Electronica is both a broad group of
electronic-based music styles intended for
listening
Listening is giving attention to a sound or action. When listening, a person hears what others are saying and tries to understand what it means. The act of listening involves complex affective, cognitive and behavioral processes. Affective p ...
rather than strictly for
dancing
Dance is a performing art art form, form consisting of sequences of movement, either improvised or purposefully selected. This movement has aesthetic and often symbolism (arts), symbolic value. Dance can be categorized and described by its chor ...
and a music scene that started in the early 1990s in the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
.
In the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...
, the term is mostly used to refer to
electronic music
Electronic music is a Music genre, genre of music that employs electronic musical instruments, digital instruments, or electronics, circuitry-based music technology in its creation. It includes both music made using electronic and electromech ...
generally.
History
Early 1990s: origins and UK scene
The original wide-spread use of the term "electronica" derives from the influential English experimental techno label New Electronica, which was one of the leading forces of the early 1990s introducing and supporting dance-based electronic music oriented towards home listening rather than dance-floor play,
although the word "electronica" had already begun to be associated with synthesizer generated music as early as 1983, when a "UK Electronica Festival" was first held.
At that time electronica became known as "electronic listening music", also becoming more or less synonymous to
ambient techno and
intelligent techno, and was considered distinct from other emerging genres such as
jungle
A jungle is land covered with dense forest and tangled vegetation, usually in tropical climates. Application of the term has varied greatly during the past recent century.
Etymology
The word ''jungle'' originates from the Sanskrit word ''jaá ...
and
trip hop.
Electronica artists that would later become commercially successful began to record in the late 1980s, before the term had come into common usage, including for example
The Prodigy,
Fatboy Slim,
Daft Punk,
The Chemical Brothers,
The Crystal Method,
Moby,
Underworld and
Faithless.
["Crystal Method...grew from an obscure club-culture duo to one of the most recognizable acts in electronica, ...", page 90, ''Wired: Musicians' Home Studios : Tools & Techniques of the Musical Mavericks'', Megan Perry, Backbeat Books Music/Songbooks 2004, ]
Mid 1990s: effect on mainstream popular music
Around the mid-1990s, with the success of the
big beat-sound exemplified by
The Chemical Brothers and
The Prodigy in the UK, and spurred by the attention from mainstream artists, including
Madonna in her collaboration with
William Orbit on her album ''
Ray of Light''
and Australian singer
Dannii Minogue with her 1997 album ''
Girl
A girl is a young female human, usually a child or an adolescent. When a girl becomes an adult, she is accurately described as a '' woman''. However, the term ''girl'' is also used for other meanings, including ''young woman'',Dictionar ...
'',
[ Girl (Dannii Minogue album)] music of this period began to be produced with a higher budget, increased technical quality, and with more layers than most other forms of dance music, since it was backed by major record labels and
MTV as the "next big thing".
["Electronica reached new heights within the culture of rave and techno music in the 1990s." Page 185, ''Music and Technoculture'', Rene T. A. Lysloff, Tandem Library Books, 2003, ]
According to a 1997 ''
Billboard'' article, "the union of the
club community and
independent labels" provided the experimental and trend-setting environment in which electronica acts developed and eventually reached the mainstream. It cites American labels such as
Astralwerks (
The Chemical Brothers,
Fatboy Slim,
The Future Sound of London,
Fluke),
Moonshine (
DJ Keoki
George Lopez (born October 23, 1966), known by his stage name DJ Keoki or Keoki Franconi, is a Salvadoran-American electronic musician, among other genres, DJ. Born in El Salvador and raised in Hawaii, Keoki began advertising himself as "supers ...
),
Sims, and City of Angels (
The Crystal Method) for playing a significant role in discovering and marketing artists who became popularized in the electronica scene.
Madonna and
Björk
Björk Guðmundsdóttir ( , ; born 21 November 1965), known mononymously as Björk, is an Icelandic singer, songwriter, composer, record producer, and actress. Noted for her distinct three-octave vocal range and eccentric persona, she has de ...
are said to be responsible for electronica's thrust into mainstream culture, with their albums ''
Ray of Light'' (Madonna),
''
Post'' and ''
Homogenic'' (Björk).
