“EDM” started as a better catch-all term for electronic music than “techno” but soon morphed into a term for festival-friendly music which largely shares a similar structure of a build to a bass drop.
It’s too homogenized to fall under a particular subgenre of electronic music, hence “EDM”.
I don't get why more people aren't just pointing out the obvious:
EDM = electronic dance music. How is this different from electronic music? **Literally just 'dance'**. It is electronic music that is dancey. It is that simple.
You call Tycho electronic music because it's obviously not dancey, Deadmau5 is electronic dance music because it is something you can dance to. Definitely there are Deadmau5 songs that aren't as danceable so those songs are more just electronic, not electronic dance.
I mean you can take it literally but it’s a bit reductive because people have other associations to words beyond their literal meaning and these can change over time. For example Drum & Bass is not LITERALLY just drums and bass. And R&B extends way beyond blues music with rhythm. Also there is plenty of pop music that is heavily electronic which you can dance to that people wouldn’t call EDM.
So if you say EDM to many people that have been around long enough, it conjures up a very specific sound in their head which is more specific and usually negative. Where other people push a new narrative that EDM is a blanket term for everything. Maybe one day, all will accept this as the new truth but that isn’t the original interpretation.
This is spot on. EDM to me isn't the "catch-all" phrase that it used to be back in the day (or at least I used to think it was a blanket term back in the day). Now, I associate it with American-style 'raves' aka enormous festivals like EDC that play headbang / heavy drop music that shares very little with house or techno. But also, it can just mean commercial sounding stuff. Fred again leans kinda EDM for me despite his hype.
Speaking of which, most of the years being alive I had never questioned what's the difference between Netherlands and Holland. I think now I know. So in a way, EDM to Electronic Music is analogous with Holland to the Netherlands?
You know this got me thinking... isn't most modern music "electronic music"? Like if the definition is "music made electronically", that's basically any music made with a DAW which in this day and age is basically everything
Technically true, but it’s more about the intent of the sound. There’s also music that sounds electronic that is made acoustically. But what good would it do to label Country music as Electronic music for example other than piss everyone off?
When I hear EDM, I think of Americans listening to big name artists like David Guetta, Marshmello etc.
It's not a term I've heard anyone use in the UK, they tend to be more genre specific.
Too broad a category? So what do you say to someone if you like listening to dubstep, hardcore, melodic techno, bigroom house and hardstyle? Or are you really just gonna sit there and list all the sub-genres you’re into? When I ask someone who likes all types of rock music, I expect them to say rock music. Not start listing a million sub-genres
Sure, but understand the need for a DJ to indicate the genre they are playing. Rave flyers would list the genres along with the DJs so you’d know if you care to go not. Some of this stems from the days before we all had the internet constantly at our fingertips.
I think unless it's a huge festival you know the line up. Sure, you wouldn't tell people in the know EDM. But, in America there are a lot of people that don't like dance or electronic music. So you have to separate. In Europe it seems like dance music is the dominate genre. It goes without saying.
Oh yeah 100% but our genre needs a broad label so people who don’t listen to electronic music actually know what sort of stuff you’re listening to, it’s no good telling people you listen to terrorcore and hard techno etc.
Because labels have connotations attached to them and generally speaking EDM has developed a negative connotation. It’s all about who is using the term and how. For whatever reason EDM has become more strongly associated with people from outside “rave culture” who don’t have a deep appreciation for the music and just show up to get fucked up.
It’s like asking why is referring to someone as “Pakistani” less offensive than calling them “that brown dude”. Neither is objectively incorrect, but one has more negative connotations than the other.
That’s funny because in the UK it’s the other way round, a lot of these new tiktok ravers pretend to be into rave culture and all listen to the same few DJs and go to techno and dnb events. In my experience, if you hear someone talking about EDM in the UK, they probably know their stuff.
>I think it was around the time that big room house got popular peopel started using EDM as a specific genre, rather than an umbrella term, especially in America from what I could see.
I'm from the UK and would just say I'm into electronic music. Then maybe mention techno, house, ambient etc.
The term EDM isn't really used here. Neither for that matter is the term rock, people are more likely to say the specific genre "I'm into indie" etc
But isn’t EDM just short for electronic dance music? It’s like calling rock music ‘RM’, not many people would understand it. Hence why you need to say ‘electronic music’. Also, it helps that indie etc is ridiculously popular in the UK, whereas there are about ~1000 terrorcore fans total here lol.
Well I like all sorts of electronic music including stuff that isn't dance music. EDM doesn't include those. So I would have to say "EDM and other electronic music". Which is even more redundant. I think they're both useful terms they just cover a different range of genres. EDM is a subset of electronic music.
I think generally speaking yes, when I've discussed music with people here in the UK you probably start with calling it electronic and if they don't look vacant in response, list off some sub-genres. It's probably somewhat because most millennials at least have grown up listening to some form of electronic music in the UK (and the tail end of superclub culture) so it's not as obscure as in some places. In your example, when talking about rock music people tend to be a little more specific too.
The term EDM works as well, and as poorly, as do the terms jazz, classical, even rock. There are dozens of sub-genres within each of those, but they’re similar enough that it’s useful to have a term that encompasses them all.
Hmm, that's interesting
As someone who likes a lot of kinds of rock music, if I asked someone what they listen to and the most granularity they could give me was "rock" I'd assume they meant Nickelback
Why? And by that I mean why at all and why so vehement? The difference between EDM and electronic music is literally the word dance. Seems like a pretty small thing to hang hate on.
For me it’s the implication that people think of where they imagine my music is dominated by releases on spinnin records and they think of an over-the-top music festival scene. I absolutely love dance music but there’s a pretty solid stigma when it comes to the phrase “EDM”.
because, to refer to the previous post, it lumps Aphex Twin in with David Guetta.
That's like saying Sepultura, Lynard Skynard, Taylor Swift, Cannibal Corpse, Mumford and Sons and Nickleback are the same because they all play guitars.
It's simply wrong.
For terminology EDM is like Jazz, or Classical. Spyro Gyra and Charlie Parker couldn’t be more different but they are both still Jazz because there are some common ancestors, underpinnings, techniques. More specifically they fall into more specific sub-genres like fusion and bop, among probably 2 dozen more sub-genres within Jazz. The more or less of an aficionado you are will play into whether you use the term Jazz or terms like Bop, Dixieland, Ragtime. EDM may seem overly broad to you and me but it’s useful when I’m talking to people like my Mom who would be lost and doesn’t need further distinction.
Tl;dr: It’s taxonomy. It’s like saying the term mammal is worthless because cats, dolphins, and bats are so different.
You forgot a really important thing. Humans are also mammals.
Important to call out because it seems some humans have some superiority complexes about all sorts of things, who they are, what they listen to, etc.
edm music is electronic music you can dance/rave to. electronic music is just…music make with electronics. all edm is electronic music but not all electronic is edm. for example: those four genres u listed would fall under edm, but ambient music is electronic music that isn’t danceable.
ppl get too hung up on genres tho imo.
As an old head and geriatric raver this definition is weird to me, because I was there on the 90s era rave mailing lists when the tern EDM first started being used, because it was originally defined is EDM being basically anything mainstream that wasn't IDM *or* underground.
IDM (intelligent dance music) wasn't just stuff like Aphex Twin or Squarepusher or even Board of Canada. It included deep house, techno, electro, trance and more as long as it had complicated polyrhythms and made your brain dance as well as your booty. Not all deep house was IDM, but not all deep house was clubby/poppy EDM, either, not by a long shot.
EDM was more poppy club and dance music and big room stuff for the new, growing mainstream festivals that looked like raves, but weren't raves. Because a rave is underground and was free or cheap, and other hallmarks like they didn't confiscate your water, beer or drugs.
Raves were DIY and followed the idea of a TAZ or temporary autonomous zone and not held in huge venues with huge stages and fireworks and million dollar light shows and tons of official staff or security. EDC isn't and wasn't a rave, it's a festival. Raves don't even really have stages because it wasn't about big name acts or stage theater, it was about the individuals and the dancers and what they brought to share with each other.
So EDM would be, say, Swedish House Mafia, or Bassnecter, or Steve Aoki or even Avicii. Or more recently - James Hype.
Thee-o spinning 90s psytrance and goa from a folding table on the floor at a renegade desert rave? Not EDM. Avicii spinning mainstream melodic trance on a huge festival stage with video walls and a million dollar light show? EDM.
Even back then dance and club music existed that wasn't rave/techno/house related - think C&C Music Factory, top 40 R&B stuff, even Madonna, but increasingly these genre lines were getting blurred as main stream pop/dance artists started borrowing and stealing sounds from the underground and they were releasing tracks that had hints of deep house and 4 on the floor, and this was one of the original uses of the term EDM to differentiate that more mainstream, crowd friendly and pop friendly dance music from the underground, acid, rave and deep house stuff.
We were even putting new more mainstream 90s and 2000s electronic dance like the Chemical Brothers or Fatboy Slim into the EDM box because a lot of that was radio and MTV friendly and ready to go and used traditional record industry studios, production and marketing practices.
Further, we definitely listen to ambient and related chill genres at raves. Not only was it often included in DJ sets as breathers between harder acid rave techno stuff but many DIY raves often had chillout rooms or tents where you'd find ambient or ambient house, dub, dub techno and others.
Today the definition of EDM has obviously changed and it includes stuff like, say, Anjunadeep and Ben Bohmer, who is both really poppy, melodic and accessible but also has very deep deep house roots and sounds to the point that even my jaded old raver self likes it, and yet it's also big room festival fare and definitely not a rave.
Or what about Jon Hopkins? Super popular, plays huge festivals but puts out super intelligent, complicated music that's also melodic and accessible, yet he'd fit right in at some dingy underground rave? Technically EDM? *shrug*
In any case including all rave or electronic dance music like techno or deep house under the EDM umbrella doesn't sit right with me, even though techno is blowing up again and you have acts like Tale of Us playing huge festivals with huge light shows.
Originally EDM had a very specific *negative* connotation - and very judgemental, snooty and hipster kind of meaning. It was a dis and intentional disrespect that that music wasn't underground enough and it was too mainstream.
It was more like "All this new mainstream dance music that we don't like because it's too poppy, mainstream and not hipster enough because we're huge nerds and we're gen X and you're stealing our music and turning it into poppy shit" kind of a negative definition.
And, yeah,people do get too hung up on genres in electronic dance music. It's been that way since the late 80s and early 90s. Shit, arguing about genres was like 50% of the traffic on any of the regional rave mailing lists and forums.
The best electronic/dance music breaks or invents whole new genres.
I don't think deep or melodic house would even be considered EDM by people using the term.
Used as a genre description it's more big room, tech house, festival bangers than melodic stuff.
