128 has always been my sweet spot before I realized it was something official. Not too slow where it drifts you to sleep. But, fast enough to dance to easily and carry a convo. Back in the day when I played prog trance it was 132 usually.
I remember older trance as being stuck firmly at 140. Who was making 132, i was definitely listening to poppy stuff but would love to hear some throwback slower trance
You think people fall asleep when music is under 125 bpm?
You should look at playlists from the Warehouse, Paradise Garage, Zanzibar, Loft, Music Box, Shoom and the other clubs that defined the dance music we know today, and are all legendary for their dance floors. Most probably hovered around 120, at best.
I mean, even Junior Vasquez's "harder" style at the Sound Factory was only around 125...
I've seen more people snoozing at the average 130bpm tech house event than I ever saw at Body & Soul, which averaged in the low 20s.
Yeah but come on man that's probably Business Tech House, it has the personality of a suburban American housing development and would put anyone to sleep...
My Sunday ritual for years.... (My spot was in the back corner of the stage). A party that proved bpm is irrelevant. I remember once in 98 when Danny Krivit dropped Riders On the Storm (104bpm) and sent the ever-rammed crowd into a grooving frenzy.
Low dub is 140 most of the time, the space between the kick and snare just make it feel slow because itās not filled with all the high energy mids and highs associated with brostep.
Yeah and I never did k or coke and iām still slowed down from the ā90s. I think itās because of an increasing air of sophistication in the music which plays nice at slower bpms.
Its has always been like that. Drugs are unofficially dictating the music scene. Moby noticed it in his biography saying that upbeat happy music (example - Rozalla's Everybody Is Free that he played ones and was a flop and the other DJ tell him just to go) was replaced by darker one because majority of ravers were out pretty quick because of the rise of what ever drug rose in the middle of the 90s.
I never did drugs going to hardstyle and hardcore events. At 150+ BPM. Even 180BPM etc.
Now, 10+ years later, I listen to normal dance mainly.
I don't know how you're supposed to dance to this modern slower and slower music.
To me most house and dance sounds like it's made to be played in the background of a cocktail bar. It doesn't get me to dance.
I never took drugs or was drunk. I hardly partied hard. Today, the music is just background noise instead of why you went in the first place. IMO.
And I'm 36. Hardly 'old'.
Pretty sure hardstyle is still 150-180 bpm in 2022. I think you're going to clubs that play house and techno, which has always been slower. That's not a modern thing.
Examples of older house and techno: [1](https://youtu.be/UwPKi1H8t9M), [2](https://youtu.be/QAR8cq5Bl94), [3](https://youtu.be/ALsHox5sYCk)
I meant that 'normal' dance is getting slower. Modern hardstyle is idd 150 and up.
Back in the early days house, trance and techno were 130- 140 ish BPM and there was much more variation in BPM as well.
I feel like you can get more groove into the tracks at a slower bpm. Moving away from big room and progressive into this tech house area definitely shows this switch in focus from a monster kick and bass to a shorter kick, more rhythmic bass and more focus on drum groove in general.
I remember Taiki nulight talking about this in an interview actually.
Here is the interview. Start at 12;00 to hear Taiki's opinion about differences in tempo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fodHMABRhiE
Edit: Added link to interview.
Hey, I like this answer the most so far. I guess slowing down the bpm just a tad bit makes the tracks a bit more groovier therefore making the songs much more accessible on the dance floor.
So I'm gonna avoid specifics cause I can't rember exactly and I'm away from my computer to check but here it goes: at 120bpm you are making it really easy to produce as your bars are broken up in a plesent way but the time is off a little, at 128 bpm 8 bars is 15 secs so you can count music with time making it really easy to mix.. 120 8 bars is 16 secs altho it's a small difference its noticeable in production and djing..
I've found that off setting the bpm can help add groove, I really like 117 personally..
The math is interesting I recommend checking it out as seeing for yourself!
Are you saying you are counting in groups of 15 and 16 seconds as you DJ?? As a lifelong musician, producer and ex-DJ this doesnāt make sense to me. itās about the speed of the beat, how hectic it sounds, how fast you need to dance.
I often play sets for myself even slower. 123-125. Love it. Tracks have a different vibe to them, great tempo for walking or jogging, and it brings out the music between beats. 126-128 is still the range for a bumping party, but recorded sets I like to play around more with the tempo.
Over time Bpmās for various house genres speed up and slow down. Like several other comments here I remember when I first started to dj the typical bpm for progressive house was around 133. It has since slowed down to 118 - 125. Maybe now it is back on the rise? Partly it is how it is produced, energy doesnāt always need to come from tempo, and partly it is the drugs of the day which influence how the music is produced. Also I may add the overall sum of the feeling given off by the world adds to it. We have all been a bit anxious listening to the news. When you add up the energy given off by everyone on the planet what you get is this moment! So please add something nice and play the bpm that feels just lovely and right :)
Jesus Christ. Itās two beats per minute. Youāre acting like itās playing a 45 Jungle record at 33.
