts for a good portion of why EDM has not taken off here.

go-bots

ak1200 rules!!!
most people i talk to dont like "edm" because they say its to repeditive and there are
no lyrics. im the only one of my friends that listens to it as a valid form of music.
my bros friend "alchemy" still make trance for bedrock but i dont think he plays live anymore.

jonjon42

!!!!
my friend Richard D James is awesome! (btw he publishes under several names Aphex Twin is I believe his most recent.)
Boy/Girl Song is very good from the Richard D. James album (yes he named an Aphex Twin album his name.. confusing, no?

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Anomaly_

It does seem a bit strange considering that major genres of electronic music were born in the US (House in Chicago, Techno in Detroit, Garage in New York, etc.). I think the general lack of lyrics and melodies may have something to do with it, though. Radio and TV are also not keen on playing anything longer than three minutes, which opposes the concept of a set.

alansmithee

That's about what I think. No lyrics=no hook or chorus which greatly limits the appeal of a song to radio/MTV. Plus, it's harder to put a face to the music, another thing which limits its mainstream success.

Glory's Sun

seems like alot of the newer trance has lyrics. Is that a push to make it more commercial? guess we'll have to wait and see


now back to what anomaly said. Chicago house is making a huge comeback but most people who get into houes ( I like proggy house) don't care much for the Chicago brand. go figure. It's almost like breakbeats. I love Florida breaks but up north they're all about electro-breaks. To me a nasty break is a nasty break. I think you're starting to see a push for electronic music. More and more people are spinning recs and alot of people are dabbling with Reason and other production programs. This will only help to increase the popularity of the music. Personally I like it better underground and hope MTV doesn't get their greedy hands on it. They tried with DJ Scribble..but he sucks. Most of the world renowned dj's get plenty of money, and the producers of course get a big share. I'm actually trying to get my promotors license so I can get a few parties set up. My crew spins really good and we have some stuff out there but I want to bring in some legends like Dj Hype, Dj Dan, and Dj Dara or Dieselboy with Messinian. Dj Dan is only $2000 get get ok well that's off topic. As I was saying, the music isn't as big as rock in some ways but I think it's bigger in a lot of ways also.

jwoody

Very true. I remember about 10 years ago when I used to go to hip-hop nights (usually Wednesday) at a big club in Newcastle and there would be the same 10-20 people turn up every week. Off the top of my head I remember seeing Jazzy Jeff, Gangstarr and many DMC mixing champions on tour.

On Fridays and Saturdays the same venue would be packed with 1000 sweaty ravers with another 500 locked outside.

Over the last few years the trends are changing as house clubs (and e) become less popular. Now I can go to one of many different clubs and hear any sort music I like.

roachboy

it is interesting, this question
but really difficult to respond to because the category is so huge...

so i figured that rather than sort out what electronic music is, i would say a couple things about the scene i am involved with, which is more "experimental" and/or electro-acoustic...old school synths, shortwaves, piano, voices, tape/tape manipulation, longform, dissonant type....

i do not have a single answer for why this stuff is not more popular here.
and by popular, i assume you mean able to draw large-ish audiences for live events.

maybe it is the length of the pieces
maybe that the music ignores the usual structural elements that set up a relation to pop forms (chord changes in particular, beats in a version of 4 for another, the usual hierarchies between/among instruments)

maybe it is the ritual element of performances, which can fill the room with a strange energy

maybe it is that the music makes significant demands on the listener.

maybe it is that people seem, for some reason, to want to see live copies of what they already know

what surprises me a bit is that netradio seems to have made almost no difference--if it is true that "electronic music" in its various mutations is more popular elsewhere than in the states, and if netradio is one mode that would enable you to cross scenes (click on the link and your head is in london, say...) you would think that this would translate into a gradual breaking down of divisions between scenes/audiences, no?

but it does not seem to work that way.
i wonder if this is a function of people now associating netradio with where they live, so that it simply does not occur to folk to hear things live in their area that might plug them into the space they inhabit via the radio?
maybe it is a function of how information about music is or is not transmitted by netradio outlets?

or maybe the problem is that people do not listen to much music in that format, that they still in the main rely on friends or recommendations or broadcast radio for access to new music?


or maybe it is something more prosiac: limited distribution for non-mainstream types of music.

at the same time, however, the scene feels like it is quite big, but not in any particular place---if you judge by the amount of (for example) tape music from the 1960s that is being reissued--someone must be buying it--but where are they?

turntable-driven forms might have an easier time of it because they mix rather than fundamentally fuck with forms of music that are already in place (in audience terms)---and they are cheaper to tour, can rely in more venues having decent (if not good) equipment.

any commentary?

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

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vanblah

I think one factor is distribution.

ANYONE can produce electronic music. Not all of it is good. And a lot of people just put out one song and that's it. No major distributor is going to touch a one song deal. Compilations? They'll only press a few hundred, maybe a few thousand. Then trying to get that music out there without a major distribution deal is really difficult.

Another problem? Electronic music is waaaaay too granular. I remember when it was just called "Techno." Now there's all these sub-genres. Mainstream America (and that is who you are talking about) doesn't want to have to know what a particular style of music is in order to listen to it.

Which leads me to clique-ishness. I'm not accusing anyone here of that, but I have witnessed it on MANY occassions in regard to electronic music. If you listen to one type of music then you are made to feel inadequate or unknowledgable about another type of music. Most people don't like to be made to appear foolish, so they will avoid the situation that may make them feel that way.

Then theres the transcience of it. Something may be cool for a day or two, but then it gets brushed aside to make room for the next thing. Makes it hard for average Joe to pick up on it.

Yes, the party scene is a little dismal, but that's to be expected when you have anti-drug zealots putting the fear that little Miffy might be offered some ecstacy at a "rave." The last party I went to was pretty innocent. I'm sure there was something going on somewhere, but no one was standing around handing out pills. The media has sensationalised a few bad scenes. That's nothing new ...

As far as music is concerned most young Americans don't want to have to:

a) take chances
b) think for themselves
c) be considered uncool

Younger Europeans generally don't give a sh*t about what anyone else thinks and are more likely to accept new things.

I realize I'm generalising with those statements.