| 1 | [[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/how-electronic-music-is-made_6970.jpg]] |
| 2 | |
| 3 | ->''"Computers and electronic music are not the opposite of the warm human music. It's exactly the same."'' |
| 4 | -->-- '''Bill Laswell''' |
| 5 | |
| 6 | Electronic Music is, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin unsurprisingly enough]], music made with electronic instruments, such as synthesizers, samplers and drum machines. |
| 7 | |
| 8 | What you use the equipment to make... well that is a very varied thing. Synthesizers and samplers and drum machines are very flexible in the range of sounds they can make, and as such, electronic music is very varied. |
| 9 | |
| 10 | You can make pretty much standard pop music with it (often called ''SynthPop''), you can make epic and uplifting tunes with it ({{Trance}}), you can make the aural equivalent of MindRape with it (see {{Industrial}}) or you can mix it with many, many other styles ({{Dubstep}}, IndustrialMetal, etc...). You can even use sample libraries to reproduce the sound of a symphony orchestra; you've probably heard that in major film scores without noticing unless you were listening very closely. Heck, one of the most influential electronic music albums of all time is [[Music/SwitchedOnBach a set of synthesizer renditions]] of the music of Music/JohannSebastianBach. |
| 11 | |
| 12 | Arguably, pure electronic (pop) music can be traced back to ''{{Music/Kraftwerk}}'', who made SynthPop music that deliberately exploited its synthetic origins. Kraftwerk was one of the first acts, if not ''the'' first, that ''exclusively'' used electronic instruments (though not exclusively synthesizers) to generate their output. Electronic music itself dates back much further than the 1970s, though; the theremin was invented ca.1920, the "croix sonore" in 1926, the ondes Martenot in 1928, and all of these were written for by avant-garde classical composers like Nikolai Obukhov, Music/OlivierMessiaen, and Joseph Schillinger. (For an example, see Obukhov's ''The Third and Last Testament'', composed in 1946.) The synthesizer itself dates back to 1895 (the Teleharmonium), although modern voltage-controlled synths (along with the name "synthesizer") were first devised by a team at RCA in the 1950s, and didn't enter popular consciousness until Robert Moog left that team to found his own company. In addition to writing for physical instruments that were powered by electricity, as early as the 1920s some composers were making use of 'found sounds' generated by radios, sometimes making longer works largely using collage and even going as far as manipulating them directly (see Dziga Vertov's ''Enthusiasm! The Dombass Symphony''). This technique, reasonably popular among the Italian and Russian Futurists, strongly foreshadowed the later "musique concrete" movement, kicked off by radio engineer Pierre Schaeffer in the late 1940s with works like "Etude aux chemins de fer" (1948), which was created by manipulating the taped sound of a train. |
| 13 | |
