What is R&B?

The full name of R&B is Rhythm & Blues, which is generally translated as "Rhythm & Blues" or "Rhythm & Blues". In a broad sense, R&B can be regarded as "black pop music". It originated from black blues music and is the basis of today's western pop and rock music. Billboard magazine once defined R&B as all black music except Jazz and Blues. It is listed as R&B, which shows how broad the scope of R&B is. Hip Hop and Rap, which have become very popular in the black music circle in recent years, both originate from R&B, and at the same time retain many R&B elements.

What is HOUSE?

HOUSE is a dance music developed from DISCO in the 1980s. This is the music played by DJs in Chicago. They mixed a record by the German electronic band Kraftwerk with the regular rhythm of electronic drums (Drum Machine) and black blues singing, and House was born~ Generally translated as "House" "Dance music is the most basic form of electronic dance music, with a 4/4 rhythm, a drum sound per beat, a simple melody, and often a high-pitched female voice singing. After DISCO became popular, some DJs changed it and deliberately made DISCO It has become less commercial, and the bass and drums have become deeper, often becoming pure musical works. Even if there are singing parts, they are mostly short sentences sung by dancing female singers, often without clear lyrics. Gradually, some people added elements such as LATIN (Latin), REGGAE (Reggae in the West Indies), RAP (rap) or JAZZ (jazz). By the late 1980s, HOUSE broke out of the underground scope and became a popular brand in Chicago and New York. and London pop chart darlings.

Why is it called "House"? That is to say, as long as you have simple recording equipment, you can make this kind of music at home ~ House is also the most easily accepted among electronic music.

Believe sung by Cher is a good example. M-People can be said to be the representative group of House. After House dance music became popular in 1986, it can be said to have replaced Disco music.

House It can be divided into:

Acid House, which is house music that combines the acid sound of TB-303.

Deep House has a very strong soul singing style, also called Garage, which is quite popular. . Like Real Mecoy, M-People, and La Bouche are all Garage groups.

Hard House is simply a house with a heavier rhythm and fiercer rhythm.

Progressive House House-like music doesn't have much soul singing, but pays more attention to melody and music arrangement. It's a bit like "performance" house music. For example, SASH!'s album It's My Life is a good Progressive House album.

Epic House is "epic" House. Epic House has beautiful, smooth melody and majestic momentum, and rarely has vocals in it (almost none!). BT's music is great Epic House, and He is also known as the "Epic House Emperor". In fact, even Rock has "Epic Rock"

Trible House Imagine: What does a House with African primitive style or Indian drums look like? ? This is Trible House~ In addition to the stable rhythm of ordinary House, this kind of House will add some original and fragmented drum beats between each beat. It is quite interesting~ However, the scope of House is too broad, everyone There is no need to insist on classifying a song. These are just to tell everyone that there are many kinds of house.

By the 1990s, HOUSE had lost its avant-garde and trendy color, but it was still very popular music.

What is Britpop?

Although Britpop has the word "Pop", it is actually a type of Rock. It originated in England in the 1990s. It can be translated into Chinese as "British Rock". This is the British music scene's reaction to the American Grunge trend. A response, mostly in band form. However, the Britpop style is actually very broad. For example, Oasis is a guitar rock band, Blur has a lot of Pop, and Pulp is close to glam rook and dance styles, but they are all classified as Britpop.

British Britpop representatives: Oasis, Blur, Suede, Pulp, Radiohead

What is Trip-Hop?

Trip-Hop is a type of British/European dance music. Its name comes from "Trip + Hip-Hop = Trip-Hop" because it originated from Bristol, England, so it was first called "Bristol Hip-Hop". Because of the Hip-Hop (in fact, a lot of music is based on Hip-Hop... If you don’t know what Hip-Hop is, go and see the hip-hop dancers, most of them use Hip-Hop music to dance.) Rhythm Slow it down (sometimes very slowly) and add some psychedelic flavor, such as a very gloomy, fat Bass, slight but psychedelic synthetic sound effects, or samples from some records. Sometimes even the noise of the record may be "deliberate" Take a sample. The so-called "trip" refers to a psychedelic and dense drug journey. Therefore, trip-hop is a kind of slow psychedelic, jazz-like, hazy break beat music with a bit of hip-hop rhythm. Although it belongs to the dance music category, its psychedelic and confusing characteristics have made it far away from the clear rhythm characteristics of ordinary dance music.

Foreign Trip-Hop representatives: Ortishead, Tricky, Massive Attack, Mandalay Moloko, Coldcut, the recognized Iron Triangle in Trip-Hop

What is Gangsta Rap?

Gangsta Rap is a type of Rap. The content of Rap is mostly related to urban crime and is full of violence and lustful feelings. This is a music trend that reflects reality. Gangsta Rap emerged in the United States in the late 1980s. The tough and sharp style of rap music was very popular in the United States, and its record sales were very high. Many Gangsta Rap musicians themselves actually "participated" in various real-life crimes, and some were imprisoned or even died as a result. It can be said that it is a genre of music that truly reflects reality and is shocking.