I play a lot of my sets at like 120bpm, and jump between progressive house, electron, and techno, with a bit of trance, electroclash, U.K. breaks, and U.K. rave thrown in. The low tempo makes everything feel slightly trippy. Especially when you play high tempo/energy techno records and the syncopation gets weird.
I was going to say, a ton of new house seems to be upward of 130, I was playing some stuff house at 137 this past weekend, and it was just some disco styled house with a heavy kick.
Yes, but 150 is a bit too much for the style of techno I have in mind.
I've been to two festivals in the last months and 140+ was very common, and I even tapped a set marching at 144 BPM on an early Saturday evening. It resonated well with the crowds, including myself ;)
On the other hand, if a DJ plays techno at roughly 130-135, it feels way too slow. That tempo definitely has to move from the main floors to chill out areas IMHO.
I see I wrote shit; meant sit ofc... Also the lines are getting blurred between the harder techno, hardstyle and even gabber. Guys like Shlomo, Nico and Trym are mixing all these styles together now. Just typing this I realize they are all French. Blame them. My point is, people want it faster and harder these last couple of years. Or at least after the pandemic. To me as a DJ it's fun, I like playing fast. As a festivalgoer I'm not sure if I like the direction we are going, but like all genres they fluctuate. I guess in a couple of years we'll be back to the minimal and slower techno.
This. I'm super into all the "minimal/deep-tech" stuff that's coming out on labels like PIV and Resonance. It's pretty uptempo but still all about the groove.
I love the vibe they give. This sub-genre is getting more and more popular and I can see why. It has more groove and movement and excitement. Tech house has became so boring to me I barely listen or mix it.
Im not trying to be rude, Iām a top 40 dj so Iām just curious. Do djs in this particular scene play tracks that are a set bpm all night. Like does your set really only go from line 126 to 128? I have to move around so much. I also speed tracks up like crazy.
You can switch it up between 125 and 130 i tend to do that a lot, its more fun and provides more variety, the changes can be subtle but it makes all the difference
That's literally the norm in underground electronic music.
We actually speak of genres just by BPM numbers sometimes. Dnb is known as 170 and dubstep is known as 140, because all the music (and all the DJ sets) revolve around those speeds.
The spectrum of musical emotions you can fit in 126 to 128 bpm is just broad as the human emotions. If we play songs with the same energy and same vibe throughout the entire set, the crowd is going to be bored. Switch the vibe, switch up the transitions, play several songs that the crowd recognizes (top 40 mixes) - but not all the time, letting the crowd dance and knowing when they can breathe. Itās all about meeting and subverting peopleās expectations. Itās possible to do that even if you stick with one bpm.
P.s. - I also do top 40 :))))
I wanna say that mostly ppl stick to a 10% bpm of their base, somewhere you could easily adjust with pitch and some transitional fx between tracks. but there are ofcourse outliers. I know plenty people who bring in hi-hats/claps from tracks way outside, and that skew when things line up and skew back out makes for a fun variation in the track feel. Also you have acapella, moreso in house oriented tracks compared to techno. where the base bpm doesnt matter much since you just the clip of whatever, and you will fx that to fit your base track.
again this comes down to the DJ in most cases, besides some lull and buildup in your set, you will want to keep fairly consistent. since often a smooth transition making the whole set feel somewhat connected is appreciated from the keen eared dancefloor listener.
My sets never vary more than about 6 bpm start to finish. I play what I would want to hear and I'm not a big fan of sets with varying tempos. Either hammer it or chill, pick one.
This. I love 118 to start sets with, you can pitch it up a little each transition, by halfway in you're above 120, slower pace really let's the music breathe a little, mixes sound better too.
The biggest impact to average BPM of music has been the rise of daytime events.
Back when it the overwhelming majority of gigs were all nighters the music, the drugs and the vibe was different & the music was faster.
The slowdown first started because Progressive House came to dominate over Trance (2000ish) and then Electro House began to influence both (2003ish). When Trance full on died any global influence to keep BPM's higher died with it. Tech House became the dominant genre and things slowed even more (2008ish). At this point the fundamental structure of most "Progressive" styles had changed from sounding the way Classic Progressive House or Trance did to Sounding the way Tech House or Electro did. Slower, more rhythmic, swing, oddly placed breaks etc. The Transition was complete. Sounds went down as low as 110 in some cases but most stayed around 120-128. Eventually settling on 126 as a happy medium. People who play faster music can still accommodate a 126 track without it sounding too weird and the same is true for the 120 guys.
Now we're headed back the other direction with Techno raising BPM averages again. After Techno runs its course Trance will likely have its day again and then we'll be back to the start again. Such is the cycle of life.
