Avant-Garde Music

Experimental (Avant-Garde)

Experimental music describes the most radical approaches that can be found throughout the history of recorded music. Experimental music has two main characteristics: the first is about the production and the other one is about the sound.

Firstly, experimental musicians use non-traditional production methods. It can be through the uncommon use of traditional instruments, such as guitars, cellos, saxophones, and even the human voice like in Sound Poetry. It can be through the production of sound with objects that aren't considered musical instruments in their original contexts, Musique concrète and radical Industrial music being examples of that method. It can be through the manipulation/application of multiple effects on already recorded material (Sound Collage). It even can be through the manipulation of the sound itself, as a physical entity (Microsound).

Secondly, these non-traditional production methods result in a sound that goes largely beyond the traditional boundaries of music. The use of traditional instruments outside of any academic structure, such as in Free Improvisation, can result in a complete absence of directing scheme in the music. Whatever production technique is used, the absence of clear rhythm or tempo or of any recognizable musical scale are then quite common. The textures can also be completely deconstructed, the remaining sound barely resembling to common definitions of music (Harsh Noise).

In the history of recorded music, experimental music has its roots in Classical Music of the beginning of the 20th century, for example in the Futurism movement. The first musicians to actively make and produce experimental music mostly carried an academical background (John Cage, Luigi Russolo, Pierre Schaeffer), but artists outside of the academic world (some early chronological examples being radical jazz artists such as Sun Ra, Chick Corea and Art Ensemble of Chicago derivating to Free Jazz and free improvisation) then began to heavily incorporate experimentation into their works. Since then, numerous artists have received some recognition making experimental music, such as Einstürzende Neubauten or Supersilent.

Since the end of the 20th century, the popularisation of Electronic instruments such as synthetizers and the spread of numerical tools for programming and manipulating sound allowed more people to experiment with music more easily. Digital electronic devices brought new sonical experimentations by themselves too, like in Glitch.

Art Punk

The term art rock has been employed to describe several works of Rock music developed right after the 1960s Psychedelic Rock explosion. Following on the heels of this phenomenon, art rock has been the result of musicians developing an interest towards a handful of forms of music out of the boundaries of rock and, in general terms, making an attempt to break away as much as possible from the constrains imposed by Rock & Roll (or from the roots of rock itself, which, in turn, inspired genres like Blues Rock, Country Rock or U.S. Folk Rock). A non-musical factor that could explain this development is the conscious transition that certain rock (and non-rock) artists made from singles-based music towards a bigger development of the album as a cohesive lyrical and thematic whole (an important step towards the popularization of the so-called concept album) as shown by the 1966–1967 set of examples like Pet Sounds, Freak Out!, The Who Sell Out or Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (which can be counted as forerunners of later art rock).

The Velvet Underground & Nico, which interpolated raw Garage Rock and psychedelia with lengthy Modern Classical-inspired drone and noise passages, unorthodox guitar tunings with heavy use of feedback, and subject matter generally centered around stark lyrical topics (all tied in with elaborate pop art-inspired imagery and live performances) is considered by critics and fans as the starting point of art rock. This template of limit-breaching rock music, concept-oriented LPs and complex live performances would be the basis for many artists during the 70s that added various influences to this archetype, including Jazz, Western Classical Music, Funk, avant-garde and early Electronic and Ambient music (and even instrumentation typical of some of these styles). Examples of art rock musicians during this stage include Roxy Music (along with the solo careers of Brian Eno and Phil Manzanera, as well as the Roxy-related 801), Pink Floyd, Station to Station/Berlin trilogy-era David Bowie, Peter Gabriel, Barclay James Harvest, Steve Harley/Cockney Rebel and ex-Velvet Underground members Lou Reed and John Cale.

Ever since its beginnings, art rock has shared connections, musical ties and even presents apparent overlaps with Experimental Rock and Progressive Rock (eventually also bearing a relationship with styles like Art Pop, Glam Rock, Krautrock and Jazz-Rock). While art rock strives to find a level of complexity similar to the one present in these two affiliated genres, it generally features a mix of rock music that tends to follow certain Pop-based structures or patterns along with the aforementioned set of eclectic influences and certain degree of complexity and conceptuality, in contrast to the more classical/jazz-mimicking or inspired patterns of prog suites, or the more radical and angular experimental rock.

