Reggaestep (

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsreggae Reggae () is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, " Do the Reggay" was the first popular song to use ...

music and

dubstep Dubstep is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in South London in the early 2000s. The style emerged as a UK garage offshoot that blended 2-step rhythms and sparse dub production, as well as incorporating elements of broken be ...

that gained popularity online in the early 2010s, particularly on

SoundCloud SoundCloud is an online audio distribution platform and music sharing website that enables its users to upload, promote, and share audio. Founded in 2007 by Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss, SoundCloud is one of the largest music streaming se ...

. Reggaestep typically has similar drum samples as those used in reggae; however, the timing of these drums corresponds with the typical syncopation of drums in

. Other influence taken from reggae include harmonic accentuation of the offbeats, however off-beat rhythms can sometimes be layered on top of more traditional dubstep or

ragga Raggamuffin music, usually abbreviated as ragga, is a subgenre of dancehall and reggae music. The instrumentals primarily consist of electronic music. Similar to hip hop, sampling often serves a prominent role in raggamuffin music. Wayne Sm ...

melodies. The tempo tends to be at 140 BPM which is typical to dubstep. The "drops" in reggaestep are very similar to those of dubstep, but often follow similar melody patterns to reggae.

Popularity

One of the most popular reggaestep tracks as of 2013 is " Make It Bun Dem" by well-known American electronic music artist

Skrillex Sonny John Moore (born January 15, 1988), known professionally as Skrillex, is an American DJ and music producer. Growing up in Northeast Los Angeles and Northern California, he joined the post-hardcore band From First to Last as the lead sing ...

, the music video of which gaining over 400M YouTube views, as well as over five million hits on SoundCloud. Despite this, the genre is relatively unknown, but was quite prevalent on

in the early 2010s. ''

The Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...

'' recognized reggaestep as a musical genre in its article about " Make It Bun Dem."

References

Reggae genres Electronic dance music genres Fusion music genres Reggae fusion Dubstep Moombahton English styles of music {{music-genre-stub