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Genres to Discover

9 February, 2008 - 12:39 — Sonya

I would like for people to lay out what is the basis of genres they do. People who are good at trance, please tell how you get the basis of what you create. Same for hip hop and techno. What type of synths? Beat? I have tried and tried to do a hip hop, but not sure on the beat or added sounds. I know of others who want to try a different genre, but don't understand certain points of it. So, here, I would like suggestions on any and all genres each one does.

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10 February, 2008 - 01:12 — J CRYS
J CRYS's picture

This is very hard to do since most genres have several other "sub-genres". I can help, hopefully, with the breakbeat scene.

First of all, the name comes from the discription of the bass drum. In most electronic music the bass drum is played at what is known as "4 on the floor" Basically the bass drum is played on every quarter note.
Breakbeat takes the same bass drum and breaks it up to be played anywhere other than every quarter note. The drums are played more like the drums would be played in a rock band for example.

The next thing that is unique to breaks is the BASSLINE!!! These synths are usually low notes and the sounds are usually refered to as warm, or phat, or muddy, and so on. The bassline is the single feature in most breakbeat music that sets it apart from other electro songs.

This is the basic overview, and there are about 20 other sub breakbeat genres: progressive, nu skool, drum n bass, funky, electro, etc.

hope this helps!

http://www.myspace.com/djxcell29

http://www.myspace.com/jcrysbass

10 February, 2008 - 05:30 — Sonya
Sonya's picture

Thanks for the input J Crys! It is very helpful and I appreciate you putting this in.

12 February, 2008 - 12:43 — The Sole
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I mostly do experimental and everything and anything is allowed, and this works for me. Free reign. For hiphop SOnya you must start with the beat. Don't do four on the floor, and stay away from techno sounding instruments and stick to more fundamental ones. DOn't put too much instruments in the track. I could go on and on but you can ask me personally directly!

12 February, 2008 - 16:54 — matt
matt's picture

Also worth noting is the BPM, which obviously determines the overall speed of the beat.

I usually make hiphop/triphop tracks between 75-90bpm, trance tracks around 160bpm, drum n bass tracks around 170-180bpm.

Yup thats a good point Sole, hiphop is usually very beat driven, as if you've got about 100 different instruments all cluttered over the top of the beat, the MC/rapper/vocalist would have a hard time feeling the beats rhythm and timing, or being heard for that matter :)

Just by listening to a few examples of each genre a bit more than you perhaps usually would, you'll pick up some commonalities between the genres tracks.... then you can be free to create your own style, while still keeping within a given genre to however much of a degree that you want to.

I remember when I started making some drum n bass tracks several years ago, and was hardly listening to anything other than my own music, and while my DJ friend liked what I was coming up with and wanted to play them in the club, he told me that I'd need to increase the BPM, because several of my dnb tracks were just a bit too slow to be able to keep the drum n bass crowd happy on the dancefloor. I soon got the feel for it after that correction, and soon became a big fan of the genre, making the tunes, listening to other dnb artists, and dancing like my brain was on fire ;)

So the "feel" for the speed, drum beat style, dancing styles, etc all fuse together into a cohesive idea of each genre, and then you're able to take those guidelines, and build around them to create a unique exciting new sound :)

12 February, 2008 - 19:02 — Sonya
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Thanks for all the info Matt. I know I will definately be researching beats.

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