After the Punk Rock explosion of the second half of the 1970s, art rock dissolved, during the following decades, into other forms of rock music, including (but not limited to): Post-Punk, New Wave, Art Punk, and Post-Hardcore. The 1990s and 2000s would then see a series of newer bands taking inspiration from the musical and conceptual leanings of 60s/70s art rock acts (along with other influences) and as such, groups like late-90s/early-00s Radiohead, The Mars Volta, TV on the Radio, dEUS, АукцЫон [Auktyon], and The Mollusk-era Ween have been commonly credited with reviving popular interest in the genre into the new millennium.

Art Rock

Avant-Garde Jazz

Avant-garde jazz is a Jazz music subgenre that came into prominence in the 1960s. Combining elements of both traditional jazz and avant-garde art music, the genre attempts to break down the boundaries of jazz by experimenting with its defining characteristics such as rhythm, harmony, melody, structure, and instrumentation. Avant-garde jazz is also characterized by a heavy use of extended techniques, including overblowing, multiphonics, and flutter-tonguing. Compositions in the genre can range from dense, complex, and thoroughly composed works to the loose and improvised sounds of Free Jazz, a subgenre of avant-garde jazz.

Among the most famous leaders of the movement were John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Charles Mingus, and Eric Dolphy.

Avant-Garde Metal

(also known as Experimental Metal, Art Metal)

Avant-Garde Metal, also referred to as Experimental Metal, is a subgenre of Metal music that first appeared in central Europe in the mid 1980s. The English translation of the French word Avant-Garde is literally vanguard, meaning the forefront of a movement or activity. As such, the genre incorporates a plethora of irregular and nonconventional sounds, song structures, and instrumentation, characterizing a vastly experimental sound that often integrates several genres into one.

It is important to note, however, that as the Metal genre as a whole progresses, certain bands that are currently deemed "avant-garde" may not be considered so in the future, and may even be setting a precedent for a new sound altogether. The application of the term "avant-garde" is relative to time period and context, such that modern "avant-garde" bands may not be categorized as "avant-garde" in the future. For example, Celtic Frost's earlier works were originally considered experimental and avant-garde for the time period, but two decades later we now consider the albums as simply Blackened Thrash Metal. It should be clear that Avant-Garde Metal bands of today may not always be described as such in the future, and in certain cases may even be described as something more specific in the future if their sound is influential enough to generate a new genre or subgenre.

Avant-Prog

(Avant-Garde Progressive Rock)

Avant-prog is a subgenre of Progressive Rock that emerged around the late 1960s and early 1970s. While progressive rock bands infuse Rock with elements from more traditional forms of Western Classical Music and Jazz, avant-prog artists draw more inspiration from Modern Classical and Avant-Garde Jazz, as well as the unorthodox instrumentation and techniques of Experimental Rock. The music is highly complex and densely arranged, sometimes involving a certain degree of improvisation but for the most part carefully composed (although many bands have recorded entirely improvised pieces as well). Avant-prog tends to be more abstract in nature than other styles of progressive rock, and as such many artists make exclusively instrumental music. If there are vocals they're often wordless, or in certain cases sung in a language invented by the artist. This is particularly common for vocal pieces in the Zeuhl subgenre.

Frank Zappa's work with the Mothers of Invention could arguably be considered the earliest example of avant-prog. The genre rose to prominence through Henry Cow and the Rock in Opposition movement, involving bands such as Univers Zéro and Samla Mammas Manna. Avant-prog never gained any real mainstream recognition, but the genre has remained active and popular in underground circles.

Brutal Prog

First coined by Weasel Walter of the band The Flying Luttenbachers, Brutal Prog describes a diverse array of artists working within the Progressive Rock and Avant-Prog idioms. Brutal Prog combines the intensity and sonic dissonance of genres like Hardcore Punk, Noise Rock, No Wave, and Free Jazz with the complexity and adventurousness of Progressive Rock, Avant-Prog, and Math Rock.

