Rave music

Rave music may either refer to the late 1980s/early 1990s genres of house, acid house and techno, the first genres of music in the world to be played at raves, or any other genre of electronic dance music that may be played at a rave. The genre "rave", also known as hardcore by early ravers, first appeared amongst the UK acid movement during the late 1980s at warehouse parties and other underground venues, as well as on UK pirate radio stations. The genre would develop into oldschool hardcore, which lead onto newer forms of rave music such as drum and bass and 2-step, as well as other hardcore techno genres, such as gabber, hardstyle and happy hardcore.

In the late 1980s, rave culture began to filter through from English expatriates and disc jockeys who would visit Continental Europe. However, rave culture's major expansion in North America is often credited to Frankie Bones, who after spinning a party in an aircraft hangar in England helped organize some of the earliest known American raves in the 1990s in New York City called "Storm Raves" which maintained a consistent core audience. Coinciding at the same time, were the "NASA" parties in NYC by DJ Scotto which was featured in the 1995 movie Kids and forthcoming was concert producer P.A.W.N. LASER in Pennsylvania who later became the most well known laser company at raves in the East Coast of the United States by cross-promoting these rave events, state to state as far south as Florida and Louisiana. After this, hundreds of smaller promotional groups sprung up across the East Coast, causing a true "scene" to develop.

Electro house

Electro house is a form of house music. Electro house is characterized by a prominent bassline and/or kick drum and a tempo between 125 and 135 beats per minute. Its origins were influenced by electro,electroclash,electropop,synthpop, and tech house. The term has been used to describe the music of many DJ Mag Top 100 DJs, including Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike, Hardwell, Skrillex, and Steve Aoki.

Characteristics

Electro-house is typified by its heavy bass. This is often in the form of buzzing basslines, such as those created with sawtooth waves and distortion. It is also often in the form of large bass drum sounds in a four-to-the-floor pattern. The tempo of electro house is usually around 130 beats per minute. Electro house sometimes resembles tech house, but it can contain melodic elements and electro-influenced samples and synths.

History

The genre has been described as a fusion genre of house and electro, either in its original form or as fused with electropop and techno in its late-1990s revival, electroclash. The word electro is now often used as an adjective, such as electro-house and electro-pop.

Rave

A rave (from the verb: to rave) is a large dance party featuring performances by DJs and occasionally live performers playing electronic music, particularly electronic dance music (EDM). The music is amplified with a large, powerful sound reinforcement system, typically with large subwoofers to produce a deep bass sound. The music is accompanied by laser light shows, projected images, visual effects and fog machines. The word "rave" was first used in the late 1980s to describe the subculture that grew out of the acid house movement.

While some raves may be small parties held at nightclubs or private residences, some raves have grown to immense size, such as the Castlemorton Common Festival in 1992. Some electronic dance music festivals have features of raves, but on a large, often commercial scale. Raves may last for a long time, with some events continuing for ten hours. Due to the association of illegal party drugs such as MDMA (ecstasy) and the use of non-authorized, secret venues for some raves, such as squat parties at warehouses, law enforcement attention has been directed at the rave scene in many countries.

Hardstyle

Hardstyle is an electronic dance genre mixing influences from hard techno and hardcore. Hardstyle typically consists of a deep, hard-sounding kick drum, intense faded or reversed basslines accompanying the beat, a dissonant synth melody, and detuned and distorted sounds. Many hardcore artists produce hardstyle tracks as well, and many newer Hardstyle tracks are written in compound time (for example older Headhunterz and Noisecontrollers work).

History

Origins

Hardstyle was influenced by gabber. Hardstyle has its origins in the Netherlands where artists like DJ Zany, Lady Dana, DJ Isaac, DJ Pavo, DJ Luna and The Prophet, who produced hardcore, started experimenting while playing their hardcore records. The first Hardstyle events, like Qlubtempo, took place at the beginning of the 21st century. The first few years of hardstyle were characterized by a tempo of around 140–150 BPM, a compressed kick drum sound, a short vocal sample, a screech and the use of a "reverse bass", which can be heard on the offbeat after each kick.