Late 1990s: American inclusion
In 1997, the North American mainstream music industry adopted and to some extent manufactured ''electronica'' as an umbrella term encompassing styles such as
techno
Techno is a Music genre, genre of electronic dance music (EDM) which is generally music production, produced for use in a continuous DJ set, with tempo often varying between 120 and 150 beats per minute (bpm). The central Drum beat, rhythm is typ ...
,
big beat,
drum and bass,
trip hop,
downtempo, and
ambient, regardless of whether it was curated by indie labels catering to the "underground"
nightclub and
rave scenes,
or licensed by major labels and marketed to mainstream audiences as a commercially viable alternative to
alternative rock
Alternative rock (also known as alternative music, alt-rock or simply alternative) is a category of rock music that evolved from the independent music underground of the 1970s. Alternative rock acts achieved mainstream success in the 1990s w ...
music.
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...
became one center of experimentation and growth for the electronica sound, with
DJs and music producers from areas as diverse as Southeast Asia and Brazil bringing their creative work to the nightclubs of that city.
["In 2000, razilian vocalist BebelGilberto capitalized on New York's growing fixation with cocktail lounge ambient music, an offshoot of the dance club scene that focused on drum and bass remixes with Brazilian sources. ...Collaborating with club music maestros like Suba and Thievery Corporation, Gilberto thrust herself into the leading edge of the emerging Brazilian electronica movement. On her immensely popular ''Tanto Tempo'' (2000)..." Page 234, ''The Latin Beat: The Rhythms and Roots of Latin Music from Bossa Nova to Salsa and Beyond'', Ed Morales, Da Capo Press, 2003, ]["founded in 1997,...under the slogan 'Musical Insurgency Across All Borders', for six years anhattan nightclubMutiny was an international hub of the south Asian electronica music scene. Bringing together artists from different parts of the south Asia diaspora, the club was host to a roster of British Asian musicians and DJs..." Page 165, ''Youth Media '', Bill Osgerby, Routledge, 2004, ]
2010s: decline of the term
By the early 2010s, the industry abandoned ''electronica'' in favor of ''
electronic dance music'' (EDM), a term with roots in academia and an increasing association with outdoor
music festivals and relatively mainstream, post-rave
electro house and
dubstep music.
Characteristics and definition
Electronica benefited from advancements in
music technology, especially
electronic musical instruments,
synthesizer
A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis ...
s,
music sequencers,
drum machines, and
digital audio workstation
A digital audio workstation (DAW) is an electronic device or application software used for recording, editing and producing audio files. DAWs come in a wide variety of configurations from a single software program on a laptop, to an integra ...
s. As the technology developed, it became possible for individuals or smaller groups to produce electronic songs and recordings in smaller studios, even in
project studios. At the same time, computers facilitated the use of music
"samples" and
"loops" as construction kits for sonic compositions.
["This loop slicing technique is common to the electronica genre and allows a live drum feel with added flexibility and variation." Page 380, ''DirectX Audio Exposed: Interactive Audio Development'', Todd Fay, Wordware Publishing, 2003, ] This led to a period of creative experimentation and the development of new forms, some of which became known as ''electronica''.
["Electronically produced music is part of the mainstream of popular culture. Musical concepts that were once considered radical - the use of environmental sounds, ambient music, turntable music, digital sampling, computer music, the electronic modification of acoustic sounds, and music made from fragments of speech-have now been subsumed by many kinds of popular music. Record store genres including new age, rap, hip-hop, electronica, techno, jazz, and popular song all rely heavily on production values and techniques that originated with classic electronic music." Page 1, ''Electronic and Experimental Music: Pioneers in Technology and Composition'', Thomas B. Holmes, Routledge Music/Songbooks, 2002, ]["Electronica and punk have a definite similarity: They both totally prescribe to a DIY aesthetic. We both tried to work within the constructs of the traditional music business, but the system didn't get us - so we found a way to do it for ourselves, before it became affordable.", quote from artist BT, page 45, ''Wired: Musicians' Home Studios : Tools & Techniques of the Musical Mavericks'', Megan Perry, Backbeat Books Music/Songbooks 2004, ] Wide ranges of influences, both sonic and compositional, are combined in electronica recordings.