Gangsta Rap group: Ice-T, Ice Cube, Dr. Dre, Snoop Doggy Dogg, 2 Pac, Geto Boys

What is Synth Pop?

The "Synth" in Synth Pop is Synthesizer. As the name suggests, Synth Pop is "pop music produced by Sythesizers". Of course, in addition to Synthesizers, other electronic instruments such as computers and drum machines are also used. wait. Synth Pop became popular in the early 1980s, but fell silent in the mid-1980s. It also caused a wave of craze in Hong Kong that year. Synth Pop is characterized by a strong sense of technology, which can sometimes be quite cold. Most of its songs are "3-minutes Pop", and Synth Pop musicians often dress up in fashionable styles.

Synth Pop representative groups: Depeche Mode, Human League, Duran Duran, OMD, Gary Numan

What is ORCHESTRA?

ORCHESTRA is an orchestra, which is divided into four parts: 1. Strings, including violins, cellos, etc., 2. Brass, 3. Woodwinds and 4. Percussion. Each instrument in the string section has multiple players (except harp), and the four groups of players are coordinated and led by one person, who is the conductor of the orchestra. ORCHESTRA emerged in the 17th century and was clearly modeled by the 18th century with the works of Haydn and Mozart. In the 19th century, new instruments were added and the number of orchestras increased. ORCHESTRA is the authentic version of Western classical/orthodox music. Western pop/rock music often uses some or all members of ORCHESTRA to assist in performances.

What is CHAMBER POP?

CHAMBER POP refers to a kind of elegant, noble and refined pop music, which has a certain feeling of classical music. The word CHAMBER MUSIC comes from classical music, which is called "chamber music" in Chinese. It is a group string performance style with an elegant atmosphere. CHAMBER POP emerged in the 1990s as a reaction to LO-FI and GRUNGE at that time. It emphasized beautiful melodies, exquisite soundtracks, and clean recordings, often using strings and wind instruments to create the musical feel of the Baroque era.

Foreign representative bands include THE DIVINE COMEDY, RIALTO, ERIC MATTHEWS and BALLE & SEBASTIAN, etc., while Hong Kong bands include Wong Yaoming, part of Peng Ling, part of MULTIPLEX, etc.

What is NEW AGE?

NEW AGE is a kind of quiet, comfortable and leisurely music. Pure music works account for a larger proportion, while singing works account for a smaller proportion. NEW AGE can be purely ACOUSTIC (that is, played with traditional self-sounding instruments), or it can be very electronic. The focus is to create a calm atmosphere of nature or a sense of the vastness of the universe, cleansing the listener's mind and making people feel calm. NEW AGE is often related to music therapy. Many NEW AGE music is said to be able to cure diseases, and many are related to meditation. This has a lot to do with the NEW AGE ideological trend and philosophy. NEW AGE music is usually regarded as quite middle-class music. WINDHAM HILL is the most representative NEW AGE record company. The representative musicians of NEW AGE include ENYA, GEORGE WINSTON, WILLIAM ACKERMAN, YANNI, KITARO, etc.

What is Electrophonic Music?

What is Electrophonic Music? As time goes by, musicians have more ways to make music. The so-called electronic music refers to music produced by electronic sounds produced by electronic synthesizers, music software, computers, etc. Electronic music has a wide range and can often be heard around us. It is used in movie soundtracks, advertising soundtracks, and even some Mandarin pop songs, but electronic dance music is the most popular. Many people think electronic music is a cold, emotionless music. In fact, electronic music can also be filled with emotions by incorporating various elements such as Rock, Jazz and even Blues.

There are also various types of electronic music, including House, Techno, Ambient, Trance, Psychedelic Trance, Breakbeat, Brit-Hop, Big-Beat, Trip-Hop, Drum''n''Bass , Jungle, Electro, Dub, Chill Out, Minimalism.

What is Techno?

Technology means "high-tech dance music"! Use computers and synthesizers to synthesize and create some special sound effects. This kind of music is often a combination of many sound effects.

The beat of Techno is also 4/4, but the speed is faster than House, and it sounds repetitive, tough, and mechanical, so some people call Techno "industrial noise", but some still focus on melody. Techno originated in Detroit, USA, with three DJs: Derrick May, Kevin Saunderson and Juan Atkins trying to combine electronic music with black music, resulting in Detroit Techno. Detroit Techno is usually gentler and not as strong as ordinary Techno. It can be said to be the origin of modern Techno.

What is Ambient?

