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Impressionism or Pop algorithm

Impressionism or Pop algorithm? The Internet is a canvas for 10’s of 1000’s of musicians. It’s a post-escapism of styles, feelings and people who don’t believe a career should be set in stone according to money. Their career is spent making music. Their payment comes from those who listen to the art they present. Much like the Beat generation of the 1950’s, and surrealist movements. Artists have always been deep thinkers, and art is still very much alive today. We’re living in a time where the musician is no longer just a musician but a painter, a sound engineer and field recorder; the world is their canvas… The electronic portraits we as musicians create are otherworldly. And it takes a certain audience to behold this type of music. Escapism isn’t made for the masses to marvel at. If the masses wanted to they would have beheld Salvador Dali in all his grandeur. Each sub-tone, freq sweep, or melody is another brush stroke. While they combine past Electro influences with their own creations. Continuing to invent new patterns of sound.

Electronic music is an endless world of new ideas, styles, feelings and hidden motives. It’s a place much like the Punk underground, where people were using their guitars to make a political statement. The speakers guitar was his or her voice. Electronic music is so deep and unexplainable, it could be that this is the new classical era or even punk, only we as composers are using everything at our disposal to create music. An avant-garde if you will. And much like the past composers, so there are now hidden artists encompassing the endless web. #WEATNU is a hidden world in a way, where only they who are seeking to show their strange artworks to the world find us. #WEATNU is growing into something of a cult following, a select group of people who love post-modern things stumble into our realm. They want to go beyond the limits. In the past people would rebel by listening to things that were above the mainstream.

Many of our parents might have rebelled by listening to Elvis instead of Bing Crosby, Punk instead of Classic rock, Post-punk instead of Disco or Techno instead of New Wave. #WEATNU is that post-escapism that is happening today. A virtual “electronic underground” of sorts. Different musicians on every continent. #WEATNU rebels against post-2000 Pop and EDM, but at the same time urges it to be more open-minded and less monotonous. Yet you might wonder, “Why would you want to rebel against Electronic Dance Music?” Because it’s mainstream, it’s a wall that suits the masses. A corp giant that has become too big. It’s a set of rules that dampens the soul of what Electronic was meant to be. It keeps the unknown electronic musician from doing what they wish, and they are forced to adhere to the formula that gets old fast to become known. The underground musician does not care about barriers, they do not base their beats on algorithms or how many people they can pack into an auditorium. The music comes from the human heart. Something that electronic music has always done, but the masses were too afraid to find it, or maybe they did not have a map to the unknown. #WEATNU is certainly an experiment. A means to present all experimental musicians, synthpop, and many other electronic styles with a way to be noticed. From dark ambient to field recording avant-garde musicians and even noise. The masses may be entranced in their EDM, but #WEATNU is certainly paying attention to its many artists who aren’t afraid to go beyond the norm. It’s become a staple for the unknown electronic artist to gain exposure and will continue in the years to come.

Almark#WEATNU Digital Magazine.

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EDM vs Electronic

Age gaps have always been trouble for any friendship or relationship, the further away someone is to another the less chance we have at getting them to understand or relate where we are coming from. History is lost between the genres and you end up with two completely different era’s and sides. #WEATNU has set out to end this confusion and present the history of Electronic music to the modern EDM youth, but when one side is confetti and loud music, the other side is dark lit clubs with soulful beats and aging DJ’s, along with their aging synthesizers and drum machines, then it becomes difficult. Enter the gap between two genres of music. One side the mainstream, the other the underground. The electronic music lover from the past 20 years is slowly approaching their 40’s, some started even younger and moving into their golden years. Early 20 somethings don’t have time to hear what the electronic sages are saying. But what we’re trying to do is present them with the ability to discover what electronic music is now, and how it’s just as strong today, if not stronger than it was 20, 30 years ago. Much of what we heard ‘back then’ is indeed underground.

When the EDM explosion hit about 2009, it appeared as if the entire world turned it’s head to this Swedish-based progressive trance/house anomaly, equipped with 90’s rave girls and kandi kids selling modern homemade go-go wear. It’s the modern version of Electronic, a place where the youth can go and relax, push themselves to the limit and just get crazy, prob more crazy than my 90’s generation ever was. When you have two sides trying to present each others music, this is where the trouble begins. A twenty year old college student doesn’t get what Boards of Canada is, or wants to, or better yet Underworld, Orbital or even Kraftwerk. 90’s rave culture was all about the music, the energy and yes, drugs. EDM is all about the festival, sometimes the music and yes drugs. Where these two cultures are now is very difficult for the other to notice or even relate. Try telling a 20 year old about the greatness and history of Electronic music and why their EDM is so popular, they will just ignore you and put on their Deadmau5 ears and go on. And yes EDM is here because of the great vibrant history of 30 years of Electronic music.

