Go Von Deeper

Deep House is a sub-genre of House music.  It still has that 4/4 kick, and the tempo ranges from 120 to 128 BPM but is more common in the low 120's.  Modern Deep House contains soulful vocals and has a very melodic, ambient feel to it, it also seems to share similarities to Tech-House especially in regards to the bassline.  Todays Deep House is very different from the more heavily Jazz influenced Deep House that originated in the late 80's.  I dont know a whole lot about this genre so I dont want to go any deeper (no pun intended) and give incorrect information, just check out this beautiful Deep House remix of one of my favorite 80's love songs " Wicked Games" by Chris Isaak.

                                                                     

Caution: Nu-Disco is extremely addictive!

This genre is still very new to me, I just was turned on to Nu-Disco about a week ago.   I am unsure of the BPM but it seems to be close to 125bpm and also share the same 4/4 beat structure of House music and as its name implies it takes heavy elements from Disco music. I like how it maintains a consistent fun danceable energy throughout the track without using epic buildups and big room drops like most modern mainstream House tracks.  This genre is very addictive.

                                                                              

Is Melbourne Bounce the next big thing?

Melbourne Bounce also known as Melbourne House is a subgenre of electro house. Similar to Dirty Dutch, It focuses more on high pitch synths that sound almost like a horn rather than those electro bass synths. Its also said to be similar to PsyTrance. This genre is so fun to dance to, its very upbeat  and the horn sounding synths just add even more fun to the genre. Melbourne Bounce is also known to use reverse bass alot on the offbeat after the kick to give it a distorted sound, this distorted kick is also found in the Hardstyle genre. Producers of this genre include the likes of TJR, Will Sparks and Joel Fletcher but Dutch producer Laidback Luke is also experimenting with Bounce. While this genre has been popular in its home town of Melbourne Australia for a while now, I see Melbourne Bounce being the next big thing in the states.

Complextro - What is it and why it could be the death of Dubstep.

Complextro is defined as a Sub-Genre of Electro House,   It has the same 4/4 beat, it's usually played around the same BPM about 128 - 132.  The term itself was started by Porter Robinson, but producers such as Wolfgang Gartner were producing Complextro tracks way before Porter came around.  Complextro tracks will consist of elements from 3 different genres (Dubstep, Glitch and Electro House).  Complextro is said to be one of the most difficult genres to produce due to the wide range of varying synths that are used.  You will hear the modern elements of Dubstep such as those Modulated bass synths, Modern talking, Saw synths  etc.  as well as very glitchy sounding synths.  While dubstep still has a somewhat large following even though it is very mainstream now, dubstep lacks one thing, Its not very danceable when compared to House music.  So Complextro  takes all those filthy nasty bass synths that you love from dubstep and it adds the 4/4 danceable beat structure found in House music, its truly the best of both worlds.  Some producers that are big in Complextro include DallasK,  James Egbert, Feed Me, Skrillex, Knife Party, Mord Fustang.

    

And heres Mord Fustang, he's still complextro but he's more melodic, not quite as filthy, he uses more "One-up mushrooms" in his tracks.

        

Moombahcore..... Now we're just making up shit.

It started with Moombahton (House + Reggaeton), but then they started adding dubstep synths such as modulated bass, modern talking etc... and they are calling it Moombahcore. This is by far the most unrecognized genre, as even beatport just puts all Moombahcore tracks in the "Electro House" section.  I remember alot of people just referring to this as 110 Dubstep, since its usually played around 110 - 115 BPM,  but IMO I think this genre is more similar to Complextro  just slowed down to about 110 BPM.   Dillon Francis, Nick Thayer, Skrillex and Knife Party all have several Moombahcore productions.

Feed Me's epic new track

Last sat I got the chance to see Feed Me perform here in atlanta, Feed Me is an Electro and Dubstep side project of well known DnB producer "Spor" whose real name is Jon Gooch.   This was my 4th time seeing Feed Me and I really wasnt sure what to expect.   The very first time I saw him was at a grimey dubstep club here in atlanta and as expected his set was mostly really heavy non-melodic dubstep, he did include some of his original electro and dubstep productions in his set , but overall the set was just way to hard.  Second time I saw him was at The Loft / Center Stage. I went in expecting another hard dubstep set, but what I heard was the complete opposite,  He started his set off with a lot of Progressive House/ Electro, He then started playing some of his harder electro tracks and his encore was his hard bass driven drumstep track "Trap Door". His set was extremely similar to a Deadmau5 set I witnessed earlier in the year like how Deadmau5 starts off progressive and builds up into more of his electro house tracks and sometime encores with his Dubstep track "Raise your weapon.   Even the LED set up of "Feed Me"s teeth had similar patterns as Deadmau5 cube which makes sense as at the time Feed Me was on Deadmau5's label "Mau5trap" I can only assume he played his set this way because this was an all ages show. Third time was at counter point music festival here in atlanta,  he started his show with some heavy dubstep and trap and i just left after 15 min to go see Steve Angellos set.