[" For example, composers often render more than one version of their own compositions. This practice is not unique to the mod scene, of course, and occurs commonly in dance club music and related forms (such as ambient, jungle, etc.—all broadly designated 'electronica')." Page 48, ''Music and Technoculture'', Rene T. A. Lysloff, Tandem Library Books, 2003, ]
Electronica includes a wide variety of musical acts and styles, linked by a penchant for overtly electronic production;
["Electronica lives and dies by its grooves, fat synthesizer patches, and fliter sweeps.". Page 376, ''DirectX Audio Exposed: Interactive Audio Development'', Todd Fay, Wordware Publishing, 2003, ] a range which includes more popular acts such as
Björk
Björk Guðmundsdóttir ( , ; born 21 November 1965), known mononymously as Björk, is an Icelandic singer, songwriter, composer, record producer, and actress. Noted for her distinct three-octave vocal range and eccentric persona, she has de ...
,
Madonna,
Goldfrapp and
IDM artists such as
Autechre, and
Aphex Twin.
Regional differences
The North American mainstream music industry uses the term as an umbrella category to refer any dance-based electronic music styles with a potential for pop appeal.
However, U.S.-based ''
AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the dat ...
'' still categorizes electronica as a top-level genre, stating that it includes danceable grooves, as well as music for headphones and
chillout areas.
["'Reaching back to grab the grooves of '70s disco/funk and the gadgets of electronic composition, Electronica soon became a whole new entity in and of itself, spinning off new sounds and subgenres with no end in sight two decades down the pike. Its beginnings came in the post-disco environment of Chicago/New York and Detroit, the cities who spawned house and techno (respectively) during the 1980s. Later in that decade, club-goers in Britain latched onto the fusion of mechanical and sensual, and returned the favor to hungry Americans with new styles like jungle/drum'n'bass and trip hop. Though most all early electronica was danceable, by the beginning of the '90s, producers were also making music for the headphones and chill-out areas as well, resulting in dozens of stylistic fusions like ambient-house, experimental techno, tech-house, electro-techno, etc. Typical for the many styles gathered under the umbrella was a focus on danceable grooves, very loose song structure (if any), and, in many producers, a relentless desire to find a new sound no matter how tepid the results." ]
In other parts of the world, especially in the UK, ''electronica'' is also a broad term, but is associated with non-dance-oriented music, including relatively experimental styles of listening electronic music. It partly overlaps what is known chiefly outside the UK as ''
intelligent dance music'' (IDM).
Included in contemporary media
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, electronica was increasingly used as background scores for
television advertisements, initially for automobiles. It was also used for various video games, including
the ''Wipeout'' series, for which the soundtrack was composed of many popular electronica tracks that helped create more interest in this type of music
[''The Changing Shape of the Culture Industry; or, How Did Electronica Music Get into Television Commercials?'', Timothy D. Taylor, University of California, Los Angeles]
Television & New Media, Vol. 8, No. 3, 235-258 (2007)
—and later for other technological and business products such as computers and financial services.
Then in 2011,
Hyundai Veloster, in association with
The Grammys, produced a project that became known as Re:Generation.
[Ed. The Grammys. Hyundai Veloster, The Recording Academy, GreenLight Media & Marketing, Art Takes Over (ATO), & RSA Films, n.d. Web. 24 May 2013. .]
See also
*
List of electronic music genres
References
Literature
*
Cummins, James. 2008. ''Ambrosia: About a Culture – An Investigation of Electronica Music and Party Culture.'' Toronto, ON: Clark-Nova Books.
External links
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