Though the genre has its precursors (such as the highly influential group Ruins), its peak of popularity occurred in the early 2000s with bands like Upsilon Acrux, Hella, Zs, Ahleuchatistas, Yowie, and Grand Ulena.

Weasel Walter's own ugEXPLODE, as well as Skin Graft Records, Cuneiform Records and Tzadik, featured numerous Brutal Prog bands.

Conducted Improvisation

(also known as Conduction)

Conducted improvisation is a form of collective improvisation directed by a conductor. One of the most influential methods of performing conducted improvisation is conduction, an idea introduced by Avant-Garde Jazz composer and conductor Lawrence Butch Morris. In conduction, the conductor uses cues such as hand or baton gestures to alter various aspects of a performance, such as harmony, rhythm, melody, phrasing etc. Signs, gestures and their meaning are chosen before each performance, but the musicians retain some degree of freedom in interpreting them. Other artists created their own methods of performing conducted improvisation. Some rely on signs in a way similar to conduction, for example Walter Thompson's soundpainting, whereas methods such as John Zorn's game pieces employ hand gestures, flash cards and a complex set of rules inspired by war games.

Conducted improvisation is closely related to Free Improvisation and Free Jazz in its open, improvised and unconventional style, but it differs from them, as some degree of direction is involved. It is also closely related to Indeterminacy in the sense that the composer is a mere conductor and does not have complete control over the music; control is passed on to the ensemble. Conducted improvisation can be played with any type of ensemble. Morris performed with both jazz and classical musicians, as well as with Traditional Folk Music and Experimental artists. As a result conducted improvisation doesn't have a typical style, nor is it necessarily non-idiomatic.

Drone

Drone music (or simply drone) is a genre characterized by a focus on long sustained tones and tone clusters or repetition of single notes. Unlike other genres that use drones as a component, such as to establish tonality, drone music puts drones at the forefront, removing most melody and rhythm. A majority of drone music highlights an understated, internally microtonal and primarily timbral sonic movement provided by the acoustics of whichever instrument is creating the drone. In the case of electronic drone this is often achieved by slight fluctuations in the drones or intentional inharmonicity.

The origins of the genre are found across the world, for example in European Plainsong's vocal drones, the sustained notes often found in rāga in South Asian Classical Music, Japanese Gagaku's aitake, Appalachian Folk Music's dulcimer noter-drone, and Pibroch bagpipe drone from Scotland. Modern composition played a role, too, with Minimalism providing a base of repetitious drone and Serialism's exploration of duration and timbre expanding upon that foundation.

Drone began to be formalized as a genre in Western art music in the mid-20th century. An early attempt was Yves Klein's Monotone Silence Symphony, created in 1949, which consisted of 20 minutes of drone and 20 minutes of silence. La Monte Young would later begin to codify the genre, first with Trio for Strings in 1958, then in the 1960s with his Theatre of Eternal Music. John Cale, a member of the ensemble, went on to pioneer drone in Rock with The Velvet Underground. Since the 1960s drone music has expanded to influence countless other genres, ranging from Ambient to Drone Metal to Post-Rock.

Electroacoustic

(also known as EA)

Electroacoustic music is based on manipulation of acoustically-played ("unplugged") music with Experimental Electronic ("plugged") techniques such as loops, feedback, layering, delay, static/noise, backwards sampling, etc. It also tends to include synthetic sounds and is closely related to Tape Music, Musique concrète, acousmatic music, and elektronische musik (these terms are sometimes used interchangeably). Live performances tend to feature one or more people on acoustic instruments, and another group member sitting at a laptop computer applying the sound processing techniques in real-time.

Electroacoustic pioneers such as Bernard Parmegiani and Karlheinz Stockhausen were typically academically trained Modern Classical composers: their compositions are arranged with the refined sensibility of classical compositions and tend to focus on sounds of Orchestral-based instruments like viols and woodwinds. However, electroacoustic music involves the electronic manipulation of all sorts of sounds, including voice and sounds that do not originate from musical instruments (Musique concrète). Furthermore, although having originated from the academic compositional sphere, it is not strictly a classical style. It has developed and expanded into less academic and more non-idiomatic styles such as EAI, and has seeped into underground music styles similar to or involving elements of Ambient, Drone, Noise, or Sound Collage. Virtually all of the incarnations of electroacoustic music, whether early academic or recent underground, involve a style that focuses more on employing creative abstract sounds and sonic textures than on song structure or melody.