Due to the hit and miss sets ive witnessed by Feed Me, i was even hesistant to go at all, This was club Opera a more upscale club where I had no idea what he had in store.  He started off with a drum n bass track or two from his Spor days, how ever he then started playing the tracks we all love such as "Cloudburn, Strange Behaviour, Blood Red, Pink Lady, Grand Theft Ecstasy" but he also kept adding in ID tracks that I have never heard before which were really fucking good.  He must have played about 13 tracks that I have never heard but every one of them was epic. His dubstep tracks were vocal and melodic but still had that nasty bass drop, he played one Trap track and even though it was  a little too crunk for my taste I was actually ok with it,  But I also noticed something new he's doing with some of these ID tracks. The intro will be a very melodic chill arrangement of progressive synth notes such as you would typically hear Deadmau5 do, but then it builds up and drops into a hard electro/ complextro style drop.

I would have to say his set was about 85% Hard electro / complextro and then about equal amounts of dubstep and drumstep, with maybe just one or two trap tracks and DnB tracks.  However his encore was one of the sickest tracks I have ever heard.  Before he played it he brought the music to a stop and got on the mic and said something about how this next track represents everything he has been trying to do in his carrer.  The track started with that beautiful arrangement of progressive synth notes,  then this rumbling bassy build up comes in and then the drop, the drop can pretty much only be defined as Big Room Electro, this goes on for a few minutes and then he changes the beat structure to a Halftime Dubstep beat out of no where and blows the crowd away with a short filthy dubstep section, finally the track  changes one more time, i believe he changes it in the end to drumstep.

So here it is from his most recently released LP "Calamari Tuesdays" under his own label (Sotto Voce) one of the most epic tracks I have ever heard "Lonely Mountain".

   

Whose ready to Rock It right now????

Drum n Bass is probably one of my least favorite genres, its just too fast to dance too at about 160 to 180 BPM,  it is played in a 4/4 beat structure like house and trance, how ever its unstraightened like breakbeats, which means that the kick drum doesn't have to hit on the qtr note.  For example House music would go as follows  Kick....Kick....Kick....Kick.... with a kick on every qtr note ,  where Breaks and DnB might look something like this Kick.Kick......Snare.Kick..... , and as the name might imply DnB consists of heavy bass lines.  The track above is "Rock It" by Subfocus,  which samples Daft Punks -" Robot Rock".
  

Pretty Lights

Pretty Lights (Derek Vincent Smith) has carved his own path in electronic music, he doesn't limit himself to any single genre, he produces dubstep, glitch hop, electro, etc..  and he is an absolute genius at his craft.  And since he pretty much creates his own genre, that saves me the time of putting the BPM and Beat structure down since it varies from track to track.  The track above is Pink Floyd - "Time (Pretty Lights remix)" and this is one of the sickest tracks I have ever heard,  I don't think there is anything he could have done different to this track to make it better. Its perfect just like it is,  the Glitch effect in this track is completely mesmerizing, even hardcore Pink Floyd fans have to appreciate this.

Uhn Tiss Uhn Tiss Uhn Tiss Uhn Tiss.... Trance

Trance is one of the genres that started my addiction of Electronic Music.  Trance is usually played at about 132 to 136 Bpm and uses the 4/4 beat structure just like House Music, however where as House Music is usually played as Kick...Kick/Snare...Kick...Kick/Snare.  Trance tends to use an Open Hi Hat on every 1/8th note, so it would look like this Kick.HiHat.Kick.Hihat.Kick.Hihat.Kick.Hihat whichs gives it that Uhn Tiss Uhn Tiss sound.  Trance also tends to be more emotional and uplifting. So you listen to House music and it makes you want to dance, if you were to listen to Trance you would feel more at home leaving your feet grounded on the floor and closing your eyes, swaying and just phasing out of this world.  Now my idea of Trance is about 132 Bpm , with Saw Synths, beautiful chord progressions and in most cases female vocals that consists of an emotional / uplifting message, this style of Trance could also be called Vocal or Anthem Trance, but some people are calling it "Trouse" due to it sharing similarities to Progressive House. A lot of people also consider real Trance to be played at 140BPM, but I personally consider 140 Trance to be more along the lines of Hard Trance. The track above "Waiting" by Dash Berlin ft. Emma Hewitt's angelic voice on vocals is IMO what Trance is really about.