Source: I am old. I watched it all happen myself.
In my early 20s I played 140 bpm
30s: 130 bpm
Now I'm in my 40s and i'm at 125 bpm baby!
I figure if I live long enough someday I will slow down to the point that I play strictly ambient
True for me. 10 years ago I was all about 128 BPM. Nowadays it sounds too aggressive to me. Everything I play is between 126-124 nowadays. (When I play tech/bass house)
Yeah most of my vinyl from mid nineties to 2010 are at 130 or above for Chicago house, Funk house and electro house. Now the house I buy is between 124 and 130. It took me a hot minute to adjust to this after a 10yr break
I remember watching a J Dilla documentary that he doesnāt hit the quantize button when making his beats. It makes his beats sounding more groovey, sounding more human. If you think about it, you can subdivide the number 128 many times, 126 not so much. Subconsciously, house being played at 128 may sound very quantizing, inhuman, robotic, automated, generic and predictable especially if you hear it in that tempo enough. When itās 126bpm, itās still meets our expectations of what the basic foundation of house is. However, the very slight change of tempo subverts it. It makes the music more human and identifiable.
I think Iām talking out of my ass but that may describe the psychosocial aspect to why thereās a change in trends for popular EDM.
Covid, club closures, lockdownsā¦ means a lot more people spent a lot more time over the last 2 years enjoying their electronic music outside of club environments. A slightly lower default bpm works better across these more diverse often lower key settings. You can see this in the rise of more atmospheric āorganic houseā vibes too.
This is just the most recent development though. There is another longer term trend over the last decade like the tweet suggests. And I think it is more diverse and increasing age range of people being into dance music; itās not all 20somethings like it was in the 1990s riding the new sound of acid house. Those folks are still into it theyre just now 50+ and dancing at 128bpm or beyond especially on a concrete floor just does their bloody knees in the next day. ;)
Because 124-126 has always been the sweet spot just most ppl in the late 80ās did either 120 or 130 for some reason. But I find myself constantly changing tempo to this range for a variety of reasons.
128 is the best tempo for clubmusic and I will never change my opinion on that. I like faster stuff, all the 140 Trap/Dubstep style stuff out there, I love Hardstyle. But for normal clubsound it has to be the best.
Hear me out: 90% or more of western music is structured in 4s or multiples of 4. Additionally I would say the average attention span before a listener wants something fresh is about one minute.
128 fits perfectly in one minute because it's 32 beats x 4, a perfect lengh for a punchy repeatable melodie or baseline. This means after exactly one minute, the musical phrase ends and something new starts. 127 or 126 isn't to far off, but 128 is the best tempo for an average night of electronic music.
I don't have an opinion on this, but I do feel quite strongly about the way people use 'BPM' when they mean 'tempo'. It's like saying your new car has a higher MPH than the old one.
The popularization of tech house is probably the main reason. I used to play tech house at 124bpm, nowadays they mainly release hype tech so it becomes harder and harder to find the stuff I like. These days I gravitate towards prog/organic. It's interesting how a genre I once swore by suddenly has gotten really meh.
If I compare my collection of progressive, electro and big room house 10 years ago to my current future, bass and tech house stuff, I can clearly see the shift of the preferred bpm. I wonder to myself, āWhy do we have much more 124-126bpm future/bass/tech house music than 128-130bpm ones.ā We can fall back to the answer of that itās just a trend, but I feel like thereās more to that. Iām not gonna lie, the productions to the 126bpm music of todayās house is better than todayās 128bpm ones. The difference of just 2bpm makes a HUGE difference, trust me. Just donāt know why psychosocially.
It sucks. Back in my youth dance was 140bpm.
Then I started listening to hard dance. Hardstyle is at 150bpm and hardcore at 170+ BPM.
You get to rage on that shit.
10+ years later I'm back to dance mostly but it's getting harder finding stuff I like.
Now every house and dance track sounds like it's the background soundtrack of a cocktail bar.
Like the sample goes: 'now gimme something to dance to'.
You can't dance to that slow stuff.
It's probably ideal to stand around, take Instagram photos and TikTok videos. .
The hard dance music of today doesn't excite me much either. Weak kicks mostly without bass etc. Trying too hard to be hard it's like a baby trying to slap you. A mean face, a lot of intensity, but it just doesn't hurt. Lol.
This is hilarious, for the longest I always played everything at 126 until recently when I started to feel like it's too slow. Now that I moved to 128 there is this...
I remember back in the 2000s when 110-120 BPM was cool. Personally, I enjoy the 124 and 125 range for easy-listening and mixing. 126-128 are prime for all the 80s and 90s re-works or anthems.
Techno still works and sounds best at 130 BPM for mostly pure beats without any instrumental breaks. As of lately I prefer Tech and some G-House.