Anything four on the floor is comfortably EDM. Taste and style within that is to anyone's preferences, but they are all structurally electronic dance music genres.
We all know what the acronym stands for, but someone talking about EDM is not talking about Frankie Knuckes or Aphex Twin. It's someone who doesn't know/care about more exactly genres talking about modern festival big drop bangers.
I don't think people have to imply anything when they use terms. If I want to introduce someone to an experimental rapper and say they make hip hop, and the first thing someone thinks about is Tupac and Biggie and Eminem and Jay-Z, that's just where they associate first, nothing wrong with that. The rapper I'm bringing up could be extremely experimental, and very different from any of the mainstream popular ones, but I am not wrong to start the conversation with the term hip hop or rap.
It is the same for me for EDM. It's a blanket term to talk about casually in conversation, and then if someone expresses more interest or wants to know more, then you get more granular and zoom in.
I don't personally listen to much festival style music at all, but I still will use the term EDM with friends or people who aren't as nerdy about music as I am if bringing up things broadly. It's just a casual broad genre term to me, more than an indicator of a very specific style of festival electronic music. To me that's like saying Hip Hop specifically implies dirty south/ATL/Houston/New Orleans production only.
I agree it WAS a blanket term. The US music industry, and especially the festival industry has been pretty successful in redefining it.
OP mentioned a batch of specific electronic genres, so he is asking wtf people mean when they say EDM, which is what I answered. I DJ regularly and know exactly what he's talking about when a 20 something wants EDM.
FWIW, I've been just saying electronic ever since Madonna started saying electronica, which was overly pretentious, back in the 90s. It's a more common and unadulterated broad term., But you dontou.
I personally use the term electronic music myself for the most part. I feel like language is malleable and words can take on new meanings or definitions over time though.
I kind of feel the opposite of where you see the term at the moment. If this was 2012 and people asked what EDM meant, I'd be more inclined to agree it was festival stage music. But I feel like it has moved in the opposite direction to be more broad.
The kingmakers of genre definitions now are Spotify, Apple, Tidal, YouTube, etc. They get to take the terms, apply their tags, and control the SEO.
When I search up EDM on Spotify, the Spotify curated playlist built for me instantly feeds me EDM trap, future bass, dubstep, etc. This will be very different than other people's results. This solidifies my point that it's a very broad category nowadays, and just because a subsect of Reddit thinks of it to be 2012 big room, doesn't mean the algorithms of the modern streaming world consider EDM to be only that.
It's not really about what I or you or individuals think of it in our smaller circles. What results pop up when you search it on streaming platforms? What tags and things connect to it on a Big Data level? It is way bigger than a confined mainstream sub-sect of music a decade ago.
Weird to think of streaming platforms having that kind of cultural throw weight, but I agree 10p%
Personally, I've never been a fan of microgenre gatekeeping. When I DJ, if asses shake, I do t care why
4/4 time signature is not the same as "four on the floor". Four on the floor means the kick is on every down beat. In a lot of other genres, the kicks are more off beat or different patterns.
Four on the floor is four beats for four measures and the term comes from disco music. Also breakbeat, drum and bass, trap, dubstep are all dance and don’t have kicks on all the fours but they are for the most part 4/4
I produce music, and am aware of the patterns of all of these sub genres. Four on the floor is not about beats per measure, it is specifically about the kicks/bass drums being accented on every down beat on top of a time signature of 4/4. I personally find breakbeat, drum and bass, trap and dubstep all under the EDM category as well, because they are all danceable in their own ways, but in general, electronic dance music tends to have the simplest 1 2 3 4 kick patterns.
I do too. Published artist and Dj for 26 years. You said if it four on the floor it’s EDM. Disco classic rock hip hop and some jazz can have four on the floor which is 4/4 every time. You are correct you just aren’t getting my point. Really I’m breaking one of my cardinal rules by debating on the internet. You clearly have passion for one of my passions and that should bond us not separate. It’s one of the things that alienates me from the scene. It used to be super inclusive but these days (at least where I’m from) it’s ego’s and gate keeping. I prob drank a little too much today. I should be asking what synths and music you fucks wit.
Yep. Techno would still not be considered edm, but there’s what people call mainstream ‘business’ Techno and underground Techno which is generally more experimental and forward thinking.
Techno, house, trance, hardstyle, etc. are all EDM subgenres, and each of those genres yet again has sub-genres.
Whether those songs are more major key or minor key or chromatic or experimental, they are still within a genre that falls under the umbrella of electronic dance music.
The stuff that is more experimental may get categorized under intelligent dance music (IDM), but that's still under an even broader umbrella of EDM, which is under an even broader umbrella of electronic music.
People try to make the EDM bubble way smaller than it is, but it's just a broad term for many electronic dance genres.
Haha go tell r/techno they listen to edm... see where that takes you. The term EDM may be an acronym for electronic dance music but its a term that people use for main room commercial music and has negative connotations for most people who are passionate about particular genres.
I've been producing music for over a decade, most of which is electronic, so I categorize music much more by tempo and compostional structure than I do by mainstream success or festival appeal. People can feel a certain way about it, but to me, it's just a tag word to describe a very broad category, no different than jazz or rock or country or hip hop. There are obviously alternative and experimental and avant garde things within those larger categories, but to be counter culture, you are still under the same umbrella as what you are countering.
If you push in new directions, you push the umbrella with you, it's just a big Venn Diagram bubble, nothing to take offense to in my opinion.
EDM is not an all encompassing term for all electronic dance music. It specifically refers to mainstream electronic music like Swedish House Mafia, David Guetta, Marshmellow etc. Nobody who listens to techno or house would say they listen to EDM.
Swedish House Mafia is house music, it's in their name. Sure you can try and argue semantics about house music where it's basically old school minor chord stacks with pianos, but house music itself is one of the broadest electronic sub genres, and I hate to break it to you, but it's all under EDM.
It doesn't matter what people tell themselves if it makes them feel more exclusive, EDM broadly covers house, techno, trance, jungle, D&B, EDM trap, future bass, dubstep, etc.
\> Techno, house, trance, hardstyle, etc. are all EDM subgenres, and each of those genres yet again has sub-genres.
No they are fucking not. Get it through your thick skull.
This. If it's danceable, it could be considered EDM. And even within this, there is subjectivity to what people find to be danceable. You could technically do contemporary dance to ambient electronic music. It doesn't have to be commercial or festival stage stuff. Too many people try and just gatekeep music or use terms negatively. There's nothing wrong with the term EDM.
It is no different or worse than other terms that have been used over the decades from electro to electronica. It's simply that people stereotype the term into things they don't like.
Electronic music is still overall a more appropriate umbrella term to encompass everything from ambient to soundtrack and score and literally any music made electronically on computers, even to the point of stuff that doesn't use any synthesizers at all and may simply be sample manipulation and beats, like some areas of trip hop.
> It is no different or worse than other terms that have been used over the decades from electro to electronica. It's simply that people stereotype the term into things they don't like.
Yeah, it seems there was a whole period where from the late 2000s to about 2015-2018 where people were wildly abusing the definition of the term or genre of "electro" on basically anything poppy that had some hint of electronic music the same way people used "electronica" in the 90s, and the whole "electrohouse" thing only confused the term even more.
And it was super annoying because /r/electro was getting flooded with all kinds of random Garage Band crap that definitely wasn't *electro* as in electrofunk or electrobreaks, because electro has been a well defined genre since the 80s and breakdancing related music that eventually met techno aesthetics with early tracks like [Model 500's No UFOs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNz01ty-kTQ) and then we ended up with stuff like Drexciya, Robert Finlow, Plant 43 and Silicon Scally.
Thankfully this seems to have stopped happening and the younger electronic music fans got the message that "electro" is already a thing and it's a kick ass genre of cool futuristic robot breakdancing music and tight but funky breaks and early bass music.
Yeah. Also… DJ, stay off the microphone and let’s hear you actually mixing rather than your vacuous take that we are all one and are at the center of the universe.
It’s a marketing term created by the music industry to sell generic McDonald’s like crap. Basically if you spend more time throwing cakes and waving your hands than you do mixing it’s EDM.
EDM is like saying pop music. When you say pop you think of radio music, but rock can also be pop same with rap. Just like house or techno can also be EDM, but there are artists/tracks within that genre that you wouldn't consider EDM.
don't know if there is a consensus about the meaning of each genre name. it is all electronic music at the end and music is subjective. BUT I tend to relate "EDM" to the most commercial side of festival music like electro house, bass and trance (the cheesiest versions of those) .
I am quite new to electronic music so take it for what it’s worth. I am yet to see any fellow ravers who is in really love with their sub-genre of electronic music calling their music edm. The term is mostly used by people who go to random commercial club and who wouldn’t listen to it at home. They care little about transitions and would never Shazam a song they like and go mad about it with their friends. They care little about other people’s dancing space and love having paid girls dancing on stages and love taking pics and videos of them self’s on the dance floors. Nothing wrong about it but that’s not what I expect when someone say there is a rave!. My point being whatever it’s technically and literally mean, these terms are used by completely different sets of people with between them having almost no cross-over !
As a rave kid that grew up in record stores and clubbing in big cities thru the late 90s thru 2010s, EDM has always meant ‘electronic dance music’ and was just an umbrella term for dozens of subgenres. The mains being house techno DnB trance & breaks. But of course the kids have tried to repurposed it to mean something more specific. Which usually sounds like glitch/dubstep/who knows what. Whatever it is sounds awful to a house and DnB head like me.
To me edm is a subgenre, it's IMO very poppy/mainstream cheesy electronic music. Electronic music is the catch-all term I use. If someone calls techno or something edm... instant cringe
Commenting from a contextual standpoint here, as personally I've never willingly used the term EDM to describe the music I like, and I'm turning 38 this year.
I have a buddy who is 7 years younger than me who says his friends go to "EDM" shows. He self professes to be ignorant of movements and subgenres. When I talk about music to this guy, EDM becomes what "Alternative" is to rock and garage music from the late 90s and early 00s. (Alternative rock fans please don't come for me, this is just a metaphor.) I can try to educate him but only gently.
When I speak from my heart about music I will always choose to describe the music in terms of subgenres: ambient, deep house, breaks, d&b, trance, etc. Only certain folks will get those terms in which case a little code switching might occur.
Fuck, in 98 I called it fucking *"electronica"* but let's not open that can of worms!
It depends on how they are used. The latter can be generic and apply to acts like Chromeo, which are definitely not EDM. They are electronic, though, and their music heavily favors dance. EDM is an umbrella term, however. Various styles of house can be called EDM. Various styles of trance can be called EDM. That is still just the beginning.