It sounds small, but in fact it is constantly making changes, such as long-term sound effects, or progressive music arrangements, etc., which often create a layered sense of space, so it is called "Situational music" often samples the sounds around us, such as human voices, car sounds, and even the melodies of other music...etc. Created by Brian Eno in the 1970s, it is a very "profound" electronic music. Later, Ambient also had branches, such as Ambient House, Ambient Techno... and so on. I believe everyone can understand it from the literal meaning. In fact, there are shadows of Ambient in many kinds of music, and even some classical music also has the flavor of Ambient.

What is Trance?

Psychedelic dance music evolved from Techno. It will make you feel "trance-like" when listening to it, but it still retains the rhythm of dance music and pays great attention to the performance of Bass. Some of it will be "hypnotic" after listening to it. "The effect. The time signature is also mainly 4/4. However, I have also heard breakbeats used (will be introduced below), such as Sven Vath’s album Fusion.

What is Psychedelic Trance?

Also known as Goa Trance, it originated from a small island in India. Goa is the name of this island. The melodies often have an Indian flavor. The characteristic of this type of Trance is that it attaches great importance to melody, subtle changes between notes, and often has overlapping melodies, and the high-pitched TB-303 sound. A bit ambient.

What is a break beat?

It is not as regular as the Boom-Boom-Boom-Boom beat of House, but is presented in a broken beat, like a syncopated beat. For example, adding a small snare drum to two beats, etc. Breakbeat is just a general term. There are many kinds of music that belong to breakbeat, such as the following Brit-Hop, Big-Beat, and black Hip-Hop.

What is Brit-Hop?

The rhythm of black Hip-Hop is accelerated, the drums are aggravated, and it is combined with some electric guitar and bass to give it a rock and roll flavor, such as the style of The Chemical Brothers.

What is Big-Beat?

"Big beat" makes Brit-Hop faster, heavier and more rock-like. It can be said to be an improved Brit-Hop into a more mature style. You You can imagine what a heavy, broken, and a bit fast beat looks like. For example, The Prodigy, The Chemical Brothers, and Fat Boy Slim are the "big corners" of Big Beat.

What is Drum N’ Bass?

For some people, Drum N'' Bass music may be annoying, because Drum N'' Bass pays great attention to playing tricks on the rhythm, and the performance of the Bass is very fast and very fast. Fast, complex breakbeats, and the use of a variety of electronic drums or sampled drum sounds. Therefore Drum N’’ Bass is also a type of breakbeat. 4Hero is a well-known band from Drum N’ Bass.

What is Jungle?

Jungle is the predecessor of Drum N’ Bass.

Jungle's speed is much faster than Drum N' Bass, and the beat is more complex and powerful. It is sometimes paired with some Rap. Unlike Drum N' Bass, which incorporates some Jazz, Soul and other elements, it sounds softer (of course this Compared with Jungle). Even the "rock chameleon" David Bowie is now doing Jungle.

What is Electro?

As early as the late 1970s and early 1980s, there were no such things as house and techno, and electronic music was less popular. There was only electro music. Electro can be said to be music that is purely produced by an electronic synthesizer (Synthesizer, which looks a bit like a keyboard). It is usually quite soft, and Roland's drum machine (Drum Machine) TR-808 is often used to produce drum sounds. Germany's Kraftwerk band can be considered a representative. Today's Electro sounds brighter and more transparent than before. Later, some DJs used Electro to transform into a kind of Hip-Hop music, which was called Old School. The current Fatboy Slim also incorporates some Electro and Old School in his music.

What is Dub?

Dub can be said to be Reggae (Reggae, also known as reggae, a South American black music with a very rhythmic and special singing style) that separates the singing and leaves only the music. When applying Dub to electronic music, part of the singing voice is extracted, the bass and drum sounds are emphasized, and a large number of Echo (echo) and other effects are added. This technique is often used to remix songs during live performances. For example, Massive Attack's album Protection was mixed from Trip-Hop music into a Dub version by Mad Professor.

What is Chill Out?

This is just a general term. Next to the dance floor, there is often an area, or a small room, where some gentler and calmer music is played, allowing dancers to relax and take a rest after dancing. It mainly plays ambient music, so it is called "Chill". Out" (cooling) for this reason. The Orb can be said to be the master of Chill Out music.

What is Minimalism?

This is translated as "minimal style" and is often heard in ambient and Techno music. Music with minimalism has a repetitive melody and a special rhythm that feels like a special frequency that makes you feel hypnotized when listening to it. Jeff Mills' works belong to Minimal Detroit-Techno, with quite a psychedelic color

Black Metal Black Metal

Using evil, pagan worship and Satanic ideas as its main appeals, It is usually classified as black metal when the lyrics contain anti-Christian and anti-religious tendencies. In addition to traditional heavy metal fixed instruments, other instruments such as piano, violin, or opera soprano are often used to create a strange atmosphere in the song. A frightening atmosphere of terror. "Black metal" is most represented by heavy metal groups from Northern Europe.

Representative bands: Emperor, Mayhem, Enslaved, Dark Funeral