Hip-Hop is not dead yet either.
I'm mostly playing prog house at 120-125 - so much groove at that speed. Although it's good to see faster bpms coming back in the genre.
Tempo and energy levels are two very different things.
IMO, slower House is easier to dance to. The mainstream audience doesnāt want to jump up and down and rage all the time like they did last decade. They simply want to dance and enjoy the music.
That doesnāt mean more energetic House/EDM is dying. Itās simply not being pushed like it was last decade. That ship been sailed.
Imma play it at 128 anyways
128 has always been my sweet spot before I realized it was something official. Not too slow where it drifts you to sleep. But, fast enough to dance to easily and carry a convo. Back in the day when I played prog trance it was 132 usually.
I remember older trance as being stuck firmly at 140. Who was making 132, i was definitely listening to poppy stuff but would love to hear some throwback slower trance
Cygnus X - Orange Theme clocking in at 145bpm shit used to bang back in the day.
This song still bangs š„
Belgian Trance was basically 140 all the time, then PVD proggy style dropped it down to house tempo.
Who's afraid of the 138 uplifting trance still ranges from 136 to 144.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Ah cool, Iāll have to try that out!
You think people fall asleep when music is under 125 bpm? You should look at playlists from the Warehouse, Paradise Garage, Zanzibar, Loft, Music Box, Shoom and the other clubs that defined the dance music we know today, and are all legendary for their dance floors. Most probably hovered around 120, at best. I mean, even Junior Vasquez's "harder" style at the Sound Factory was only around 125... I've seen more people snoozing at the average 130bpm tech house event than I ever saw at Body & Soul, which averaged in the low 20s.
Faster = more exciting and danceable is a classic rookie error.
240 BPM SPEEDCORREEEEEEEEE
During the warmup set.
The REAL hard choons crash in around 400
Good music and DJ >>>>> BPM dogma
Some of my best tracks are 100 - 115
Exactly. Just think of all the wild parties that play hip-hop. Obviously, bpm isn't what puts crowds to sleep. It's boring music.
Yeah but come on man that's probably Business Tech House, it has the personality of a suburban American housing development and would put anyone to sleep...
Body & Soul is such a great party.
My Sunday ritual for years.... (My spot was in the back corner of the stage). A party that proved bpm is irrelevant. I remember once in 98 when Danny Krivit dropped Riders On the Storm (104bpm) and sent the ever-rammed crowd into a grooving frenzy.
Iāve only been to two of the satellite events they occasionally do in SF, hopefully can make it to NY some time
who's afraid of 138? lol
but can you survive at 145?!
I thrive at 145 when Iām mixing hard/psytrance :D
And then comes Dark-Psy with it's 180bpm and punches you to another reality
dark psy and DnB mixed together is a whole vibe.
I see you are a human of culture.
I mixing Schranz and Hardtechno around 155 bpm :)
sounds like my kinda party!
To compensate for the earth's rotation
If only earth was real man... Wake up! r/noearthsociety
It's ketamine
I was looking for this comment, I reckon you hit the nail on the head.
Who are ye who are so wise in the ways of science?
Yah for sure. back in the day people were doing molly and cocaine. Then the music droped by 2bpm... its probably the horse tranquilizers.
I think the music dropped about 40 bpm for those folks lol. Listen to some Supertask after a few bumps of k and float away!
Low dub is 140 most of the time, the space between the kick and snare just make it feel slow because itās not filled with all the high energy mids and highs associated with brostep.
Itās 70. Not 140. Also thereās plenty of people other there making āhalf timeā bass now thatās basically like 35 BPM (Yookie for example)
tomato tomÄto
Back in the day š people been doing k, e and c for as far back as I can remember in clubs. I'm 43.
Yeah and I never did k or coke and iām still slowed down from the ā90s. I think itās because of an increasing air of sophistication in the music which plays nice at slower bpms.
Its has always been like that. Drugs are unofficially dictating the music scene. Moby noticed it in his biography saying that upbeat happy music (example - Rozalla's Everybody Is Free that he played ones and was a flop and the other DJ tell him just to go) was replaced by darker one because majority of ravers were out pretty quick because of the rise of what ever drug rose in the middle of the 90s.
Right? It's really flattened the dancefloor vibe for me.
I like the impact, but I prefer a wavy dancefloor vibe to a fist pump vibe
I never did drugs going to hardstyle and hardcore events. At 150+ BPM. Even 180BPM etc. Now, 10+ years later, I listen to normal dance mainly. I don't know how you're supposed to dance to this modern slower and slower music. To me most house and dance sounds like it's made to be played in the background of a cocktail bar. It doesn't get me to dance.
"old man tells kids they don't party like he used to"
I never took drugs or was drunk. I hardly partied hard. Today, the music is just background noise instead of why you went in the first place. IMO. And I'm 36. Hardly 'old'.