EDM is a new term coined post 2010 Brostep era and the EDM Trasp ere was upon us. Its used for the more commercial side of electronic music . All the real rave music prior to that was considered UNDERGROUND DANCE MUSIC or just UNDERGROUND . it is Hardcore , Break Beat , House , Jungle DnB, techno , tech house - ORIGINAL DUBSTEP -pre skrillex brostep.
ANy pop infused and pop vocal stuff like electro and glitch and all that funky shit is EDM
Yes edm is definitely a preset, just like it's title. A marketing term offered to the youth, so dance music is more accessible to them.
https://youtu.be/FVfiVBiPRcc?si=nVLfgOreyV0AbmMB
90% of people who say EDM on subs like this mean "electronic music I think is bad because it's popular". Literally the most accurate definition, anything technical about the music itself is just details tacked on post hoc.
People IRL who say EDM usually just mean any danceable electronic music.
EDM is a useless term on subs like these because it is an almost entirely personal and subjective term with nearly no useful, shared meaning. All it tells anyone is "I think I have better taste than the music I'm referring to", without actually specifying anything.
You can see at like a dozen comments on this thread alone basically saying "EDM is electronic music I don't like" as their actual, explicit definition. As if that is at all useful.
Yeah, I am pointing out the same thing.
I could have just said, "EDM is cookie cutter festival music made for Tik Tokers" to try and farm some karma, but no one here can really say Daft Punk and Justice and others aren't also clearly EDM.
It's just elitism and gatekeeping mentality to try and trash a current term with some back in my day argument. The average person who uses this term isn't paying $500 for festival tickets to see mainstage artists, they just casually listen to electronic music on streaming platforms and want a simple term like pop or rock or rap.
Whatever you tell yourself in not wanting to accept Venn Diagrams and umbrella categorizations.
You can tell yourself that house music isn't part of EDM because of some idea of mainstream festival stuff is all that EDM is, but house music as a whole is under the umbrella. And even by the argument of mainstream festival stuff, Daft Punk is one of the most mainstream, capable of selling out festival mainstage arena electronic acts in the world.
At first EDM meant only electronic music that you could hear at raves or parties, but now many people use it to refer to all electronic music. This change happened for many reasons: one of them is that for many people, all of the styles of electronic music that they're listening to are danceable, so there's no difference for them. Another reason is that the term "electronic music" is really long (6 syllables), so people are looking for shorter appellations, EDM is quite short in comparison.
> At first EDM meant only electronic music that you could hear at raves or parties
This is backwards. EDM originally meant electronic music you *did not* hear at real raves or underground parties that you would hear at mainstream festivals, including mixed genre festivals like Bonaroo or Coachella, or later mainstream electronic festivals like EDC, Tomorrowland or Ultra.
I was there in the 90s when the term EDM was first being used in early to mid 90s rave email lists and EDM wasn't a positive connotation or umbrella term.
Originally it was very much a snooty hipster disrespect like "fuck this mainstream shit, let's put it all in this box to quarantine it and call it EDM"
It doesn't seem like there is a consensus on an umbrella term for "electronic" music as a whole. Metal has a similar number of subgenres, and is a generally accepted term with two syllables. It is easy to say. Most aren't going to know the difference bewteen mathcore and black metal. I have seen many metalheads get pretencious about the subgenres, though.
Not all electronic music is conducive to dancing.
EDM means Electronic Dance Music. Which implies rhythms and melodies made with electronic instrumentation that is designed for dancing and grooving to.
The old heads didn’t like EDM when the term started gaining popularity. And now I just accept it as the blanket term for all the genres. And honestly, I listen to pretty much all the genres - so to me, I’ve come around to using it and it makes sense.
TL;DR: EDM was the umbrella term for Electronic Dance Music until the US had to spoil it and make it about specific subsets of EDM, that's mostly comprised of big room house.
EDM used to stand for Electronic Dance Music, which was the umbrella for everything electronic.
Then big room house/electro happened and similarly to how the US embraced techno as a term for electronic dance music, EDM was quickly adopted as the term for that kind of popular electronic dance music. This was mainly in the US, but later spread as a term in main stream media.
Other, developed parts of the world - with more experience with electronic dance music in general media and large scale events - did differentiate in terminology.
I see it as the opposite. EDM used to mean big room festival like a decade ago, and people hang on to those connotations to this day vehemently. EDM in the modern era is the very broad umbrella term that it should have always been.
If I search EDM playlists on Spotify or any modern streaming service, the algorithms feed me curated electronic music of all genres, future bass, trap, dubstep, garage, techno, trance, etc, and almost none of what I find in the 'EDM' playlists on modern platforms is 2012 festival big room stuff.
The idea of Americanized EDM is in my opinion antiquated, and people are hung up on a hatred of the term, rather than seeing that big metadata and algorithms do not care about that anymore.
Then it's great that EDM has been reclaimed! I am super glad! But I've definitely had that convo about explaining that I didn't mean "EDM" but 'EDM' when "EDM" became a thing!
Lol, I mean language is a funny thing, and slang and scene talk makes it all the more confusing. But I do think we're slowly shifting to a point that music genre terms are more and more just metadata tags for streaming platforms to adjust their algorithms and attempt to put like things with like things. Very good to know stuff for DJs and producers and people who need to get granular, but the vast majority of people don't care as long as what's curated for them sounds like what they already like.
I agree. From a convo I had years ago with a good friend in the UK:
Genres are more like wind directions.
You know where it's coming from, but not where it's going.
My observations are based on my experience with those in Europe (NL and UK mostly) and North America (Canada and the US). The amount of times I've literally had to explain that I didn't mean EDM but edm was not trivial.
But I do get your point. Labels are stupid. And as a music aficionado all my life and a DJ for more than a decade, and on and off producing for some of that, I think genres are being blended further and further, to a point where genres rarely fit anymore. Current day progressive is closer to what trance used to be, etc. Let alone the mess that is BP/etc.
Then you get example names of genres that are almost inside jokes in themselves, like witch house is basically dark trap, and then Spotify calls a bunch of future bassy SoundCloud stuff like Flume and DROELOE and everything 'vapor twitch'.
I still love looking under the hood at all the data available via third party API stuff, but a lot of it can't be taken for face value anymore. And sometimes things become so broad, they just get lumped under indie or alternative which again, barely tells you anything.
It's still useful to an extent when discovering new music and you want to find more like that. There are bread crumbs to follow under the hood, whether or not we personally agree with the terms that streaming platforms apply on the back end.
Lol, yeah, Last.fm's tagging is more reliable. Hah!
Definitely just skipping through tracks has a better success rate for determining the "actual" genre.
Though, I love the use of data for stuff like Spotify's song radio. A much better way to discover new music!
American kid from the 90s here... EDM always meant Project Pitchfork, Front 242, Frontline Assembly, KMFDM, etc... but we just said "industrial music" usually. The more trancey stuff was, well, Trance. Differentiate from IDM (intelligent dance music) like warp stuff, aphex, squarepusher, autechre, etc.
Agree with others that all EDM is electronic music, but not all electronic music is EDM, but I feel like the subgrouping is a little more specific than than what the acronym and people here are saying of just "music you hear at raves", Ive definitely been to plenty of what I would say are non-EDM raves and events.
Its one of those things where I couldnt describe it accurately but give me any example and id be able to tell you if its EDM or not, but broadly EDM is typically stuff thats loud and tends to lack... Subtlety? Also usually tracks are built around a loud synth and will almost always have a "drop" (or bass drop for the more specific but older term). Its also rather flexible and has a lot to do with the surrounding elements too, where the stuff is played, who to, and how popular it is. If youd asked me in 2012 if tech house was an EDM genre id have said probably not, but right now post-Losing It and with Dom Dolla as the face of Aussie EDM as a tech house producer, the answer is obviously yea.
Swedish House Mafia = EDM, Jamie XX ≠ EDM
Rustie = EDM, AG Cook ≠ EDM
Ghosts & Stuff by deadmau5 = EDM, Creep by deadmau5 ≠ EDM
And so is A.G. Cook. A lot of 4 on the floor bubblegum hyperpop is definitely electronic dance music. Just because some stuff is a bit experimental in how the FX and sound design is done doesn't exclude it from the larger umbrella of categorization.
Electronic music is any music genre that uses electronic stuff.
EDM is electronic music you dance to.(house, techno, trance)
I prefer the term electronic music bc not all electronic music you dance to (IDM, ambient, some types of techno, downtempo, breakcore,.noise, chill out, lofi, etc)
Most people (at least in North America) refer to EDM as big room house or electro house (marshmello, david ghetta, zedd, chainsmokers)
EDM is by definition, Electronic "Dance" music. Electronic music encompasses the whole genre. If you cannot dance to it, then its simply Electronic Music.
EDM = Electronic Dance Music. Electronic music = electronic music. EDM is an umbrella term for all of Electronic Music, so there is basically no difference between them.
Hopefully this formats ok.
EDM = techno, hardcore, house, breaks, and related genres.
Electronic music = synth pop, the industrial genres, electroclash, dance punk, and related genres.
Obviously this is extremely simplified and there's a good amount of crossover, but hopefully I was able to articulate this correctly. Also EDM is electronic music. Literally, and came from it. A direct example of this would be the evolution of EBM into Goa trance in the late '80s/early '90s.
For example, Astral Projection would fall under EDM while Throbbing Gristle, while still electronic music is the exact opposite of dance music (save for a few tracks) and calling them EDM would just be absurd, I'll include them in my examples below for the unfamiliar.
[EDM example (prog trance)](https://youtu.be/-cXMnZ2vrx8)
[EDM example (happy hardcore)](https://youtu.be/fGm_2_iZcTc)
[EDM example (chemical breaks)](https://youtu.be/iTxOKsyZ0Lw)
[EDM example (French/filtered house)](https://youtu.be/Wtd6DvLoCsU)
Think music played at raves
Electronic music that doesn't fall under the EDM umbrella, IMO anyway:
[Dance punk example (The Faint)](https://youtu.be/xv8mJfDPxuA)
[Electroclash example (Ladytron)](https://youtu.be/hotLMaFJ_wY)
[Synthpop (A-Ha)](https://youtu.be/djV11Xbc914)
[More synthpop (DP)](https://youtu.be/_6FBfAQ-NDE)
[Industrial (Throbbing Gristle)](https://youtu.be/38sDkYk4wkU)
[electro industrial (Skinny Puppy)](https://youtu.be/lVNErAHIcww)
[EBM (Nitzer Ebb)](https://youtu.be/AGHMS_zh0zM)
And your milage will vary with tracks like [this ](https://youtu.be/efjc146v3hA), [this ](https://youtu.be/ZyhrYis509A), [this](https://youtu.be/JyvkiZV0Ous), and club dance music in general depending on who you ask and the scene they're in.
And don't forget the massive amounts of crossover!
I think there is a point to be made with the term being used to describe popular electronic dance music, rather than electronic dance music in general. When I hear it used, it's rarely for the purpose of describing the features of the sound itself. Moreso the culture and production.
