¿De dónde nació la música electrónica? ¿Cuando comenzaron a sonar y como se desarrollaron esa inmensidad de estilos de electrónica que tenemos hoy en día? Dubstep, Techno, Trance, House, BreakBeat, Jungle, Drum and Bass, Garage, Downtempo, Trip Hop, SythPop y un sin fin de música electrónica que compone una maraña de estilos donde nos perdemos con facilidad.

Promocionado por Digital Imported tenemos el proyecto Ishkur’s Guide to Electronic Music v2.5. Se trata de una web desarrolla en flash que nos muestra paso a paso y estilo por estilo la historia de la música electrónica desde sus orígenes más cercanos en los últimos años hasta el año 65000 a.c., pasando por todos los estilos de electrónica y conceptos básicos como MC, Gear o Samples.

La web divide en 7 grandes estilos destacables en la música electrónica: HOUSE, TRANCE, TECHNO, BREAKBEAT, JUNGLE, HARDCORE, DOWNTEMPO. Para amenizar la visita vamos a mostraros la maraña de estilos que nos enseña la web, junto con un video relacionado con el estilo.

HOUSE

«House is the most soulful genre. It’s also the simplest, the oldest, the warmest, and where electronic music is concerned, easily the most human-sounding, making it the most popular, commanding the most producers, artists, labels, DJs, fans, and subgenres. The whole of top40 pop music gets its hooks, gimmicks, lines and melodies from house music (and vice versa). That is why it stands as the world’s perennial party music, and it will probably stay that way until the end of time. Or until someone finds a more catchy beat than the 4/4 bassdrum.»

Deep New York Underground Lounge House Music DJ Mix by JaBig [DEEP & DOPE 117]

TRANCE

«Trance is the most emotional genre. It can make you cry, make you shout, make you cheer, and make you celebrate absolutely nothing of substance except pure, ecstatic bliss. This is interesting, when at one time it was very repetitive and hypnotic (hence its label ‘trance’) and was very easy to get lost in whilst divulging in aforementioned emotions. But now it’s quite difficult to get entranced due mostly to the fact that the genre has devolved into such trite, derivative junk that even the biggest culprits of it are having trouble lying about how interesting it is. If you ignore the cliched, breakdown-build-anthem template side of the genre that is so canned and predictable you can set your watch to it, trance is still pretty fun. Unless you’re trying to be a Sasha worshipping pretentious snob not partaking in that, in which case you don’t even want to admit you’re listening to trance anymore.»

Paul van Dyk – For An Angel 2009

TECHNO

«Techno is the depressing, gritty dystopian genre, a musical personification of the industrial, recession-sacked automotive industries of Detroit in the late 80s.The term was lifted from Alvin Toffler’s book «The Third Wave», and by 1990 it had become the music press’ fancy word for everything electronic. With that said, it makes sense that the best stuff isn’t coming from that city anymore, since the word hardly represents the music–even when used in the proper context. But what it lacks in soul it more than makes up in purity of sound and a mythology so romantic that it can’t possibly figure out what to do with itself anymore.»

Zombie Nation – Kernkraft 400

BREAKBEAT

«Breakbeat is the genre with the most history and, arguably, the most success, which explains why, in this day and age, it is the most fractured music with the most hangups with just about everything else. It’s problem has to do with the fact that it now tries too much to sound like itself, using prestige and tradition to get by where talent and ingenuity can not. For what it’s worth, the most interesting sounds coming out of Breakbeat can mostly be found on mainstream Top40 radio rather than the romantic underground scene it claims to have ties to.»

Freestylers – Warrior Charge (Breakfastaz Remix)

JUNGLE

«Jungle is the sole aggressor of the genres. It is also the only genre that might lay claim to having been invented solely in the 90s, even though it’s not. The antithesis to the bright, flashy schmaltz that some of the other genres exhibit, the black sheep of the electronic family is rough, abrasive, crusty, dirty, and full of swaggering machismo. Even its namesake speaks of raw, primitive militarism, lending fashion and behavior tips to its aficionados. The cleaner variant of Jungle, Drum n Bass, a term invented by the music press before there was a sound to signify it (one of the few genres where the actual name predated the existence of the music), is very formulaic, clean and smoothed out, and hence trendy to those who like to be junglists but the cut-up sounds of jungle just aren’t palatable to them.»

Barrington Levy – Under Me Sensi ( X Project Remix )

HARDCORE

«Hardcore is the musical genre with bi-polar disorder: one half is blistering, sadistic anger, a seething uncontrollable rage that seeks to ruin and wreck everything that exists, including everyone else’s fun time. It is hardcore’s mission to inundate the world with pointless, seering sonic hell, insisting every chance it gets that it will never be defeated, can not be killed, and refuses to go away no matter how much people want it to. The other half of hardcore is way too silly and stupid to take such anger seriously anymore.»

Dougal/Gammer – Jam the Nightclub [Remix]

DOWNTEMPO

«Downtempo isn’t dance music, it is listening music. For 40 years it has dedicated itself to the exploration of new audio textures and undiscovered sonic soundscapes, often inventing whole instruments and sound kaleidoscopes in its push for novelty. Because of this, the other genres have made a habit of consistently and constantly raiding the atmospheric mood and ambience of Downtempo to employ in their own eclectic styles. But though it doesn’t actively seek the spotlight as much as the others, Downtempo will remain as the genre that was here first and will probably be here at the end, since it is the only one driven solely by an insatiable desire for innovation.»

‘Dr Who’ Theme – BBC Radiophonic Workshop, The

Si eres un apasionado de la música electrónica y no te quieres perder ningún detalle, te recomendamos sin duda que le eches un vistazo a Ishkur’s Guide to Electronic Music v2.5.

¡Disfrutad AFEléctricos!