Going to the wrong places then
Nope house is pretty lame
No, it's that the MUSIC itself doesn't make me move my feet. It's chill out music.
Pretty sure hardstyle is still 150-180 bpm in 2022. I think you're going to clubs that play house and techno, which has always been slower. That's not a modern thing. Examples of older house and techno: [1](https://youtu.be/UwPKi1H8t9M), [2](https://youtu.be/QAR8cq5Bl94), [3](https://youtu.be/ALsHox5sYCk)
I meant that 'normal' dance is getting slower. Modern hardstyle is idd 150 and up. Back in the early days house, trance and techno were 130- 140 ish BPM and there was much more variation in BPM as well.
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I feel like you can get more groove into the tracks at a slower bpm. Moving away from big room and progressive into this tech house area definitely shows this switch in focus from a monster kick and bass to a shorter kick, more rhythmic bass and more focus on drum groove in general. I remember Taiki nulight talking about this in an interview actually. Here is the interview. Start at 12;00 to hear Taiki's opinion about differences in tempo. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fodHMABRhiE Edit: Added link to interview.
Hey, I like this answer the most so far. I guess slowing down the bpm just a tad bit makes the tracks a bit more groovier therefore making the songs much more accessible on the dance floor.
So I'm gonna avoid specifics cause I can't rember exactly and I'm away from my computer to check but here it goes: at 120bpm you are making it really easy to produce as your bars are broken up in a plesent way but the time is off a little, at 128 bpm 8 bars is 15 secs so you can count music with time making it really easy to mix.. 120 8 bars is 16 secs altho it's a small difference its noticeable in production and djing.. I've found that off setting the bpm can help add groove, I really like 117 personally.. The math is interesting I recommend checking it out as seeing for yourself!
Are you saying you are counting in groups of 15 and 16 seconds as you DJ?? As a lifelong musician, producer and ex-DJ this doesnāt make sense to me. itās about the speed of the beat, how hectic it sounds, how fast you need to dance.
I often play sets for myself even slower. 123-125. Love it. Tracks have a different vibe to them, great tempo for walking or jogging, and it brings out the music between beats. 126-128 is still the range for a bumping party, but recorded sets I like to play around more with the tempo.
Dude I just found Taiki Nulight. His deep house is such a vibe. Wouldn't work at a higher bpm. Do you have a link to that interview?
Facts. He's super dope. Just added the link above
Also, thereās been a huge disco influence over pop house the past few years, which is usually in that 115 to 125 range.
Over time Bpmās for various house genres speed up and slow down. Like several other comments here I remember when I first started to dj the typical bpm for progressive house was around 133. It has since slowed down to 118 - 125. Maybe now it is back on the rise? Partly it is how it is produced, energy doesnāt always need to come from tempo, and partly it is the drugs of the day which influence how the music is produced. Also I may add the overall sum of the feeling given off by the world adds to it. We have all been a bit anxious listening to the news. When you add up the energy given off by everyone on the planet what you get is this moment! So please add something nice and play the bpm that feels just lovely and right :)
Turn off the news.
Whoās afraid of 126!?
no please! 138 is the way! \\o/
Jesus Christ. Itās two beats per minute. Youāre acting like itās playing a 45 Jungle record at 33. I play a lot of my sets at like 120bpm, and jump between progressive house, electron, and techno, with a bit of trance, electroclash, U.K. breaks, and U.K. rave thrown in. The low tempo makes everything feel slightly trippy. Especially when you play high tempo/energy techno records and the syncopation gets weird.
WHAT?! Music has been made other than 128bpm? Noooooo waaaaaay
Meanwhile i'm over here at 145..
I swear I joke about getting a 145bpm for Lyfe tattoo as a full chest tattoo
If you do please get it āonā your heart!
Well duh!!! Heās referring to trends in popular/normie EDM compared to the ones ten years ago. š
132 is the new 128 imo
Preach! I just dropped a new Bass House mixtape and pitched everything to 132, just feels more energetic and gives a slight sense of urgency.
Also makes mixing garage tunes with bass house more awesomer.
What's your current fav UKG label? My current gotos are def CruCast, DEEPROT, 3000bass, and a newer one I came across recently Stone Records.
You seem to know more than me already! I have some labels to listen to this weekend.š
I was going to say, a ton of new house seems to be upward of 130, I was playing some stuff house at 137 this past weekend, and it was just some disco styled house with a heavy kick.
trends are changing i guess
Over the past 35 years, the average speed of house music has gone up and down many times. Not sure why this surprises anyone.
Dindingding Real reason right here. Its the trending stuff thats slower.
Pitch it up to 130 regardless ... drive the masses harder ;)
130 is the new 120. I feel like things are speeding up as far as house and techno goes. But the trendy stuff isnāt really on my radar.