| 14 | The idea of abandoning physical instruments (and prerecorded sounds) altogether and producing compositions completely synthetically was first proposed in 1949, by Werner Meyer-Eppler in his paper ''Elektronische Klangerzeugung: Elektronische Musik und Synthetische Sprache''. From there, many possibilities of the medium began to be explored and too many developments and trends occurred to be worth describing here. Major figures to watch for in the succeeding years include Music/EdgardVarese (''Deserts'', 1954); Karlheinz Stockhausen (too many works to pick one, but see ''Elektronische Studien I'' and ''II'', 1954); Iannis Xenakis (''Concret PH'', 1958; ''Persepolis'', 1971; created a system to translate drawings of shapes into electronic sounds in the late '70s); and there have probably been ''thousands'' of other interesting composers writing in the same line. Popular music groups like Music/TheBeatles and Music/{{Kraftwerk}} were directly influenced by Stockhausen, as he continued to be a huge figure in avant-garde music throughout the 1960s and far beyond. |
| 15 | |
| 16 | !! Sub-genres include: |
| 17 | |
| 18 | [[index]] |
| 19 | * AcidJazz |
| 20 | * AlternativeDance |
| 21 | * {{Ambient}} |
| 22 | * Big Beat |
| 23 | * {{Breakbeat}} |
| 24 | * Classical Electronic or AvantGardeMusic (experimental electronic music from the 1940s-1960s. Includes early synthesiser works like Music/WendyCarlos' ''Music/SwitchedOnBach'' and most tape manipulation music such as that of Delia Derbyshire (best known for producing the original ''Series/DoctorWho'' theme at the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_Radiophonic_Workshop BBC Radiophonic Workshop]]). |
| 25 | * {{Chiptune}} |
| 26 | * {{Crunkcore}} |
| 27 | * DancePunk |
| 28 | * DarkWave |
| 29 | * {{Disco}} (some songs only, mainly the ones Music/GiorgioMoroder is involved in) |
| 30 | * {{Downtempo}} |
| 31 | * DrumAndBass ([=DnB=] for short, includes jungle) |
| 32 | * {{Dubstep}} |
| 33 | * {{Electro}} (think "Planet Rock" - basically HipHop meets Electronic Music) |
| 34 | * ElectronicDanceMusic (for an index on all electronic artists and producers with their own pages) |
| 35 | * ElectronicRock (a catch-all term referring any artist that uses elements of both Electronic Music and Rock.) |
| 36 | * {{Electroswing}} |
| 37 | * {{Eurobeat}} |
| 38 | * {{Freestyle}} |
| 39 | * {{Glitch}} |
| 40 | * {{Harsh Noise}} |
| 41 | ** Harsh Noise Wall |
| 42 | * HouseMusic (no, not that Series/{{House}}--although the theme song is by Music/MassiveAttack, one of the {{Trope Codifier}}s of another genre that was partially influenced by House Music, called Trip-Hop.) |
| 43 | ** ElectroHouse |
| 44 | * {{Industrial}} (including all of its subgenres; see that page for more details) |
| 45 | ** Electronic Body Music ({{EBM}}) |
| 46 | ** IndustrialMetal |
| 47 | * {{IDM}} (Intelligent Dance Music) |
| 48 | * ItaloDisco |
| 49 | ** Also the related Hi-NRG and Space Disco genres. |
| 50 | * {{Jumpstyle}} |
| 51 | * MinimalWave (a sub-culture consisting of DIY PostPunk and SynthPop bands, also known as Minimal Synth) |
| 52 | * MusiqueConcrete (tape-manipulation-based music that was part of the AvantGardeMusic scene in the 40s-60s, mostly; a huge influence on later [[{{Sampling}} sample-based]] music) |
| 53 | * {{Nightcore}} |
| 54 | * {{Skweee}} |
| 55 | * SpeedyTechnoRemake |
| 56 | * SynthPop |
| 57 | * UsefulNotes/{{Synthwave}} (a {{Retraux}} throwback to the 80s in every sense of the phrase; also sometimes known as New Italo Disco) |
| 58 | * {{Techno}} |
