| Electronica | |
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| Stylistic origins | |
| Cultural origins | Early 1990s, United Kingdom[1] |
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| Fusion genres | |
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Electronica is both a broad group ofelectronic-based music styles intended for listening rather than strictly for dancing[2][1] and a music scene that came to prominence in the early1990s in the United Kingdom.[1] In the United States, the term is mostly used to refer to electronic music generally.[3]
The original widespread use of the term "electronica" derives from the influential Englishexperimental techno label New Electronica, which was one of the leading forces of the early1990s introducing and supporting dance-basedelectronic music oriented towards home listening rather than dance-floor play,[1] although the word "electronica" had already begun to be associated withsynthesizer generated music as early as 1983, when a "UK Electronica Festival" was first held.[4][5][6] At that time electronica became known as "electronic listening music", also becoming more or less synonymous toambient techno andintelligent techno, and was considered distinct from other emerging genres such asjungle andtrip hop.[1]
Electronica artists that would later become commercially successful began to record in the late1980s, before the term had come into common usage, including for examplethe Prodigy,Fatboy Slim,Daft Punk,the Chemical Brothers,the Crystal Method,Moby,Underworld andFaithless.[7]
Around the mid-1990s, with the success of thebig beat-sound exemplified by the Chemical Brothers and the Prodigy in the UK, and spurred by the attention from mainstream artists, includingMadonna in her collaboration withWilliam Orbit on her albumRay of Light[8] and Australian singerDannii Minogue with her 1997 albumGirl,[9] music of this period began to be produced with a higher budget, increased technical quality, and with more layers than most other forms ofdance music, since it was backed by major record labels andMTV as the "next big thing".[10]
According to a 1997Billboard article, "the union of the club community andindependent labels" provided the experimental and trend-setting environment in which electronica acts developed and eventually reached the mainstream. It cites American labels such asAstralwerks (the Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim,the Future Sound of London,Fluke),Moonshine (DJ Keoki),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.[11]
Madonna andBjörk are said[by whom?] to be responsible for electronica's thrust into mainstream culture, with their albumsRay of Light (Madonna),[8]Post andHomogenic (Björk).
In 1997, the North American mainstream music industry adopted and to some extent manufacturedelectronica as an umbrella term encompassing styles such astechno, big beat,drum and bass, trip hop,downtempo, andambient, regardless of whether it was curated by indie labels catering to the "underground" nightclub andrave scenes,[11][12] or licensed by major labels and marketed to mainstream audiences as a commercially viable alternative toalternative rock music.[13]
New York City became one center of experimentation and growth for the electronica sound, with DJs and music producers from areas as diverse asSoutheast Asia and Brazil bringing their creative work to the nightclubs of that city.[14][15]
Electronica benefited from industry advancements inmusic technology, especiallyelectronic musical instruments, synthesizers,music sequencers,drum machines, anddigital audio workstations. As the technology developed, it became possible for individuals or smaller groups to produce electronic songs and recordings in smaller studios, even inproject studios. At the same time, computers facilitated the use of musicsamples andloops as construction kits for sonic compositions.[16] This led to a period of creative experimentation and the development of new forms, some of which became known as electronica.[17][18] Wide ranges of influences, both sonic and compositional, are combined in electronica recordings.[19]
Electronica includes a wide variety of musical acts and styles, linked by a penchant for overtly electronic production;[20] a range which includes more popular acts such as Björk, Madonna,Goldfrapp andIDM artists such asAutechre, andAphex Twin.
The North American mainstream music industry uses the term as an umbrella category to refer any dance-based electronic music styles with a potential forpop appeal.[1] However, United States–basedAllMusic still categorizes electronica as a top-level genre, stating that it includes danceablegrooves, as well as music for headphones andchillout areas.[21]
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 relativelyexperimental styles of listening electronic music. It partly overlaps what is known chiefly outside the UK as intelligent dance music (IDM).[1]
In the late 1990s and early2000s, electronica was increasingly used as background scores fortelevision advertisements, initially for automobiles. It was also used for various video games, includingtheWipeout series, for which the soundtrack was composed of many popular electronica tracks that helped create more interest in this type of music[22]—and later for other technological and business products such as computers and financial services.[citation needed] Then in 2011,Hyundai Veloster, in association withthe Grammys, produced a project that became known as Re:Generation.[23]
Electronica is a broad term used to describe the emergence of electronic music that is geared for listening instead of strictly for dancing.
The glitch genre arrived on the back of the electronica movement, an umbrella term for alternative, largely dance-based electronic music (including house, techno, electro, drum'n'bass, ambient) that has come into vogue in the past five years. Most of the work in this area is released on labels peripherally associated with the dance music market, and is therefore removed from the contexts of academic consideration and acceptability that it might otherwise earn. Still, in spite of this odd pairing of fashion and art music, the composers of glitch often draw their inspiration from the masters of 20th-century music who they feel best describe its lineage.
With record sales slumping and alternative rock presumed over, the music industry is famously desperate for a new movement to replace its languishing grunge product. And so its gaze has fixed on a vital and international scene of knob-twiddling musicians and colorfully garbed clubgoers—a scene that, when it began in Detroit discos ten years ago, was called techno. If all goes according to marketing plan, 1997 will be the year "electronica" replaces "grunge" as linguistic plague, MTV buzz, ad soundtrack, and runway garb. The music has been freshly installed in Microsoft commercials, in the soundtrack to Hollywood's recycled action-hero picThe Saint, and in MTV's newest, hourlong all-electronica program,Amp.
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