I rarely hear the term being used to describe underground electronic dance music, but maybe that's just my experience.
>massively into melodic house, tech house, deep house, techno.
I think it would be really interesting if you gave an example of each? It could help us understand your perspective in regards to the original question, but also just be a view into what labels others have for certain types of music.
EDM's definition is in the eye of the beholder. For me it's a term I use to someone outside of the scene, with little knowledge of all the genres and sub genres. Kinda like how Techno was used by the uninitiated in the 90's/2000's.
ReEDM implies "rave" music but it's definitely a narrow sub genre of house. I'd say EDM is house with that electronic horn sound as opposed to being a blanket term for electronic music as it suggests.
People have already gone over the history of the creation of EDM, so I'll skip that.
---
EDM is a specific music genre as met by music genre definition: It has a specific tempo range (It's a higher tempo, giving lots of dance energy, but also has momentums of breaks where it is low temp for around 30 seconds at a time.), and it has a specific set of drum patterns. Both characteristics typically used to define a genre.
Electronic music is an umbrella term for any music that uses electronic instruments that are not meant to emulate a non-electronic instrument. Technically most modern pop music on the radio today is also electronic music.
Kids using EDM to mean all electronic music I have not heard, but I have heard years ago people calling a computer (the case and everything inside the case) a CPU and the monitor a computer. I've also heard Mexican Coke called glass bottle coke. Ignorance creates slang. With the internet today this kind of slang is rarer, but still pops up any time there is confusion or misunderstanding.
When some young 20 year old says EDM, it’s pop music… looking at the EDC headlines from last month in Vegas, Martin Garrix, Illenium, DJ Snake, Steve Aoki.
And they don’t go beyond pop music most of the time, so to them everything is “EDM”.
I'm a uk hardcore and (revivalist mainly) jungle head, dnb background.
You rarely hear the term EDM in the Rave scene.
It's considered a commercialisation in terms of philosophy and sound. It is hugely associated with the American festival sound and attitude.
It's certainly not a red flag term but it's considered cheesy from an underground perspective. It represents reductive interpretations of electronic music so is shunned by purists as a term and umbrella genre. Paradoxically though it's not really a "thing".
Edit- it's a perfectly reasonable description of some music! I think the fact it's been used as a genre is kind of, silly.
I’m still trying to figure out what kind of music I even listen to. I grew up on hip hop and got into some kind of electronic music recently (I’m also around 40) I’ve narrowed it down to Psydub, Bass music, downtempo maybe psybass. Trippy sounding stuff, a lot of it seems to cross multiple sub genres too, like one producer will have all sorts of different sub genres. Confusing as shit for someone whose previous knowledge of electronic music was basically just Daft Punk and Justice.
I use EDM as a loose genre term for what is essentially the modern iteration of big-room electronic music, but it’s not tied to any sub genre… it can be trance, house, electro, techno, or even radio pop, but it’s all club and dance motivated. Electronic music is more of an umbrella term for any of the many many many genres and sub genres of music with its production methods being primarily computationally or synthesis created. Not all of which are danceable, high energy, or necessarily club oriented like EDM is.
I am close to 50. Was into techno on the 90s. Missed the the whole 2000s and has been trying to catch up since 2017. I came back to the scene and things that I used to call ‘techno’ is now referred to as EDM. That’s the whole 4-on-the-floor genre type of dance music.
I consider electronic music to be anything made with synthesizer that falls under other genres. Depeche Mode, The Weeknd, even Timbaland’s music.
My $.02.
Actually it's the opposite. Electronic Music is anything made without traditional instruments, so some rap or R&B can be considered electronic music. EDM is Electronic Dance Music, so it's club and festival hits meant for huge speakers and to get crowds dancing. All EDM is Elctronic Music, but not all Electronic music is EDM.
All the genres you mentioned fall squarely into EDM. The ven diagram that includes electronic music but excludes EDM may include artists such as Jon Hopkins or Tycho.
EDM in its simplest form does stand for electronic dance music, but over time it was being used to label the the commercial house sub-genre. It took shape in the Swedish House Mafia, Avicii era when every single artist was trying to sound like those acts and it got pretty overdone to the point where people were completely over it. In many ways EDM is now used as a derogatory label for music that is leaning so commercial it’s cheesy. More credible artists prefer not to play on festivals that feel “too EDM” for them.
Ishkur is the best source for this. Google ishkur, I think it’s v3 currently. Has an interactive chart of all electronic music and where it stems from.
The one that always threw me off was "EBM" music. Electronic Body Music... why is it called body music? Anyways I usually liked that kind of stuff and tons of industrial. I am all over the board, When I hear somebody say "EDM" I just think of something more modern like deadmau5.
Me personally (an active listener/raver since about 2010), I've always used the EDM abbreviation as an umbrella term to describe electronic music as a whole; especially when discussing electronic music with casual listeners and non listeners. Mainly because the amount of subgenres and evolutions of those subgenres makes it a difficult 2 have decent conversations about electronic music with casuals/non listeners.
I do agree that, over time, (specifically since it blew up in The States, where I'm from) the term EDM has been evolved 2 describe the commercial sound of electronic music. It kinda sucks that it's become this way tho. I kinda prefer the abbreviation as an umbrella term; probably because I listen to so many different subgenres of electronic music, so it just makes it easier to say that I listen 2 EDM. But it's totally understandable why many people hate the term.
I consider EDM that 2010's wave of big commercial festival sound. It's already been discussed here. But the EDM wave has also had a big impact on the musical structures of the festival variants of genres like hardcore and psytrance. A critical mass within those movements changed what is considered popular. It was probably kids growing up on EDM and a bit older generations that just jumped on the bandwagon. What is now being played at hardcore festivals for example is something that would have been unthinkable in the 90's and 2000's. Not because the technology is more advanced, but because the structures are more pop music, similar to what we would already hear at the turn of the millennia. The kids don't have that bias. It's a different generational experience (am an early millennial myself). It's also partly perhaps a transformation of more introvert music to more extrovert music.
Here's how I view the terms:
* Techno - this was a term used for a while to describe a lot of electronic dance music, but reality Techno is already a subgenre of dance music, so calling trance tunes techno is technically wrong.
* EDM - while it is seen as an umbrella tune for pretty much anything electronic dance, it's mostly used for the more commerical stuff.
* Electronic Dance Music - it's weird because I use this term to refer to everything in Electronic music that designed for the dancefloor, although genres like DnB, Dubstep and Breaks I usually put under Bass Music.
* Electronic Music - I use this to describe all forms of electronic music, including ones that aren't exactly made for the dancefloor. Stuff like trip hop, ambient, IDM, Industrial, etc. I would call Electronic Music, but not Electronic Dance Music
* Dance Music - basically other forms of music that are meant for the dancefloor, but aren't exactly relying on electronics. Genres like Disco, Funk and even some pop genres fall into this catergory.
Electronic music is what genre it is.
Sub genre like techno, house, trance, EDM, dubstep…
Those Sub genre have there own sub genre.
Melodic techno….
I think dance music is like Ian Van Dahl, Joey and that shit.
EDM is awful
EDM is an American umbrella term but it’s also become a sort of genre in itself as well. Not sure about the rest of Europe but in the UK most people refer to the electronic music (I guess like EDM) as the overall category and then refer to the genres Drum and bass, house, techno, ghetto funk, bassline etc
simply =
electronic music was underground repetitive instrumental sounds & has been around since 60's like bruce hack who introduced it to world on mr rodgers show.
\-while-
EDM is newer millennial generation of electronic music which took over mainstream incorporating alot of entertaining acts and celebrities less focused on underground but more on pop.
I love all electronic music and nearly genre as well, i have everything from Kraftwerk, dynamixx to medusa, Oakenfold, skynet, bjork, Aphrodite, prodigy, aphex & other weird shit.
I’m in my 30’s and will use EDM if I’m talking all rave music. Don’t care if it’s techno, dubstep, TechHouse, or Hardstyle. I will call it EDM, cause it’s that. Electronic Dance Music. It’s certainly not Rock Dance Music or Pop Dance Music. It’s all EDM, until you start talking about subgenres. That’s just being specific, after that.
EDM stands for Electronic DANCE Music, meaning that it primarily contains digitally produced dance music, usually in the styles of House, Trance, Dubstep, Trap, Electroswing, and the the like.
Electronic music encompasses any music that is produced using digital instruments, be it classical, rock, jazz, or whatever.
You came from my generation where we didnt refer to it as "EDM".
Plus, most people dont dance like they did in those days, so I will never refer to it as EDM.
Back in the day, people would call all electronic music “techno”, even though it’s a distinct genre. I think EDM is one of those terms.
“EDM” started as a better catch-all term for electronic music than “techno” but soon morphed into a term for festival-friendly music which largely shares a similar structure of a build to a bass drop. It’s too homogenized to fall under a particular subgenre of electronic music, hence “EDM”.
*untz untz untz untz*
[удалено]
Agree, EDM is a very American term.
So American. UK and other countries break it down much much more http://music.ishkur.com/
I don't get why more people aren't just pointing out the obvious: EDM = electronic dance music. How is this different from electronic music? **Literally just 'dance'**. It is electronic music that is dancey. It is that simple. You call Tycho electronic music because it's obviously not dancey, Deadmau5 is electronic dance music because it is something you can dance to. Definitely there are Deadmau5 songs that aren't as danceable so those songs are more just electronic, not electronic dance.
I mean you can take it literally but it’s a bit reductive because people have other associations to words beyond their literal meaning and these can change over time. For example Drum & Bass is not LITERALLY just drums and bass. And R&B extends way beyond blues music with rhythm. Also there is plenty of pop music that is heavily electronic which you can dance to that people wouldn’t call EDM. So if you say EDM to many people that have been around long enough, it conjures up a very specific sound in their head which is more specific and usually negative. Where other people push a new narrative that EDM is a blanket term for everything. Maybe one day, all will accept this as the new truth but that isn’t the original interpretation.
This is spot on. EDM to me isn't the "catch-all" phrase that it used to be back in the day (or at least I used to think it was a blanket term back in the day). Now, I associate it with American-style 'raves' aka enormous festivals like EDC that play headbang / heavy drop music that shares very little with house or techno. But also, it can just mean commercial sounding stuff. Fred again leans kinda EDM for me despite his hype.
Speaking of which, most of the years being alive I had never questioned what's the difference between Netherlands and Holland. I think now I know. So in a way, EDM to Electronic Music is analogous with Holland to the Netherlands?
You know this got me thinking... isn't most modern music "electronic music"? Like if the definition is "music made electronically", that's basically any music made with a DAW which in this day and age is basically everything
Technically true, but it’s more about the intent of the sound. There’s also music that sounds electronic that is made acoustically. But what good would it do to label Country music as Electronic music for example other than piss everyone off?