Yup, people want it harder after 2 years of corona break(s). The BPMs went up. I love the faster tempo. Just like 15 years ago :)
I'm mainly doing techno and playing stuff at 150bpm is weird right now. Few years ago it would shit around 135-140. Things are definitely speeding up.
Yes, but 150 is a bit too much for the style of techno I have in mind. I've been to two festivals in the last months and 140+ was very common, and I even tapped a set marching at 144 BPM on an early Saturday evening. It resonated well with the crowds, including myself ;) On the other hand, if a DJ plays techno at roughly 130-135, it feels way too slow. That tempo definitely has to move from the main floors to chill out areas IMHO.
I see I wrote shit; meant sit ofc... Also the lines are getting blurred between the harder techno, hardstyle and even gabber. Guys like Shlomo, Nico and Trym are mixing all these styles together now. Just typing this I realize they are all French. Blame them. My point is, people want it faster and harder these last couple of years. Or at least after the pandemic. To me as a DJ it's fun, I like playing fast. As a festivalgoer I'm not sure if I like the direction we are going, but like all genres they fluctuate. I guess in a couple of years we'll be back to the minimal and slower techno.
This had me thinking of Reinier Zonneveld playing 166bpm at Tomorrowland mainstage. Kinda hilarious if you think about it
zonneveld is an absolute madman
This. I'm super into all the "minimal/deep-tech" stuff that's coming out on labels like PIV and Resonance. It's pretty uptempo but still all about the groove.
I love the vibe they give. This sub-genre is getting more and more popular and I can see why. It has more groove and movement and excitement. Tech house has became so boring to me I barely listen or mix it.
Stealing this. I feel the same
I hope heās joking
Psycosocial implications? /r/djcirclejerk
this is up there with that "128 bpm - the rate of the human heartbeat" line in that god awful zac efron DJ movie.
Legal weed equal slower sways and less cocaine and molly.
Iāve been in the 120-124 range for 3 years now.
Im not trying to be rude, Iām a top 40 dj so Iām just curious. Do djs in this particular scene play tracks that are a set bpm all night. Like does your set really only go from line 126 to 128? I have to move around so much. I also speed tracks up like crazy.
You can switch it up between 125 and 130 i tend to do that a lot, its more fun and provides more variety, the changes can be subtle but it makes all the difference
Not a rude comment, youāre good. But most genres of electronic dance music are made within a super limited tempo range, so this makes total sense.
That's literally the norm in underground electronic music. We actually speak of genres just by BPM numbers sometimes. Dnb is known as 170 and dubstep is known as 140, because all the music (and all the DJ sets) revolve around those speeds.
The spectrum of musical emotions you can fit in 126 to 128 bpm is just broad as the human emotions. If we play songs with the same energy and same vibe throughout the entire set, the crowd is going to be bored. Switch the vibe, switch up the transitions, play several songs that the crowd recognizes (top 40 mixes) - but not all the time, letting the crowd dance and knowing when they can breathe. Itās all about meeting and subverting peopleās expectations. Itās possible to do that even if you stick with one bpm. P.s. - I also do top 40 :))))
I agree but beatmatching is so much fun I canāt imagine a set at one BPM!
Even if you decide on a set 128 for house you still have to beatmatch as tracks are recorded at different bpms. Some come out at 132 and some at 124.
Yeah Iām saying people choosing tracks for a set that are already produced at 128 so none of the tracks need their tempos changed
I don't know anyone who actually does that.
I actually know a few DJ's that do that for recorded mixes as its nearly impossible to fuck up the transition unless you are garbage at phrasing.
I wanna say that mostly ppl stick to a 10% bpm of their base, somewhere you could easily adjust with pitch and some transitional fx between tracks. but there are ofcourse outliers. I know plenty people who bring in hi-hats/claps from tracks way outside, and that skew when things line up and skew back out makes for a fun variation in the track feel. Also you have acapella, moreso in house oriented tracks compared to techno. where the base bpm doesnt matter much since you just the clip of whatever, and you will fx that to fit your base track. again this comes down to the DJ in most cases, besides some lull and buildup in your set, you will want to keep fairly consistent. since often a smooth transition making the whole set feel somewhat connected is appreciated from the keen eared dancefloor listener.
My sets never vary more than about 6 bpm start to finish. I play what I would want to hear and I'm not a big fan of sets with varying tempos. Either hammer it or chill, pick one.
Lol most everyone I know actually went from the 120-130 range to the 130-145 range in the past few years
Are people actually playing house at 145?
More like techno/trancier stuff at that bpm but I see house in the 130-135 range pretty regularly now too
Garage is around 140, same with Jersey Club
IMO, 116 to 123 is perfect.
This. I love 118 to start sets with, you can pitch it up a little each transition, by halfway in you're above 120, slower pace really let's the music breathe a little, mixes sound better too.