Something needs to be done to save our history of electronic music, preserve it. I personally miss the days of discovering new underground electronic genres such as DnB, Dub, Experimental, where your heart moved to the rhythm, it was soulful, it was magic. Being American and hearing a underground UK artist gave me a warm feeling. Today the endless array of billionaire titles in a super-saturated market gives EDM its luster. But all this time Electronic lovers who grew up to the classics, try to relate their story to the EDM generation, at how important the history is. It’s akin to talking to your teenager about tin cans and how you would make a telephone from them during the 90’s, then they reach for their iPhone and thumb a few words to their friend in the middle of your conversation. The beauty of #WEATNU is the variety of sub-genres we provide to the masses, if they would only listen. Our attempt is to present them with these modern underground musicians who simply want to share their experience with others, and do not care to adhere to the mold of EDM to be heard. These artists are shaping a new genre, and even without #WEATNU, this in time was bound to happen. Humans decide the fate of music, because everyone has tastes. Is Electronic better than EDM? Only the electronic lover can answer that. But between the genres, one is like oil and one is like water, and oil and water never mix.

Almark#WEATNU Digital Magazine

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#WEATNU artist spotlight.

P VIDDY RUNS THE CITY, are an Indietronica duo from the US.

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*TSE* Produce IDM/Electronic, just recently added to #WEATNU They are dual musicians who create music together via an online project.

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Atlanta native, Chris Euton creates EDM influenced electronic, fused with downtempo, industrial rock and lush soundscapes

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SJ is a self-taught multi-instrumentalist, music producer/sound designer who hails from South-Africa. She is also a member of The Shimmer Effect, an online electronic music collab project with Stephen Mullarkey from Scotland.

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The State of Electronic Music

by Dave Bulera

As we all know the state of music is changing.
It has been changing for years now.
Especially electronic music.

Electronic music has existed from as far back as the 1920s, but
it started becoming increasingly common starting in the late 1960s.
During the 1970s after the more affordable and portable synthesizers were released,
electronic music started to take off.
Rock bands started toying with electronic music, and this lead to synth rock.

As the 70s progressed so did electronic music. With the development of MIDI and digital audio.
Toward the end of the 70s and the early 80s, synthpop became more popular.

Through the 80s, electronic music changed into many forms.
New genres started to pop up.
Ambient, then Techno and Electronica, downtempo, and breakbeat.
These forms grew in popularity in the 90’s.
As the 2000s hit so did many more genres.
Different forms of the electronic sounds morphed into new sounds and styles.
This is about the time where Dubstep and EDM started gaining ground.

 

As time went by, many styles remained, but the electronic genre in mainstream music steadily declined.

Rock, metal, hip hop, and especially pop not only held their ground but took over the electronic scene.

The most recent figures show that electronic music only holds about 9% of the radio market.
Pop/Rock holds 24% of that same market.
EDM and Dubstep still tend to get the lion’s share of the plays worldwide in the electronic market.

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The reason for this trend is because of the record label structure world wide.
Universal holds most of the rights to music worldwide. With 57% of all music signed under Universal, it’s no wonder that Pop/Rock, and EDM are so much more popular, because Universal makes it that way.

Surprisingly independent labels hold 15% of the market,which is actually more than Sony at 13%.
But keeping in mind that this is all of the independents combined.

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Music has gone the way of streaming.
But if you add up all the streaming services, Spotify, Beats Music, Deezer, Rdio, Rhapsody, Xbox Music, Sony Music Unlimited, what you get is that paid, on-demand subscription services account for just 3% of overall music spending.

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This is the mountain we need to climb as electronic artists, and electronic music fans.
We somehow need to figure out how to get that 9% of the radio market to increase dramatically.

With the advancement of the Internet, and the the growth of streaming services, getting any music heard is becoming much more difficult.
Along with the fact that there are many more artists to compete with than ever before.

This is the reason why WEATNU was created. To try to bridge the gap, and give artists a better chance of getting heard.

A group of artists with a goal to help each other, and get the music out to the masses.
The big goal, to get that 9% of the market closer to that 24% at the top.

Sources: Wikipedia - Electronic Music; Google Research : Music Timeline - Dance/Electronic; Next Big Sound Presents 2014: State Of The Industry; Digital Music News - On-Demand Streaming Subscriptions Account for 3% of Music Spending.
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