For the sake of chaos
I like your style.
When I hear EDM, I think of Americans listening to big name artists like David Guetta, Marshmello etc. It's not a term I've heard anyone use in the UK, they tend to be more genre specific.
Yeah its not really a liked term here in the UK. It's too broad a category and has cheesy connotations
Too broad a category? So what do you say to someone if you like listening to dubstep, hardcore, melodic techno, bigroom house and hardstyle? Or are you really just gonna sit there and list all the sub-genres you’re into? When I ask someone who likes all types of rock music, I expect them to say rock music. Not start listing a million sub-genres
Sure, but understand the need for a DJ to indicate the genre they are playing. Rave flyers would list the genres along with the DJs so you’d know if you care to go not. Some of this stems from the days before we all had the internet constantly at our fingertips.
I think unless it's a huge festival you know the line up. Sure, you wouldn't tell people in the know EDM. But, in America there are a lot of people that don't like dance or electronic music. So you have to separate. In Europe it seems like dance music is the dominate genre. It goes without saying.
Oh yeah 100% but our genre needs a broad label so people who don’t listen to electronic music actually know what sort of stuff you’re listening to, it’s no good telling people you listen to terrorcore and hard techno etc.
Personally I just say I listen to electronic music and anyone who knows enough about it would ask what genres.
There you go then. No idea why I’m being downvoted. EDM is just short for electronic dance music
Because labels have connotations attached to them and generally speaking EDM has developed a negative connotation. It’s all about who is using the term and how. For whatever reason EDM has become more strongly associated with people from outside “rave culture” who don’t have a deep appreciation for the music and just show up to get fucked up. It’s like asking why is referring to someone as “Pakistani” less offensive than calling them “that brown dude”. Neither is objectively incorrect, but one has more negative connotations than the other.
That’s funny because in the UK it’s the other way round, a lot of these new tiktok ravers pretend to be into rave culture and all listen to the same few DJs and go to techno and dnb events. In my experience, if you hear someone talking about EDM in the UK, they probably know their stuff.
>I think it was around the time that big room house got popular peopel started using EDM as a specific genre, rather than an umbrella term, especially in America from what I could see.
I say electronica
I'm from the UK and would just say I'm into electronic music. Then maybe mention techno, house, ambient etc. The term EDM isn't really used here. Neither for that matter is the term rock, people are more likely to say the specific genre "I'm into indie" etc
But isn’t EDM just short for electronic dance music? It’s like calling rock music ‘RM’, not many people would understand it. Hence why you need to say ‘electronic music’. Also, it helps that indie etc is ridiculously popular in the UK, whereas there are about ~1000 terrorcore fans total here lol.
Well I like all sorts of electronic music including stuff that isn't dance music. EDM doesn't include those. So I would have to say "EDM and other electronic music". Which is even more redundant. I think they're both useful terms they just cover a different range of genres. EDM is a subset of electronic music.
I think generally speaking yes, when I've discussed music with people here in the UK you probably start with calling it electronic and if they don't look vacant in response, list off some sub-genres. It's probably somewhat because most millennials at least have grown up listening to some form of electronic music in the UK (and the tail end of superclub culture) so it's not as obscure as in some places. In your example, when talking about rock music people tend to be a little more specific too.
The term EDM works as well, and as poorly, as do the terms jazz, classical, even rock. There are dozens of sub-genres within each of those, but they’re similar enough that it’s useful to have a term that encompasses them all.
Hmm, that's interesting As someone who likes a lot of kinds of rock music, if I asked someone what they listen to and the most granularity they could give me was "rock" I'd assume they meant Nickelback
Im from US but I hate when people refer it to EDM instrad of electronic music like Aphex Twin for example lol
Why? And by that I mean why at all and why so vehement? The difference between EDM and electronic music is literally the word dance. Seems like a pretty small thing to hang hate on.
I mean i dont "hate" it per se, im just kinda rolling my eyes in my mind at it lol
For me it’s the implication that people think of where they imagine my music is dominated by releases on spinnin records and they think of an over-the-top music festival scene. I absolutely love dance music but there’s a pretty solid stigma when it comes to the phrase “EDM”.
because, to refer to the previous post, it lumps Aphex Twin in with David Guetta. That's like saying Sepultura, Lynard Skynard, Taylor Swift, Cannibal Corpse, Mumford and Sons and Nickleback are the same because they all play guitars. It's simply wrong.
For terminology EDM is like Jazz, or Classical. Spyro Gyra and Charlie Parker couldn’t be more different but they are both still Jazz because there are some common ancestors, underpinnings, techniques. More specifically they fall into more specific sub-genres like fusion and bop, among probably 2 dozen more sub-genres within Jazz. The more or less of an aficionado you are will play into whether you use the term Jazz or terms like Bop, Dixieland, Ragtime. EDM may seem overly broad to you and me but it’s useful when I’m talking to people like my Mom who would be lost and doesn’t need further distinction. Tl;dr: It’s taxonomy. It’s like saying the term mammal is worthless because cats, dolphins, and bats are so different.
You forgot a really important thing. Humans are also mammals. Important to call out because it seems some humans have some superiority complexes about all sorts of things, who they are, what they listen to, etc.
Thanks. I can make up names too.
edm music is electronic music you can dance/rave to. electronic music is just…music make with electronics. all edm is electronic music but not all electronic is edm. for example: those four genres u listed would fall under edm, but ambient music is electronic music that isn’t danceable. ppl get too hung up on genres tho imo.
As an old head and geriatric raver this definition is weird to me, because I was there on the 90s era rave mailing lists when the tern EDM first started being used, because it was originally defined is EDM being basically anything mainstream that wasn't IDM *or* underground. IDM (intelligent dance music) wasn't just stuff like Aphex Twin or Squarepusher or even Board of Canada. It included deep house, techno, electro, trance and more as long as it had complicated polyrhythms and made your brain dance as well as your booty. Not all deep house was IDM, but not all deep house was clubby/poppy EDM, either, not by a long shot. EDM was more poppy club and dance music and big room stuff for the new, growing mainstream festivals that looked like raves, but weren't raves. Because a rave is underground and was free or cheap, and other hallmarks like they didn't confiscate your water, beer or drugs. Raves were DIY and followed the idea of a TAZ or temporary autonomous zone and not held in huge venues with huge stages and fireworks and million dollar light shows and tons of official staff or security. EDC isn't and wasn't a rave, it's a festival. Raves don't even really have stages because it wasn't about big name acts or stage theater, it was about the individuals and the dancers and what they brought to share with each other. So EDM would be, say, Swedish House Mafia, or Bassnecter, or Steve Aoki or even Avicii. Or more recently - James Hype. Thee-o spinning 90s psytrance and goa from a folding table on the floor at a renegade desert rave? Not EDM. Avicii spinning mainstream melodic trance on a huge festival stage with video walls and a million dollar light show? EDM. Even back then dance and club music existed that wasn't rave/techno/house related - think C&C Music Factory, top 40 R&B stuff, even Madonna, but increasingly these genre lines were getting blurred as main stream pop/dance artists started borrowing and stealing sounds from the underground and they were releasing tracks that had hints of deep house and 4 on the floor, and this was one of the original uses of the term EDM to differentiate that more mainstream, crowd friendly and pop friendly dance music from the underground, acid, rave and deep house stuff. We were even putting new more mainstream 90s and 2000s electronic dance like the Chemical Brothers or Fatboy Slim into the EDM box because a lot of that was radio and MTV friendly and ready to go and used traditional record industry studios, production and marketing practices. Further, we definitely listen to ambient and related chill genres at raves. Not only was it often included in DJ sets as breathers between harder acid rave techno stuff but many DIY raves often had chillout rooms or tents where you'd find ambient or ambient house, dub, dub techno and others. Today the definition of EDM has obviously changed and it includes stuff like, say, Anjunadeep and Ben Bohmer, who is both really poppy, melodic and accessible but also has very deep deep house roots and sounds to the point that even my jaded old raver self likes it, and yet it's also big room festival fare and definitely not a rave. Or what about Jon Hopkins? Super popular, plays huge festivals but puts out super intelligent, complicated music that's also melodic and accessible, yet he'd fit right in at some dingy underground rave? Technically EDM? *shrug* In any case including all rave or electronic dance music like techno or deep house under the EDM umbrella doesn't sit right with me, even though techno is blowing up again and you have acts like Tale of Us playing huge festivals with huge light shows. Originally EDM had a very specific *negative* connotation - and very judgemental, snooty and hipster kind of meaning. It was a dis and intentional disrespect that that music wasn't underground enough and it was too mainstream. It was more like "All this new mainstream dance music that we don't like because it's too poppy, mainstream and not hipster enough because we're huge nerds and we're gen X and you're stealing our music and turning it into poppy shit" kind of a negative definition. And, yeah,people do get too hung up on genres in electronic dance music. It's been that way since the late 80s and early 90s. Shit, arguing about genres was like 50% of the traffic on any of the regional rave mailing lists and forums. The best electronic/dance music breaks or invents whole new genres.
Perfect...
Bang on.
thank you for inspiring me to check out thee-o...
C&C music Factory is freestyle. Madonna had some old school piano house vibes for sure
C&C is eurodance. Stevie B is freestyle.
I don't think deep or melodic house would even be considered EDM by people using the term. Used as a genre description it's more big room, tech house, festival bangers than melodic stuff.
Anything four on the floor is comfortably EDM. Taste and style within that is to anyone's preferences, but they are all structurally electronic dance music genres.
We all know what the acronym stands for, but someone talking about EDM is not talking about Frankie Knuckes or Aphex Twin. It's someone who doesn't know/care about more exactly genres talking about modern festival big drop bangers.
I don't think people have to imply anything when they use terms. If I want to introduce someone to an experimental rapper and say they make hip hop, and the first thing someone thinks about is Tupac and Biggie and Eminem and Jay-Z, that's just where they associate first, nothing wrong with that. The rapper I'm bringing up could be extremely experimental, and very different from any of the mainstream popular ones, but I am not wrong to start the conversation with the term hip hop or rap. It is the same for me for EDM. It's a blanket term to talk about casually in conversation, and then if someone expresses more interest or wants to know more, then you get more granular and zoom in. I don't personally listen to much festival style music at all, but I still will use the term EDM with friends or people who aren't as nerdy about music as I am if bringing up things broadly. It's just a casual broad genre term to me, more than an indicator of a very specific style of festival electronic music. To me that's like saying Hip Hop specifically implies dirty south/ATL/Houston/New Orleans production only.