Melodic Progressive House PR( Y )DA

     

Tonight I want to feature my favorite producer of all time,  he goes by the aliases  Pryda, Sheridan, Cirez D but most will just know him as Eric Prydz.  He is known for his hit pop track "Call on Me" which I'm pretty sure everbody in the world has heard whether you listen to EDM or not. After this track went #1 in 6 different countries Eric Prydz could have just continued to keep putting out mainstream pop tracks, but instead he decided to do something else.  He started producing very melodic progressive house music, similar to something like Deadmau5 produces.  A lot of people who like high energy Electro music will probably not like Prydz, as his sets are not very high energy, but you can't help but to just get lost in those beautiful chord progressions in his tracks.  This track is one of his newer tracks, and I just cant stop listening to it. Its called "Everyday",  its has the perfect vocals to go with his signature melodic style. 

Hard with Style

Hardstyle is a genre of Electronic Music that is played at around 150 BPM,  its most known for a heavy kick drum with reverse bass on every offbeat, giving it a distorted sound. Alot of Hardstyle producers such as "Headhunterz" will also use deep , sinister sounding vocal samples as found in the video above while some producers like "Brennan Heart" prefer positive, uplifing vocals in their tracks. I can only listen to Hardstyle in small doses, after a while it starts to give you a headache and makes you kind of anxious, I assume because of the very fast BPM accompanied with the distorted kick.

As of last year, i have heard a couple Big Room House tracks that sample elements of hardstyle.  While still played at 128 BPM, you can definateley hear that reverse bass after each kick. You can hear for yourself in the video below by Dimitri Vegas and Like Mike, Lil Jon and Coone.

Careful, its a Trap.

Electronic Trap which is usually just referred to as Trvp is a newer genre of music, it was inspired by the dirty south hip hop type of Trap which was made popular by T.I. , Gucci Mane and Young Jeezy. Its is played at around 130 to 175 BPM and it shares the same 2/4 (half-time) beat structure as dubstep and most hip hop tracks. Other similarities between the older dirty south hip hop trap and this newer electronic trap include the 808 kick drum,  snare drum rolls, hi hat rolls and chopped vocal samples usually saying something like "What  What  What".  This electronic Trap is being referred to as the new Dubstep, and i can definately see that happening here in Atlanta. Alot of people got into electronic music a couple years ago through dubstep, but dubstep was really just a fad and it has faded out as of recently, so it seems like all those people have now jumped on the Trap bandwagon.  There is alot of very good Trap tracks out there and alot of Trap remixes as well, such as the one above of Awolnation - Sail,  but when i go to the club and the DJ plays Trap, for some reason he tends to leave out all the melodic Trap music and just ends up playing an hour long set of ghetto crunk Trap.  There was even a case last year in Chicago where Trap producers Flosstradamus were banned from performing their set as police said last time they almost caused a riot.

Dirty Dutch Explained

Dirty Dutch House is a subgenre of Electro House.   While Electro House has more focus on electro bass lead synths and basslines, Dirty Dutch shows more emphasis on High pitched lead synths rather than bass synths. You can see what im talking about at 2.14 in the above video.  This track is from the king of dirty dutch "Chuckie", while "Afrojack" and "Sidney Samson" are huge names in the Dirty Dutch scene, i still think Chuckie is the king of this genre, as he has managed to keep it underground. Dirty Dutch will always be one of my favorite genres.

What is Reverse Bass?

Reverse Bass is a synth usually found in the Hardstyle genre of music, you can hear it on the offbeat of most Hardstyle tracks.  Reverse Bass is also one of the main elements of Melbourne Bounce as heard in the track above at 0.38 by Will Sparks.

Another Big Room Progressive Banger

This is my favorite genre in EDM, This is Big Room Progressive House.  I know that some people aren't going to like the autotune on a couple sections of the chorus, but I could see this track being a festival banger. Tracks like this are the reason for my blog,  I am always searching beatport, youtube etc... for cool remixes and tracks that people really dont know about, and this is one of them. So here it is Cosmo - "Wayward Son", a Big Room Progressive remix of 70's Rock Hit "Carry on Wayward Son" by Kansas

Amazing remix of Daft Punks - "The Grid"

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I am actually not even sure what genre this track is, but damn its amazing. It sounds like progressive house with that banging kick drum and alot of the electronica synths from the original removed, but its too slow to be House at 102BPM. So im just going to call it electronica since thats what the original track is that was featured on the "Tron Legacy" soundtrack.  I could put this on repeat and fall asleep to this one, the video is pretty sick as well.

