So many genres, why yet another one?

With this artificial lounge group I found myself creating a new genre. Something not everyone might agree with and something I wasn't really aware of until this private message i just received:

On 17 May 2008, 07:22 you wrote:
so, we're creating new genres here on last.fm?

k. good luck with that one mate.

I'm not really sure if the message was meant to be sarcastic or not, either way it motivated me to discuss whether it's good or not to create yet another genre when there are so many already. I returned the following reply to the sender.

"That came across a bit sarcastic, is it? Well some people hate genres and the fact that there's so many, but I just think these people don't understand language in general, the essence of giving different things a different name. Like cars, imagine having a certain car in mind but not a brand, something like an oldtimer maybe, How could you explain to a dealer what kind of car you want to buy if you couldn't say your looking for an oldtimer, redhot, race car or whatever, these genres make it easer to point out something, without having to know a lot about the subject.
You just have to distinguish one tree from another to find your way in the forrest. IDM has so many different moods, I just wanted to be able to listen to an idm radio station without getting all the aggressive kinds of idm that are more likely to hear in a club.

Sorry if you just ment it as a compliment. Although it doesn't really matter if you did or didn't, either way I didn't really realize I was creating a genre, maybe I am, you made that clear to me, so thank you.

In reply to the message I'd like to know what all of you think about the subject. So were discussing whether or not we should continue this new genre.

Like you say Silben, I believe the benefit of identifying a style of music isn't necessarily about creating a new genre, but about bringing together like minded people who enjoy that style, in a community which is current and active.


I for one have neglected my music because i have been playing a lot of halflife for the last 2 years or so. Now i have had a change in lifestyle and started a new job, i have got back into listening to lots of music. Mainstream electronic music seems to have gone the way of dubstep and remnants of glitch still seem to be popular, I like it when I'm in the right mood, but its not something i can listen to repeatedly and enjoy like boc, tycho and aphex's older melodic stuff.


So to stumble upon a community which likens musicians similar to boc and tycho makes me happy ^^. I guess over-categorising of music into ten million different sub-genres is a bit OCD, but in this case i for one have benefited, So thanks a lot.

fall.

I agree with quiUip, and with what you all say for that matter.
I see no problem in 'creating' new genres, it is a way of classifying things and also a way to discover music you might like (by searching artists with the same genre as one you like or with internet radio stations that play specific genres).

The only problem I see is that having too many genres could create confusion, and you would loose the purpose of it. Imagine having dozens of senseless tags for every artist, most of which you would see for the first time.

But, keeping that in mind and being reasonable, I think new labels should be more than welcome, provided they bring something new and are not just a mere reformulation of something that already is.

As for what qiUip said, I can understand that people get attached to certain 'genres' and become protective about them, not wanting certain artists to be labelled a genre they are into. Or on the other side, not wanting a certain genre to be associated with an artist they like. But genres and tags should only be treated as abstract concepts, guidelines, hints and nothing more. I've seen comment such as "Ok what really is the style of this artist, and nobody dares answer me downtempo or IDM" (I don't remember the exact post but it was pretty agressive and pointless at the same time)

Come on, that's abusive.