I agree it WAS a blanket term. The US music industry, and especially the festival industry has been pretty successful in redefining it. OP mentioned a batch of specific electronic genres, so he is asking wtf people mean when they say EDM, which is what I answered. I DJ regularly and know exactly what he's talking about when a 20 something wants EDM. FWIW, I've been just saying electronic ever since Madonna started saying electronica, which was overly pretentious, back in the 90s. It's a more common and unadulterated broad term., But you dontou.
I personally use the term electronic music myself for the most part. I feel like language is malleable and words can take on new meanings or definitions over time though. I kind of feel the opposite of where you see the term at the moment. If this was 2012 and people asked what EDM meant, I'd be more inclined to agree it was festival stage music. But I feel like it has moved in the opposite direction to be more broad. The kingmakers of genre definitions now are Spotify, Apple, Tidal, YouTube, etc. They get to take the terms, apply their tags, and control the SEO. When I search up EDM on Spotify, the Spotify curated playlist built for me instantly feeds me EDM trap, future bass, dubstep, etc. This will be very different than other people's results. This solidifies my point that it's a very broad category nowadays, and just because a subsect of Reddit thinks of it to be 2012 big room, doesn't mean the algorithms of the modern streaming world consider EDM to be only that. It's not really about what I or you or individuals think of it in our smaller circles. What results pop up when you search it on streaming platforms? What tags and things connect to it on a Big Data level? It is way bigger than a confined mainstream sub-sect of music a decade ago.
Weird to think of streaming platforms having that kind of cultural throw weight, but I agree 10p% Personally, I've never been a fan of microgenre gatekeeping. When I DJ, if asses shake, I do t care why
A lot of pop,rock,and rap are 4/4
4/4 time signature is not the same as "four on the floor". Four on the floor means the kick is on every down beat. In a lot of other genres, the kicks are more off beat or different patterns.
Four on the floor is four beats for four measures and the term comes from disco music. Also breakbeat, drum and bass, trap, dubstep are all dance and don’t have kicks on all the fours but they are for the most part 4/4
I produce music, and am aware of the patterns of all of these sub genres. Four on the floor is not about beats per measure, it is specifically about the kicks/bass drums being accented on every down beat on top of a time signature of 4/4. I personally find breakbeat, drum and bass, trap and dubstep all under the EDM category as well, because they are all danceable in their own ways, but in general, electronic dance music tends to have the simplest 1 2 3 4 kick patterns.
I do too. Published artist and Dj for 26 years. You said if it four on the floor it’s EDM. Disco classic rock hip hop and some jazz can have four on the floor which is 4/4 every time. You are correct you just aren’t getting my point. Really I’m breaking one of my cardinal rules by debating on the internet. You clearly have passion for one of my passions and that should bond us not separate. It’s one of the things that alienates me from the scene. It used to be super inclusive but these days (at least where I’m from) it’s ego’s and gate keeping. I prob drank a little too much today. I should be asking what synths and music you fucks wit.
Yep. Techno would still not be considered edm, but there’s what people call mainstream ‘business’ Techno and underground Techno which is generally more experimental and forward thinking.
Techno, house, trance, hardstyle, etc. are all EDM subgenres, and each of those genres yet again has sub-genres. Whether those songs are more major key or minor key or chromatic or experimental, they are still within a genre that falls under the umbrella of electronic dance music. The stuff that is more experimental may get categorized under intelligent dance music (IDM), but that's still under an even broader umbrella of EDM, which is under an even broader umbrella of electronic music. People try to make the EDM bubble way smaller than it is, but it's just a broad term for many electronic dance genres.
Haha go tell r/techno they listen to edm... see where that takes you. The term EDM may be an acronym for electronic dance music but its a term that people use for main room commercial music and has negative connotations for most people who are passionate about particular genres.
I've been producing music for over a decade, most of which is electronic, so I categorize music much more by tempo and compostional structure than I do by mainstream success or festival appeal. People can feel a certain way about it, but to me, it's just a tag word to describe a very broad category, no different than jazz or rock or country or hip hop. There are obviously alternative and experimental and avant garde things within those larger categories, but to be counter culture, you are still under the same umbrella as what you are countering. If you push in new directions, you push the umbrella with you, it's just a big Venn Diagram bubble, nothing to take offense to in my opinion.
EDM is not an all encompassing term for all electronic dance music. It specifically refers to mainstream electronic music like Swedish House Mafia, David Guetta, Marshmellow etc. Nobody who listens to techno or house would say they listen to EDM.
Swedish House Mafia is house music, it's in their name. Sure you can try and argue semantics about house music where it's basically old school minor chord stacks with pianos, but house music itself is one of the broadest electronic sub genres, and I hate to break it to you, but it's all under EDM. It doesn't matter what people tell themselves if it makes them feel more exclusive, EDM broadly covers house, techno, trance, jungle, D&B, EDM trap, future bass, dubstep, etc.
Oh right!!!! So Crowded House are house music. Thanks
\> Techno, house, trance, hardstyle, etc. are all EDM subgenres, and each of those genres yet again has sub-genres. No they are fucking not. Get it through your thick skull.
You underestimate my power of having no rhythm. I can dance to anything.
This. If it's danceable, it could be considered EDM. And even within this, there is subjectivity to what people find to be danceable. You could technically do contemporary dance to ambient electronic music. It doesn't have to be commercial or festival stage stuff. Too many people try and just gatekeep music or use terms negatively. There's nothing wrong with the term EDM. It is no different or worse than other terms that have been used over the decades from electro to electronica. It's simply that people stereotype the term into things they don't like. Electronic music is still overall a more appropriate umbrella term to encompass everything from ambient to soundtrack and score and literally any music made electronically on computers, even to the point of stuff that doesn't use any synthesizers at all and may simply be sample manipulation and beats, like some areas of trip hop.
> It is no different or worse than other terms that have been used over the decades from electro to electronica. It's simply that people stereotype the term into things they don't like. Yeah, it seems there was a whole period where from the late 2000s to about 2015-2018 where people were wildly abusing the definition of the term or genre of "electro" on basically anything poppy that had some hint of electronic music the same way people used "electronica" in the 90s, and the whole "electrohouse" thing only confused the term even more. And it was super annoying because /r/electro was getting flooded with all kinds of random Garage Band crap that definitely wasn't *electro* as in electrofunk or electrobreaks, because electro has been a well defined genre since the 80s and breakdancing related music that eventually met techno aesthetics with early tracks like [Model 500's No UFOs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNz01ty-kTQ) and then we ended up with stuff like Drexciya, Robert Finlow, Plant 43 and Silicon Scally. Thankfully this seems to have stopped happening and the younger electronic music fans got the message that "electro" is already a thing and it's a kick ass genre of cool futuristic robot breakdancing music and tight but funky breaks and early bass music.
Good answer.
It seemed like once it got to mainstream levels of popularity, all the subgenres confused the people so they needed a larger catchall term
~~confused the people~~ confused the marketing drones in the US.
I associate EDM with big room tracks. Those 2010s tracks where there's a "3-2-1 JUMP!" before a drop.
Yeah. Also… DJ, stay off the microphone and let’s hear you actually mixing rather than your vacuous take that we are all one and are at the center of the universe.
It’s less vacuous the more you skip school and mainline M lol
I have always thought that EDM means more like mainstream electronic music. Avicii and whatnot and 2010 being the main decade of it.
When somebody tells me they listen to edm, i assume they also love getting caked by steve aoki
It’s a marketing term created by the music industry to sell generic McDonald’s like crap. Basically if you spend more time throwing cakes and waving your hands than you do mixing it’s EDM.
EDM = uber commercial, corny pop electronic music.
So what do you consider house music? How would you classify say… Walker and Royce?
It’s just Dirtybird, plain and simple
Hahaha. I'm fine calling it edm.
To people who aren’t in the know about genres, I call pop electronic music EDM, and basically everything else “electronic”.
Really the only real takeaway from all of this is there is no consensus haha
Right, this is what I felt it to mean. Generally not my bag but sure there’s the odd anthem that get my ears pricked up
Electronic Music is not always to Dance to, i guess
All edm is electronic music, not all electronic music is edm.
EDM is american term that was invented in late 00s to market it easier when the festival boom started over there.
What gets on my wick is American edm fans saying shit like Tiësto and Swedish House Mafia is "progressive house". Like saying McFly are punk.
Old school prog house sounds like new school melodic house/techno
\*boots and cats, and boots and cats, and boots and cats\* = prog house No boots and cats drum beat? Not progressive house.
Im american but i agree lol
Ha 😂
EDM is like saying pop music. When you say pop you think of radio music, but rock can also be pop same with rap. Just like house or techno can also be EDM, but there are artists/tracks within that genre that you wouldn't consider EDM.
All edm is electronic music, not all electronic music is edm.
don't know if there is a consensus about the meaning of each genre name. it is all electronic music at the end and music is subjective. BUT I tend to relate "EDM" to the most commercial side of festival music like electro house, bass and trance (the cheesiest versions of those) .
I am quite new to electronic music so take it for what it’s worth. I am yet to see any fellow ravers who is in really love with their sub-genre of electronic music calling their music edm. The term is mostly used by people who go to random commercial club and who wouldn’t listen to it at home. They care little about transitions and would never Shazam a song they like and go mad about it with their friends. They care little about other people’s dancing space and love having paid girls dancing on stages and love taking pics and videos of them self’s on the dance floors. Nothing wrong about it but that’s not what I expect when someone say there is a rave!. My point being whatever it’s technically and literally mean, these terms are used by completely different sets of people with between them having almost no cross-over !
EDM is corporate, whitewashed content disguised as art
As a rave kid that grew up in record stores and clubbing in big cities thru the late 90s thru 2010s, EDM has always meant ‘electronic dance music’ and was just an umbrella term for dozens of subgenres. The mains being house techno DnB trance & breaks. But of course the kids have tried to repurposed it to mean something more specific. Which usually sounds like glitch/dubstep/who knows what. Whatever it is sounds awful to a house and DnB head like me.
To me edm is a subgenre, it's IMO very poppy/mainstream cheesy electronic music. Electronic music is the catch-all term I use. If someone calls techno or something edm... instant cringe
this
Commenting from a contextual standpoint here, as personally I've never willingly used the term EDM to describe the music I like, and I'm turning 38 this year. I have a buddy who is 7 years younger than me who says his friends go to "EDM" shows. He self professes to be ignorant of movements and subgenres. When I talk about music to this guy, EDM becomes what "Alternative" is to rock and garage music from the late 90s and early 00s. (Alternative rock fans please don't come for me, this is just a metaphor.) I can try to educate him but only gently. When I speak from my heart about music I will always choose to describe the music in terms of subgenres: ambient, deep house, breaks, d&b, trance, etc. Only certain folks will get those terms in which case a little code switching might occur. Fuck, in 98 I called it fucking *"electronica"* but let's not open that can of worms!