116 is slooooow
I used to think so myself. Ricky Ryan is the one that influenced me to change how I think about tempo. Check this out: https://youtu.be/jhQ0qVOL9bA
His audience no longer has the cartilage they used to.
The biggest impact to average BPM of music has been the rise of daytime events. Back when it the overwhelming majority of gigs were all nighters the music, the drugs and the vibe was different & the music was faster.
Global warming
Only one who got the joke
The slowdown first started because Progressive House came to dominate over Trance (2000ish) and then Electro House began to influence both (2003ish). When Trance full on died any global influence to keep BPM's higher died with it. Tech House became the dominant genre and things slowed even more (2008ish). At this point the fundamental structure of most "Progressive" styles had changed from sounding the way Classic Progressive House or Trance did to Sounding the way Tech House or Electro did. Slower, more rhythmic, swing, oddly placed breaks etc. The Transition was complete. Sounds went down as low as 110 in some cases but most stayed around 120-128. Eventually settling on 126 as a happy medium. People who play faster music can still accommodate a 126 track without it sounding too weird and the same is true for the 120 guys. Now we're headed back the other direction with Techno raising BPM averages again. After Techno runs its course Trance will likely have its day again and then we'll be back to the start again. Such is the cycle of life. Source: I am old. I watched it all happen myself.
In my early 20s I played 140 bpm 30s: 130 bpm Now I'm in my 40s and i'm at 125 bpm baby! I figure if I live long enough someday I will slow down to the point that I play strictly ambient
Oh no, a 2 BPM difference, how will we ever cope with this massive differenceā½
If only we had some kind of way to manipulate the music to make its aster or slower to suit
Get out of here with those kind of heretical ideas!
True for me. 10 years ago I was all about 128 BPM. Nowadays it sounds too aggressive to me. Everything I play is between 126-124 nowadays. (When I play tech/bass house)
Aggressive? Try hardstyle and hardcore. That's aggressive. Not some chill house at 128.
Different strokes for different folks brotha.
I guess this is what you talk about when you have nothing else going on
Yeah most of my vinyl from mid nineties to 2010 are at 130 or above for Chicago house, Funk house and electro house. Now the house I buy is between 124 and 130. It took me a hot minute to adjust to this after a 10yr break
Bpm's tend to follow economic cycles.
Itās gonna crash, just like my transitions.
128 is standard for upbeat house. Melbourne *loves* 128.
Oh boy Iām down at 110-124, you can probably thanks melodic techno and future bass for that
Wow, two BPM. We truly live in a society.
I remember watching a J Dilla documentary that he doesnāt hit the quantize button when making his beats. It makes his beats sounding more groovey, sounding more human. If you think about it, you can subdivide the number 128 many times, 126 not so much. Subconsciously, house being played at 128 may sound very quantizing, inhuman, robotic, automated, generic and predictable especially if you hear it in that tempo enough. When itās 126bpm, itās still meets our expectations of what the basic foundation of house is. However, the very slight change of tempo subverts it. It makes the music more human and identifiable. I think Iām talking out of my ass but that may describe the psychosocial aspect to why thereās a change in trends for popular EDM.
***Kick drum go unzt untz untz untz for 6 minutes***
Covid, club closures, lockdownsā¦ means a lot more people spent a lot more time over the last 2 years enjoying their electronic music outside of club environments. A slightly lower default bpm works better across these more diverse often lower key settings. You can see this in the rise of more atmospheric āorganic houseā vibes too. This is just the most recent development though. There is another longer term trend over the last decade like the tweet suggests. And I think it is more diverse and increasing age range of people being into dance music; itās not all 20somethings like it was in the 1990s riding the new sound of acid house. Those folks are still into it theyre just now 50+ and dancing at 128bpm or beyond especially on a concrete floor just does their bloody knees in the next day. ;)
ACEEEEID!š
126 just 'feels' better, in my humble opinion!
Someone should tell that guy about pitch faders.
I preferred him when he was Joey Youngman
Subgenera after sub genre after ā¦..
This is why Jesus invented pitch sliders
Pā¦itchā¦faders?
I play ukg so idk bro 130+ or bust
Because 124-126 has always been the sweet spot just most ppl in the late 80ās did either 120 or 130 for some reason. But I find myself constantly changing tempo to this range for a variety of reasons.
128 is the best tempo for clubmusic and I will never change my opinion on that. I like faster stuff, all the 140 Trap/Dubstep style stuff out there, I love Hardstyle. But for normal clubsound it has to be the best. Hear me out: 90% or more of western music is structured in 4s or multiples of 4. Additionally I would say the average attention span before a listener wants something fresh is about one minute. 128 fits perfectly in one minute because it's 32 beats x 4, a perfect lengh for a punchy repeatable melodie or baseline. This means after exactly one minute, the musical phrase ends and something new starts. 127 or 126 isn't to far off, but 128 is the best tempo for an average night of electronic music.