Introduction to DubHouse

This genre is called DubHouse, atleast thats what Ash Pournouri the owner of "At Night Management" is calling it. At Night management  is also responsible for Aviciis rise to success. Their newest edition is this duo that go by the name "Cazzette", made up of two swedes by the names of Sebastian Furrer and Alexander Bjorklund. This genre basically starts out like your normal electro house or complextro track, it carries the 4/4 beat, it uses a mixture of modulated bass,  dubstep  and electro sounding bass synths as well as the modern talking synth. What makes DubHouse different than electro house or complextro is that at some point during the track (usually the 2nd drop) the beat changes from a 4/4 beat to a 2/4 beat and their is more focus on the dubstep bass synths during this time (See @ 2.53 in the above track).

Mainstream Dubstep

I started this blog with the intentions of posting less mainstream tracks, and focusing on the 4/4 genres.  But i have to go against both those things with this track, just because the video is so sick. We have Electro House producer Don Diablo on the beats, and none other than Alex Clare and Kelis on vocals.  Don himself even helped with the production of the video.  So here it is, probably the only mainstream dubstep track im ever going to post.  Don Diablo feat. Alex Clare & Kelis - "Give it all".

     

 And if your like me and dubstep isnt your thing, then heres the banging Electro House remix by Don Diablo & CID

        

This track is the definition of Big Room Progressive House

This is my favorite track of all time,  the chilling female vocals at the beginning mixed with the perfect progressive synths that leads into this beautiful chord progression build up and finally that lead stab synth climax at 1.30 that can't be described by anything other than "Big Room".  This track is the ultimate club killer, it has vocals that almost everyone can sing along too, it has a build up that lets you know something big is about to happen, and then the climax almost forces you to put your hands up and get lost in the moment.

I have just discovered breaks

For the longest time i would turn my nose up at any music genre that was missing a 4 on the floor beat. I couldn't stand the awful non melodic underground dubstep that was being played at the clubs, and thankfully even though it looks like dubstep is finally fading away, unfortunately now it seems everyone who got into EDM through the dubstep bandwagon a couple years ago has now migrated over to this electronic trap music, which is nothing more than the chopped vocal samples, snare rolls and the 2/4 beat from dirty south hip-hop mixed with electronic synths that will make any white boy on  bath salts feel crunk.  I absolutely hate this part of the EDM scene.

Before i was even ten years old i was listening to "Alice Deejay", "Haddaway"  and other tracks from "Now thats what i call club music vol 2" due to my father playing this in the Jeep. Then when i was a teenager I would hear the mainstream tracks such as "Zombie Nation" by Kernkraft 400 or "Blue" by Eiffel 65, I believe i even heard the Prodigy and Crystal Method at this time but electronic music was very rare in the redneck town i grew up in. It wasnt until high school when i learned that my plaid shirt and jeans from TJ maxx werent exactly making me any more popular and I learned that the cool kids shopped at this store called Abercrombie and Fitch. So one day my freshman year of highschool my mom and I made the hour long drive to the closest mall, as I approached the store I could hear this kick drum beating at a 4/4 beat  from a couple stores away, then when I entered the store is when my love of electronic music took hold. "What is this? I love it" I thought to my self as the beautiful chord progressions, the epic big room build ups and that pounding kick drum at 128 BPM of Progressive House filled my ears for the first time in my life. As soon as i returned home from the store I went straight to searching for what i had just heard, this is where it all started.  I admit I did give dubstep a try and even liked it for short time, but it wasn't until I heard a big room house set by DJ LOS  in a local club here in atlanta that sealed my love of House music and that steady 4/4 beat and made me disregard anything else such as dubstep, drum n bass etc.

Just recently i have rediscovered breakbeats. Whenever i used to hear the term breaks I thought it was some sort of old school hip hop music,   not knowing that the prodigy and crystal method I heard back in my teenage years were actually breakbeats, but the Breaks of today is different. It uses these electro bass synths and heavy modulated bass and its still a 4/4 beat like house so it has that high energy dance feel to it, but the kick drum isn't hitting on every quarter note making it sound less repetitive than house music.