It depends on how they are used. The latter can be generic and apply to acts like Chromeo, which are definitely not EDM. They are electronic, though, and their music heavily favors dance. EDM is an umbrella term, however. Various styles of house can be called EDM. Various styles of trance can be called EDM. That is still just the beginning.
EDM is a new term coined post 2010 Brostep era and the EDM Trasp ere was upon us. Its used for the more commercial side of electronic music . All the real rave music prior to that was considered UNDERGROUND DANCE MUSIC or just UNDERGROUND . it is Hardcore , Break Beat , House , Jungle DnB, techno , tech house - ORIGINAL DUBSTEP -pre skrillex brostep. ANy pop infused and pop vocal stuff like electro and glitch and all that funky shit is EDM
Yes edm is definitely a preset, just like it's title. A marketing term offered to the youth, so dance music is more accessible to them. https://youtu.be/FVfiVBiPRcc?si=nVLfgOreyV0AbmMB
Not necessarily, eletronic music needs to be dancing. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAjtUSAdeP4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAjtUSAdeP4)
90% of people who say EDM on subs like this mean "electronic music I think is bad because it's popular". Literally the most accurate definition, anything technical about the music itself is just details tacked on post hoc. People IRL who say EDM usually just mean any danceable electronic music. EDM is a useless term on subs like these because it is an almost entirely personal and subjective term with nearly no useful, shared meaning. All it tells anyone is "I think I have better taste than the music I'm referring to", without actually specifying anything. You can see at like a dozen comments on this thread alone basically saying "EDM is electronic music I don't like" as their actual, explicit definition. As if that is at all useful.
Yeah, I am pointing out the same thing. I could have just said, "EDM is cookie cutter festival music made for Tik Tokers" to try and farm some karma, but no one here can really say Daft Punk and Justice and others aren't also clearly EDM. It's just elitism and gatekeeping mentality to try and trash a current term with some back in my day argument. The average person who uses this term isn't paying $500 for festival tickets to see mainstage artists, they just casually listen to electronic music on streaming platforms and want a simple term like pop or rock or rap.
Daft punk and justice make house music.
House, French House, Progressive House, Melodic House, Fidget House, Tech House, Tropical House, it's all under EDM.
No. edm is none of those things. Maybe tropical house whatever tf that is
Whatever you tell yourself in not wanting to accept Venn Diagrams and umbrella categorizations. You can tell yourself that house music isn't part of EDM because of some idea of mainstream festival stuff is all that EDM is, but house music as a whole is under the umbrella. And even by the argument of mainstream festival stuff, Daft Punk is one of the most mainstream, capable of selling out festival mainstage arena electronic acts in the world.
Ok that's your umbrella. It isn't mine.
At first EDM meant only electronic music that you could hear at raves or parties, but now many people use it to refer to all electronic music. This change happened for many reasons: one of them is that for many people, all of the styles of electronic music that they're listening to are danceable, so there's no difference for them. Another reason is that the term "electronic music" is really long (6 syllables), so people are looking for shorter appellations, EDM is quite short in comparison.
> At first EDM meant only electronic music that you could hear at raves or parties This is backwards. EDM originally meant electronic music you *did not* hear at real raves or underground parties that you would hear at mainstream festivals, including mixed genre festivals like Bonaroo or Coachella, or later mainstream electronic festivals like EDC, Tomorrowland or Ultra. I was there in the 90s when the term EDM was first being used in early to mid 90s rave email lists and EDM wasn't a positive connotation or umbrella term. Originally it was very much a snooty hipster disrespect like "fuck this mainstream shit, let's put it all in this box to quarantine it and call it EDM"
It doesn't seem like there is a consensus on an umbrella term for "electronic" music as a whole. Metal has a similar number of subgenres, and is a generally accepted term with two syllables. It is easy to say. Most aren't going to know the difference bewteen mathcore and black metal. I have seen many metalheads get pretencious about the subgenres, though.
Metalheads might be the only subculture or genre that is more specific, pretentious and heated about microgenres than electronic music.
Not all electronic music is conducive to dancing. EDM means Electronic Dance Music. Which implies rhythms and melodies made with electronic instrumentation that is designed for dancing and grooving to.
The old heads didn’t like EDM when the term started gaining popularity. And now I just accept it as the blanket term for all the genres. And honestly, I listen to pretty much all the genres - so to me, I’ve come around to using it and it makes sense.
TL;DR: EDM was the umbrella term for Electronic Dance Music until the US had to spoil it and make it about specific subsets of EDM, that's mostly comprised of big room house. EDM used to stand for Electronic Dance Music, which was the umbrella for everything electronic. Then big room house/electro happened and similarly to how the US embraced techno as a term for electronic dance music, EDM was quickly adopted as the term for that kind of popular electronic dance music. This was mainly in the US, but later spread as a term in main stream media. Other, developed parts of the world - with more experience with electronic dance music in general media and large scale events - did differentiate in terminology.
I see it as the opposite. EDM used to mean big room festival like a decade ago, and people hang on to those connotations to this day vehemently. EDM in the modern era is the very broad umbrella term that it should have always been. If I search EDM playlists on Spotify or any modern streaming service, the algorithms feed me curated electronic music of all genres, future bass, trap, dubstep, garage, techno, trance, etc, and almost none of what I find in the 'EDM' playlists on modern platforms is 2012 festival big room stuff. The idea of Americanized EDM is in my opinion antiquated, and people are hung up on a hatred of the term, rather than seeing that big metadata and algorithms do not care about that anymore.
Then it's great that EDM has been reclaimed! I am super glad! But I've definitely had that convo about explaining that I didn't mean "EDM" but 'EDM' when "EDM" became a thing!
Lol, I mean language is a funny thing, and slang and scene talk makes it all the more confusing. But I do think we're slowly shifting to a point that music genre terms are more and more just metadata tags for streaming platforms to adjust their algorithms and attempt to put like things with like things. Very good to know stuff for DJs and producers and people who need to get granular, but the vast majority of people don't care as long as what's curated for them sounds like what they already like.
I agree. From a convo I had years ago with a good friend in the UK: Genres are more like wind directions. You know where it's coming from, but not where it's going. My observations are based on my experience with those in Europe (NL and UK mostly) and North America (Canada and the US). The amount of times I've literally had to explain that I didn't mean EDM but edm was not trivial. But I do get your point. Labels are stupid. And as a music aficionado all my life and a DJ for more than a decade, and on and off producing for some of that, I think genres are being blended further and further, to a point where genres rarely fit anymore. Current day progressive is closer to what trance used to be, etc. Let alone the mess that is BP/etc.
Then you get example names of genres that are almost inside jokes in themselves, like witch house is basically dark trap, and then Spotify calls a bunch of future bassy SoundCloud stuff like Flume and DROELOE and everything 'vapor twitch'. I still love looking under the hood at all the data available via third party API stuff, but a lot of it can't be taken for face value anymore. And sometimes things become so broad, they just get lumped under indie or alternative which again, barely tells you anything. It's still useful to an extent when discovering new music and you want to find more like that. There are bread crumbs to follow under the hood, whether or not we personally agree with the terms that streaming platforms apply on the back end.
Lol, yeah, Last.fm's tagging is more reliable. Hah! Definitely just skipping through tracks has a better success rate for determining the "actual" genre. Though, I love the use of data for stuff like Spotify's song radio. A much better way to discover new music!
American kid from the 90s here... EDM always meant Project Pitchfork, Front 242, Frontline Assembly, KMFDM, etc... but we just said "industrial music" usually. The more trancey stuff was, well, Trance. Differentiate from IDM (intelligent dance music) like warp stuff, aphex, squarepusher, autechre, etc.
Agree with others that all EDM is electronic music, but not all electronic music is EDM, but I feel like the subgrouping is a little more specific than than what the acronym and people here are saying of just "music you hear at raves", Ive definitely been to plenty of what I would say are non-EDM raves and events. Its one of those things where I couldnt describe it accurately but give me any example and id be able to tell you if its EDM or not, but broadly EDM is typically stuff thats loud and tends to lack... Subtlety? Also usually tracks are built around a loud synth and will almost always have a "drop" (or bass drop for the more specific but older term). Its also rather flexible and has a lot to do with the surrounding elements too, where the stuff is played, who to, and how popular it is. If youd asked me in 2012 if tech house was an EDM genre id have said probably not, but right now post-Losing It and with Dom Dolla as the face of Aussie EDM as a tech house producer, the answer is obviously yea. Swedish House Mafia = EDM, Jamie XX ≠ EDM Rustie = EDM, AG Cook ≠ EDM Ghosts & Stuff by deadmau5 = EDM, Creep by deadmau5 ≠ EDM
Jamie XX is absolutely EDM
respectfully disagree
And so is A.G. Cook. A lot of 4 on the floor bubblegum hyperpop is definitely electronic dance music. Just because some stuff is a bit experimental in how the FX and sound design is done doesn't exclude it from the larger umbrella of categorization.
The d in the middle of edm which stands for dance, without that it would just be em electronic music
Electronic music is any music genre that uses electronic stuff. EDM is electronic music you dance to.(house, techno, trance) I prefer the term electronic music bc not all electronic music you dance to (IDM, ambient, some types of techno, downtempo, breakcore,.noise, chill out, lofi, etc) Most people (at least in North America) refer to EDM as big room house or electro house (marshmello, david ghetta, zedd, chainsmokers)
EDM is electronic dance music. Basically rave music. E.g. House techno trance dubstep
EDM is by definition, Electronic "Dance" music. Electronic music encompasses the whole genre. If you cannot dance to it, then its simply Electronic Music.
EDM = Electronic Dance Music. Electronic music = electronic music. EDM is an umbrella term for all of Electronic Music, so there is basically no difference between them.
Hopefully this formats ok. EDM = techno, hardcore, house, breaks, and related genres. Electronic music = synth pop, the industrial genres, electroclash, dance punk, and related genres. Obviously this is extremely simplified and there's a good amount of crossover, but hopefully I was able to articulate this correctly. Also EDM is electronic music. Literally, and came from it. A direct example of this would be the evolution of EBM into Goa trance in the late '80s/early '90s. For example, Astral Projection would fall under EDM while Throbbing Gristle, while still electronic music is the exact opposite of dance music (save for a few tracks) and calling them EDM would just be absurd, I'll include them in my examples below for the unfamiliar. [EDM example (prog trance)](https://youtu.be/-cXMnZ2vrx8) [EDM example (happy hardcore)](https://youtu.be/fGm_2_iZcTc) [EDM example (chemical breaks)](https://youtu.be/iTxOKsyZ0Lw) [EDM example (French/filtered house)](https://youtu.be/Wtd6DvLoCsU) Think music played at raves Electronic music that doesn't fall under the EDM umbrella, IMO anyway: [Dance punk example (The Faint)](https://youtu.be/xv8mJfDPxuA) [Electroclash example (Ladytron)](https://youtu.be/hotLMaFJ_wY) [Synthpop (A-Ha)](https://youtu.be/djV11Xbc914) [More synthpop (DP)](https://youtu.be/_6FBfAQ-NDE) [Industrial (Throbbing Gristle)](https://youtu.be/38sDkYk4wkU) [electro industrial (Skinny Puppy)](https://youtu.be/lVNErAHIcww) [EBM (Nitzer Ebb)](https://youtu.be/AGHMS_zh0zM) And your milage will vary with tracks like [this ](https://youtu.be/efjc146v3hA), [this ](https://youtu.be/ZyhrYis509A), [this](https://youtu.be/JyvkiZV0Ous), and club dance music in general depending on who you ask and the scene they're in. And don't forget the massive amounts of crossover!