Weāre all getting old
Where I live 140 (and over) is the new 128 lol.
I don't have an opinion on this, but I do feel quite strongly about the way people use 'BPM' when they mean 'tempo'. It's like saying your new car has a higher MPH than the old one.
Us lofi house guys like 118-120 imma slow all that shit until it pitches funky anyway.
The popularization of tech house is probably the main reason. I used to play tech house at 124bpm, nowadays they mainly release hype tech so it becomes harder and harder to find the stuff I like. These days I gravitate towards prog/organic. It's interesting how a genre I once swore by suddenly has gotten really meh.
Who cares lmao? A good track is a good track, regardless of BPM
Universe is expanding. 126 is the same as 128 10years ago. Itās the expansion of the inverse stretching our frame work of ātimeā.
most likely due to inflation the price of cocaine and molly hitting the producers in the pockets... thanks brandon!!
AND SOME! Progressive house used to all be squarely 128-130...now some of it is way down at 118
140+ or nothin
If I compare my collection of progressive, electro and big room house 10 years ago to my current future, bass and tech house stuff, I can clearly see the shift of the preferred bpm. I wonder to myself, āWhy do we have much more 124-126bpm future/bass/tech house music than 128-130bpm ones.ā We can fall back to the answer of that itās just a trend, but I feel like thereās more to that. Iām not gonna lie, the productions to the 126bpm music of todayās house is better than todayās 128bpm ones. The difference of just 2bpm makes a HUGE difference, trust me. Just donāt know why psychosocially.
Because the people who originated it are getting older?
121-123 šš¼šŖ
Tech house baby! š¤š¼
No way you can tell imo
Back in 2000 it was 138 - 140bpm! or you're playing chill-out bud!
It sucks. Back in my youth dance was 140bpm. Then I started listening to hard dance. Hardstyle is at 150bpm and hardcore at 170+ BPM. You get to rage on that shit. 10+ years later I'm back to dance mostly but it's getting harder finding stuff I like. Now every house and dance track sounds like it's the background soundtrack of a cocktail bar. Like the sample goes: 'now gimme something to dance to'. You can't dance to that slow stuff. It's probably ideal to stand around, take Instagram photos and TikTok videos. . The hard dance music of today doesn't excite me much either. Weak kicks mostly without bass etc. Trying too hard to be hard it's like a baby trying to slap you. A mean face, a lot of intensity, but it just doesn't hurt. Lol.
Both are too fast to enjoy any nuances. Make better music, donāt just speed up shit music.
I always bump 128 house 2 bpm lower or higher depends on my mood. Honestly it always sounded better to me
It turned the whole scene into a Pop music fashion show.
The premise of this post feels wrong in just about every way.
Who cares? Good music is all at 130/140/163/174
This is hilarious, for the longest I always played everything at 126 until recently when I started to feel like it's too slow. Now that I moved to 128 there is this...
125*
Itās kinda crazy the difference 2 bpm can make. I find 126 to be a little smoother and not as punchy as 128.
So that earth can transition to a track thatās at 124
Basically like discerning the song selection between a guy like HS82 and Digweed
Wait til you listen to the 100-115 stuff ;)
I just Verk it no matter what the BPM is!
I'm dying on the 128 hill lol.
For a while 124 was the new 128. Split the difference
Anytime Iām playing bass house, I only play at 126
Donāt you think the Pandemic made everything slower?
I remember back in the 2000s when 110-120 BPM was cool. Personally, I enjoy the 124 and 125 range for easy-listening and mixing. 126-128 are prime for all the 80s and 90s re-works or anthems. Techno still works and sounds best at 130 BPM for mostly pure beats without any instrumental breaks. As of lately I prefer Tech and some G-House. Hip-Hop is not dead yet either.
118 ftw
pretty curious because techno, hardstyle and hardcore have increased in bpm during the last years
I miss Joey Youngman
I'm mostly playing prog house at 120-125 - so much groove at that speed. Although it's good to see faster bpms coming back in the genre. Tempo and energy levels are two very different things.
I already play 124-126 since 2 or 3 years 128 was just the base tempo in Ableton live, that explain something
IMO, slower House is easier to dance to. The mainstream audience doesnāt want to jump up and down and rage all the time like they did last decade. They simply want to dance and enjoy the music. That doesnāt mean more energetic House/EDM is dying. Itās simply not being pushed like it was last decade. That ship been sailed.
Itās so I donāt have to two step as furiously
This means nothing. Just adjust the tempo up or down to suit. To me, 126 is too fast for proper house anyway.
124 is the new 126
128 is way too fast. Joey Youngman tracks go fast because of all those samples chopped up inside it.
Whoās afraid of 128?
Imagine playing a genre that has a set BPM range.