[sneak]

The correct term for what you refer to as "american dubstep" is actually Brostep.

Dubstep was invented in Europe in the 90s and came out of the early techno scene. The shit these douches are making in California is completely unrelated.

[anateus]

I really hate to be a "genre pedant", but Dubstep is a descendant of garage, dub, drum and bass and a few other styles from the very late 90s early 00s in England. "Early techno" is Detroit in the 80s.

If you're correcting someone on nomenclature please be more accurate, and if you're trolling, please be funnier.

[sneak]

Dubstep proper is a near direct descendant of dub techno, pioneered in Berlin in the early 90s, following in the footsteps of Detroit techno from the 80s and the 2-step and acid house coming out of the UK and Chicago.

I live down the street from Hardwax, for fuck's sake.

[JonnieCache]

As much as there is an aesthetic link between the berlin sound and early dubstep, the croydon lot weren't listening to lots of basic channel and stuff at the time.

The UK scene has its own independent subbass heritage. People in the london scene at least aren't generally that aware of what comes out of europe, especially back in the web 1.0 era we're talking about.

Check out this from 2000: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doMX6su9Ue0

And this from 95: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjQZxMoF8Kc

Both pure london sounds.

Burial in particular was already doing that sound without having ever having heard of basic channel, until kode9 showed it to him.

http://blackdownsoundboy.blogspot.co.uk/2006/03/soundboy-bur...

Also living next to hardwax doesn't qualify you to know about tunes. My mum used to live near blackmarket and she hasn't got any dubs at all.

EDIT: Also technically the R&S lot took that sound from english people like Mad Professor in the 80s :P

[balloot]

You clearly don't hate to be a "genre pedant" :)

[codeulike]

There are too many electronic music genres. A slight change to the timing of the drums or the way vocal samples are used should not propel a track into a completely different genre. Does all this come about because people are ultra specific about what they will dance to?

[JonnieCache]

It comes about because the genre names describe the scene more than the music. There may be only relatively small (to an outsider) aesthetic differences between, say, progressive house and UKG, if you go to raves where each is played you will find the people playing and dancing to it are completely different, with almost no crossover. The racial makeup will be different, the age, social class, the drugs being used, the clothes worn.

That's why people differentiate dance music so carefully. When people talk about dubstep they aren't talking about a halfstep drumloop and a falling 808, they're talking about Third Base, Plastic People, Big Apple, Music House and Red Stripe. When people talk about berlin techno they're not just talking about 909s on the up and white noise filter bleeps, they're talking about Hardwax, Berghain and D&M.

[codeulike]

Good answer. Its a shame that a more cosmopolitan attitude does not prevail.

[JonnieCache]

True, although a certain amount of isolationism is needed to fully develop creative ideas. Really good new art is typically utterly alienating to everyone except you and your associates, and it needs to stay that way long enough so that you can explore its potential before outsiders are let in and the inevitable compromise and dilution begins.

The internet has kindof put a top to this and it's a shame. The creative engine of the london underground which produced dubstep and everything before it is chasing its own tail right now, devoid of new ideas, and it's partly for this reason IMO.

[mcantelon]

"Brostep" is actually a pretty good term for it.

[minikomi]

Interesting. I've always thought that Dubstep was a mutation which came out of the acid -> hardcore -> garage -> grime lineage in the UK.

[eminkel]

Western Music Formation and Influences by Genre and Region: http://www.thomson.co.uk/blog/wp-content/uploads/infographic...

[jamesbritt]

Interesting, though it completely ignores Scottish/Irish folk music, Appalachian/bluegrass, country, and western.

[eminkel]

Western Dance Music* ... sorry.