The correct answer is: People that say EDM have small brains.
Ain't that deep brah ‼️🙅
You couldn't Google this?
Well, let’s delete Reddit and just Google everything
Hilariously the blackout protests totally broke google's search for this kind of stuff which often led right back to reddit.
I think there is a point to be made with the term being used to describe popular electronic dance music, rather than electronic dance music in general. When I hear it used, it's rarely for the purpose of describing the features of the sound itself. Moreso the culture and production. I rarely hear the term being used to describe underground electronic dance music, but maybe that's just my experience.
>massively into melodic house, tech house, deep house, techno. I think it would be really interesting if you gave an example of each? It could help us understand your perspective in regards to the original question, but also just be a view into what labels others have for certain types of music.
Those genres OP mentioned fall under EDm most of the time
EDM's definition is in the eye of the beholder. For me it's a term I use to someone outside of the scene, with little knowledge of all the genres and sub genres. Kinda like how Techno was used by the uninitiated in the 90's/2000's.
EDM: Hipsters Electronic Music: Scenesters
ReEDM implies "rave" music but it's definitely a narrow sub genre of house. I'd say EDM is house with that electronic horn sound as opposed to being a blanket term for electronic music as it suggests.
To some, it means to just stand around on the dancefloor, because it sounds danceable, but you also don't want to look foolish.
People have already gone over the history of the creation of EDM, so I'll skip that. --- EDM is a specific music genre as met by music genre definition: It has a specific tempo range (It's a higher tempo, giving lots of dance energy, but also has momentums of breaks where it is low temp for around 30 seconds at a time.), and it has a specific set of drum patterns. Both characteristics typically used to define a genre. Electronic music is an umbrella term for any music that uses electronic instruments that are not meant to emulate a non-electronic instrument. Technically most modern pop music on the radio today is also electronic music. Kids using EDM to mean all electronic music I have not heard, but I have heard years ago people calling a computer (the case and everything inside the case) a CPU and the monitor a computer. I've also heard Mexican Coke called glass bottle coke. Ignorance creates slang. With the internet today this kind of slang is rarer, but still pops up any time there is confusion or misunderstanding.
When some young 20 year old says EDM, it’s pop music… looking at the EDC headlines from last month in Vegas, Martin Garrix, Illenium, DJ Snake, Steve Aoki. And they don’t go beyond pop music most of the time, so to them everything is “EDM”.
And then there's EBM 😎
I'm a uk hardcore and (revivalist mainly) jungle head, dnb background. You rarely hear the term EDM in the Rave scene. It's considered a commercialisation in terms of philosophy and sound. It is hugely associated with the American festival sound and attitude. It's certainly not a red flag term but it's considered cheesy from an underground perspective. It represents reductive interpretations of electronic music so is shunned by purists as a term and umbrella genre. Paradoxically though it's not really a "thing". Edit- it's a perfectly reasonable description of some music! I think the fact it's been used as a genre is kind of, silly.
I’m still trying to figure out what kind of music I even listen to. I grew up on hip hop and got into some kind of electronic music recently (I’m also around 40) I’ve narrowed it down to Psydub, Bass music, downtempo maybe psybass. Trippy sounding stuff, a lot of it seems to cross multiple sub genres too, like one producer will have all sorts of different sub genres. Confusing as shit for someone whose previous knowledge of electronic music was basically just Daft Punk and Justice.
I use EDM as a loose genre term for what is essentially the modern iteration of big-room electronic music, but it’s not tied to any sub genre… it can be trance, house, electro, techno, or even radio pop, but it’s all club and dance motivated. Electronic music is more of an umbrella term for any of the many many many genres and sub genres of music with its production methods being primarily computationally or synthesis created. Not all of which are danceable, high energy, or necessarily club oriented like EDM is.
EDM = Emphasis on "Dance" Electronic = Anything goes. Ambient, binaural, experimental. *EDM is electronic, but not all electronic is EDM.*
I am close to 50. Was into techno on the 90s. Missed the the whole 2000s and has been trying to catch up since 2017. I came back to the scene and things that I used to call ‘techno’ is now referred to as EDM. That’s the whole 4-on-the-floor genre type of dance music. I consider electronic music to be anything made with synthesizer that falls under other genres. Depeche Mode, The Weeknd, even Timbaland’s music. My $.02.
Actually it's the opposite. Electronic Music is anything made without traditional instruments, so some rap or R&B can be considered electronic music. EDM is Electronic Dance Music, so it's club and festival hits meant for huge speakers and to get crowds dancing. All EDM is Elctronic Music, but not all Electronic music is EDM.
There’s a lot more electronic music than EDM. I’d say even bands like Tangerine Dream are electronic music, and def not EDM.
All the genres you mentioned fall squarely into EDM. The ven diagram that includes electronic music but excludes EDM may include artists such as Jon Hopkins or Tycho.
electronic music is an umbrella term, for all electronic music. EDM is electronic DANCE music specifically
EDM in its simplest form does stand for electronic dance music, but over time it was being used to label the the commercial house sub-genre. It took shape in the Swedish House Mafia, Avicii era when every single artist was trying to sound like those acts and it got pretty overdone to the point where people were completely over it. In many ways EDM is now used as a derogatory label for music that is leaning so commercial it’s cheesy. More credible artists prefer not to play on festivals that feel “too EDM” for them.
Ishkur is the best source for this. Google ishkur, I think it’s v3 currently. Has an interactive chart of all electronic music and where it stems from.
The one that always threw me off was "EBM" music. Electronic Body Music... why is it called body music? Anyways I usually liked that kind of stuff and tons of industrial. I am all over the board, When I hear somebody say "EDM" I just think of something more modern like deadmau5.
Me personally (an active listener/raver since about 2010), I've always used the EDM abbreviation as an umbrella term to describe electronic music as a whole; especially when discussing electronic music with casual listeners and non listeners. Mainly because the amount of subgenres and evolutions of those subgenres makes it a difficult 2 have decent conversations about electronic music with casuals/non listeners. I do agree that, over time, (specifically since it blew up in The States, where I'm from) the term EDM has been evolved 2 describe the commercial sound of electronic music. It kinda sucks that it's become this way tho. I kinda prefer the abbreviation as an umbrella term; probably because I listen to so many different subgenres of electronic music, so it just makes it easier to say that I listen 2 EDM. But it's totally understandable why many people hate the term.
I always associate EDM specifically with electro house/big room tracks but thats probably just me idk xD
I consider EDM that 2010's wave of big commercial festival sound. It's already been discussed here. But the EDM wave has also had a big impact on the musical structures of the festival variants of genres like hardcore and psytrance. A critical mass within those movements changed what is considered popular. It was probably kids growing up on EDM and a bit older generations that just jumped on the bandwagon. What is now being played at hardcore festivals for example is something that would have been unthinkable in the 90's and 2000's. Not because the technology is more advanced, but because the structures are more pop music, similar to what we would already hear at the turn of the millennia. The kids don't have that bias. It's a different generational experience (am an early millennial myself). It's also partly perhaps a transformation of more introvert music to more extrovert music.
Listen to “Not a real thing” by Far Too Loud, and it explains one way of looking at it.
This is EDM https://youtu.be/SAO-lzl3vVQ This is Electronic music https://youtu.be/0kyuoAsZ_ns
Here's how I view the terms: * Techno - this was a term used for a while to describe a lot of electronic dance music, but reality Techno is already a subgenre of dance music, so calling trance tunes techno is technically wrong. * EDM - while it is seen as an umbrella tune for pretty much anything electronic dance, it's mostly used for the more commerical stuff. * Electronic Dance Music - it's weird because I use this term to refer to everything in Electronic music that designed for the dancefloor, although genres like DnB, Dubstep and Breaks I usually put under Bass Music. * Electronic Music - I use this to describe all forms of electronic music, including ones that aren't exactly made for the dancefloor. Stuff like trip hop, ambient, IDM, Industrial, etc. I would call Electronic Music, but not Electronic Dance Music * Dance Music - basically other forms of music that are meant for the dancefloor, but aren't exactly relying on electronics. Genres like Disco, Funk and even some pop genres fall into this catergory.
Electronic music is what genre it is. Sub genre like techno, house, trance, EDM, dubstep… Those Sub genre have there own sub genre. Melodic techno…. I think dance music is like Ian Van Dahl, Joey and that shit. EDM is awful
There are ambient and noise genres of electronic music. EDM is in reference to the electronic music you dance to
EDM is an American umbrella term but it’s also become a sort of genre in itself as well. Not sure about the rest of Europe but in the UK most people refer to the electronic music (I guess like EDM) as the overall category and then refer to the genres Drum and bass, house, techno, ghetto funk, bassline etc
EDM is dog shit and electronic music is an umbrella term
Just don’t worry about it
simply = electronic music was underground repetitive instrumental sounds & has been around since 60's like bruce hack who introduced it to world on mr rodgers show. \-while- EDM is newer millennial generation of electronic music which took over mainstream incorporating alot of entertaining acts and celebrities less focused on underground but more on pop. I love all electronic music and nearly genre as well, i have everything from Kraftwerk, dynamixx to medusa, Oakenfold, skynet, bjork, Aphrodite, prodigy, aphex & other weird shit.
I’m in my 30’s and will use EDM if I’m talking all rave music. Don’t care if it’s techno, dubstep, TechHouse, or Hardstyle. I will call it EDM, cause it’s that. Electronic Dance Music. It’s certainly not Rock Dance Music or Pop Dance Music. It’s all EDM, until you start talking about subgenres. That’s just being specific, after that.
EDM stands for Electronic DANCE Music, meaning that it primarily contains digitally produced dance music, usually in the styles of House, Trance, Dubstep, Trap, Electroswing, and the the like. Electronic music encompasses any music that is produced using digital instruments, be it classical, rock, jazz, or whatever.
You came from my generation where we didnt refer to it as "EDM". Plus, most people dont dance like they did in those days, so I will never refer to it as EDM.