| 59 | ** HardcoreTechno (in spite of the name, often considered a genre separate from Techno proper) |
| 60 | * {{Trance}} |
| 61 | * TrapMusic |
| 62 | * [[TripHop Trip-Hop]] |
| 63 | * UKGarage (differentiated from American Garage, which is a subgenre of HouseMusic) |
| 64 | * {{Vaporwave}}: A genre that originated from TheInternet that once mainly relied on [[{{Sampling}} slowed-down samples of music]] from TheEighties or TheNineties, but has grown to take on many different forms since then. |
| 65 | ** FutureFunk: The upbeat, danceable and anime-themed subgenre of Vaporwave. |
| 66 | |
| 67 | !!Other Electronic Acts |
| 68 | [[folder:IDM]] |
| 69 | * Music/MuZiq |
| 70 | * Music/TheAlgorithm |
| 71 | * Music/AphexTwin |
| 72 | ** 1992 - ''Music/SelectedAmbientWorks8592'' |
| 73 | ** 1994 - ''Music/SelectedAmbientWorksVolumeII'' |
| 74 | ** 1995 - ''Music/ICareBecauseYouDo'' |
| 75 | ** 1996 - ''Music/RichardDJamesAlbum'' |
| 76 | ** 2001 - ''Music/{{Drukqs}}'' |
| 77 | ** 2014 - ''Music/{{Syro}}'' |
| 78 | * Music/{{Autechre}} |
| 79 | * Music/BoardsOfCanada |
| 80 | ** 1998 - ''Music/MusicHasTheRightToChildren'' |
| 81 | ** 2002 - ''Music/{{Geogaddi}}'' |
| 82 | ** 2005 - ''Music/TheCampfireHeadphase'' |
| 83 | ** 2013 - ''Music/TomorrowsHarvest'' |
| 84 | * Music/{{C418}} |
| 85 | * Music/FlyingLotus |
| 86 | * Music/{{Matmos}} |
| 87 | * Music/MouseOnMars |
| 88 | * Music/ParovStelar |
| 89 | * Music/SweetTrip |
| 90 | * Music/VenetianSnares |
| 91 | [[/folder]] |
| 92 | |
| 93 | [[folder:Others]] |
| 94 | * Music/SixtyFiveDaysOfStatic |
| 95 | * Music/HundredGecs |
| 96 | ** 2016 - ''[[Music/HundredGecsEP 100 gecs]]'' |
| 97 | ** 2019 - ''Music/ThousandGecs'' |
| 98 | * Music/AbneyPark |
| 99 | * Music/AfroCeltSoundSystem |
| 100 | * Music/{{Air|Band}} |
| 101 | * Music/AliceGlass |
| 102 | * Music/AnarchyClub |
| 103 | * Music/{{Animusic}} |
| 104 | * Music/{{Arca}} |
| 105 | * Music/EduardArtemyev |
| 106 | * Music/TheAvalanches |
| 107 | ** 2000 - ''Music/SinceILeftYou'' |
| 108 | ** 2016 - ''Music/{{Wildflower}}'' |
| 109 | * Music/{{Aviators}} |
| 110 | * Music/NickBertke |
| 111 | * Music/{{Bjork}} |
| 112 | ** 1993 - ''Music/{{Debut}}'' |
| 113 | ** 1995 - ''Music/{{Post}}'' |
| 114 | ** 1997 - ''Music/{{Homogenic}}'' |
| 115 | ** 2004 - ''Music/{{Medulla}}'' |
| 116 | * Music/BlankBanshee |
| 117 | * Music/BlixtySlycat |
| 118 | * Music/MichaelGuyBowman |
| 119 | * Music/CarpenterBrut |
| 120 | * Music/CanonBlue |
| 121 | * Music/{{chipspeech}} |
| 122 | * Music/CircuitFreq |
| 123 | * Music/ClarenceClarity |
| 124 | * Music/ClazziquaiProject |
| 125 | * Music/CrystalCastles |
| 126 | * Music/{{Current 93}} |
| 127 | * [[Music/BrianBurton Danger Mouse]] |
| 128 | * Music/DoesItOffendYouYeah |
| 129 | * Music/{{DROELOE}} |
| 130 | * Music/RobDougan |
| 131 | * Music/ENomine |
| 132 | * Music/EmergencyBroadcastNetwork |
| 133 | * Music/{{Empire of the Sun|Band}} |
| 134 | * Music/{{Enigma}} |
| 135 | * Music/JamesFerraro |
| 136 | * Music/BradFiedel |
| 137 | * Music/TheFireman |
| 138 | ** 2008 - ''Music/ElectricArguments'' |
| 139 | * Creator/TobyFox |
| 140 | ** 2022 - "Music/SkiesForeverBlue" (with Itoki Hana) |
| 141 | * Music/{{Fraktus}} |
| 142 | * Music/FrouFrou |
| 143 | * Music/{{Futret}} |
| 144 | * Music/MortGarson |
| 145 | * Music/GirlTalk |
| 146 | * Music/{{Godflesh}} |
| 147 | * Music/{{Goldfrapp}} |
| 148 | * Music/{{Goldie}} |
| 149 | * Creator/{{Gooseworx}} |
| 150 | * Music/{{Grimes}} |
| 151 | ** 2012 - ''Music/{{Visions}}'' |
| 152 | ** 2015 - ''Music/ArtAngels'' |
| 153 | ** 2020 - ''Music/MissAnthropocene'' |
| 154 | * Music/{{GUNSHIP}} |
| 155 | * Music/BruceHaack |
| 156 | * Music/{{HANA}} |
| 157 | * Music/SusumuHirasawa |
| 158 | * Music/JuliaHolter |
| 159 | * [[Music/{{Homestuck}} The Homestuck Music Team]] |
| 160 | ** [[Music/HomestuckFanMusic Homestuck Gaiden]] |
| 161 | * Music/IC3PEAK |
| 162 | * Music/ImogenHeap |
| 163 | * Music/MarkIsham |
| 164 | * Music/AlexJohnson |
| 165 | * Music/KimAndBuran |
| 166 | * Creator/DaveMicrowavesGames |
| 167 | * Music/LemonJelly |
| 168 | * Music/TheLivingTombstone |
| 169 | * Music/LordsOfAcid |
| 170 | * Music/{{MXXN}} |
| 171 | * Music/AManCalledAdam |
| 172 | * Music/MashrouLeila |
| 173 | * Music/{{Matmos}} |
| 174 | * Music/MaxTundra |
| 175 | * Music/OtisMcDonald |
| 176 | * Music/MerShoppingMissbrukForStudenter |
| 177 | * Music/TheMidnight |
| 178 | * Music/{{Mikazukibigwave}} |
| 179 | * Music/MyssKeta |
| 180 | * Music/MysterySkulls |
| 181 | * Music/NeonIndian |
| 182 | * Music/{{Nephew}} |
| 183 | * Music/{{ODESZA}} |
| 184 | * Music/{{Opposition}} |
| 185 | * Music/OverClockedRemix |
| 186 | * Music/PandaBear |
| 187 | * Music/{{Patten}} |
| 188 | * Music/PCMusic |
| 189 | * Music/PepeDeluxe |
| 190 | * Music/AlexanderPerls |
| 191 | * Music/{{Perturbator}} |
| 192 | * Music/PinnPanelle |
| 193 | * Music/ThePresets |
| 194 | * Music/PrettyLights |
| 195 | * Music/{{Psapp}} |
| 196 | * Music/RJD2 |
| 197 | * Music/RyuichiSakamoto |
| 198 | ** 1976 - ''Music/DisappointmentHateruma'' (with Toshiyuki Tsuchitori) |
| 199 | ** 1978 - ''Music/ThousandKnives'' |
| 200 | * Music/{{Sakanaction}} |
| 201 | * Music/SanHolo |
| 202 | * Creator/OsamuSato |
| 203 | * Music/{{Savant}} |
| 204 | * Music/EricSerra |
| 205 | * Music/{{Shivr}} |
| 206 | * Music/SilvaHound |
| 207 | ** "Music/{{Addict}}" |
| 208 | * Music/SoundHolic |
| 209 | * Music/{{SPOCK}} |
| 210 | * Music/DeStaat |
| 211 | * Music/SufjanStevens |
| 212 | ** 2010 - ''Music/TheAgeOfAdz'' |
| 213 | * Music/StudioKillers |
| 214 | * Music/{{Sunscreem}} |
| 215 | * Creator/SamTaylorJohnson |
| 216 | * Music/JGThirlwell |
| 217 | * Music/{{Tofie}} |
| 218 | * Music/{{Uffie}} |
| 219 | * Music/UnextraordinaryGentlemen |
| 220 | * Music/{{Vangelis}} |
| 221 | * Music/{{Vektroid}} |
| 222 | * Music/VenetianSnares |
| 223 | * Creator/LiamVickers |
| 224 | * Music/VyletPony |
| 225 | ** 2022 - ''Music/CanOpenersNotebookFishWhisperer'' |
| 226 | ** 2023 - ''Music/CarouselAnExaminationOfTheShadowCreekflow'' |
| 227 | * Music/WatashiNoKoko |
| 228 | * Music/WoodenToaster |
| 229 | * Music/YuuheiSatellite |
| 230 | * Music/BertineZetlitz |
| 231 | * Music/{{Zytokine}} |
| 232 | [[/folder]] |
| 233 | [[/index]] |
| 234 | |
| 235 | !!Electronic Music Inspired Tropes |
| 236 | * CyberpunkIsTechno: For when {{cyberpunk}} and its offshoots have a soundtrack consisting of techno. |
| 237 | * FreakyElectronicMusic: For when electronic music used to symbolize villainy, like its progenitor RottenRockAndRoll. |
| 238 |
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