Electroacoustic Improvisation

(also known as EAI)

EAI (Electroacoustic Improvisation) is a difficult to define style of Free Improvisation characterised by a very slow moving, physical, textured aesthetic, often created using unconventional instruments (like prepared guitars and turntables) processed through a laptop computer. It takes influence from a wide range of improvised music - such as Noise, Drone and experimental Jazz - although the sheer uniqueness of the genre makes it difficult to precisely pin down its development. It maintains a keen underground following worldwide, with labels such as Mego, Improvised Music From Japan and Erstwhile regularly releasing records from many of the key figures in the genre.

Experimental Hip Hop

Experimental Hip Hop is a style of Hip Hop music that refers to the experimental use of eccentric hip hop elements (usually including but not limited to abstract lyrics) in ways unconventional and considered unsuitable for traditional Hip Hop music. While Abstract Hip Hop and Experimental Hip Hop are sometimes used interchangeably, Abstract Hip Hop differs from Experimental Hip Hop in that the former refers directly to Hip Hop music with abstract lyrical content, while Experimental Hip Hop is an umbrella term for Hip Hop music that embodies elements of the genre that fall outside the constraints of convention. Experimental Hip Hop is usually electronically produced and sometimes incorporates elements of other sub-genres such as Turntablism or Plunderphonics.

Experimental Rock

Experimental Rock is a term applied to music which, while essentially falling under the category of rock music, abandons generic trappings of the genre and experiments with rhythm, dissonance, instrumentation, noise, electronics, studio manipulation and other factors not commonly associated with rock 'n roll. Some of the earliest artists which could fall under the term Experimental Rock include Monks, The Mothers of Invention, The Velvet Underground, Fifty Foot Hose, Nico, Captain Beefheart, Silver Apples, and others.

Field Recordings

(also known as Phonography)

Material recorded outside of a recording studio for the purpose of capturing the audible illustration of an environment. Captured sound can be either natural (Nature Recordings, such as the sound of water, wind, animal calls, etc.) or anthropogenic (e.g. noises caused by moving trains, city traffic or Radio Broadcast Recordings). Field recordings are widely used in Experimental music, Musique concrète, Ambient and other similar genres.

This field of art is sometimes also called "phonography" because of the similarities to photography.

In a broader meaning the term "field recording" can also mean any recording made outside the studio, including actual musical performances or speeches. However, the use of this genre should be restricted to releases consisting of captured environmental sounds.

Free Improvisation

(also known as Free Music)

A musical genre that while influenced by both Free Jazz and Classical Indeterminacy, exists outside of the boundaries of both. It came to be in the late 1960s with British artists Derek Bailey and AMM. Most often confused with Free Jazz, it differs in significant ways. Free Improvisation lacks the rhythmic drive of Free Jazz, it also tends to explore a more varied textural presentation, and the melodic material is far less scalular, giving Free Improvisation a more angular and abstract sound.

Free Jazz

Free jazz is a subgenre of Jazz that originated in the early 1960s. Appearing in the dawn of what would later become the more widespread Avant-Garde Jazz movement, free jazz attempts to break free from the conventions and patterns imposed by earlier jazz subgenres in terms of melodic, harmonic and rhythmic sequences and changes within which improvisation, one of the essential aspects of jazz, occurs. Dissonance, atonality, disposal of regular harmonic structures and increased rhythmic changes are prevalent in the style. The movement would take its name from Ornette Coleman's 1961 release Free Jazz, credited for serving as an almost manifesto for the genre's radical approach to rhythm and harmony, presented in the setting of collective improvisation.

For many African American innovators, free jazz was a tool of creative liberation, as well as a counter to the stereotypical view of African American music at the time, and the commodification of the performers of such music by white audiences. Often, free jazz drew heavily from non-Western musical sensibilities and techniques of traditional African Music, such as the use of one voice chords and polyrhythms. For example, Ed Blackwell, a drummer and pioneer of free jazz, was known for using an African talking drum.

Free jazz's eventual expansion across the globe lead to the European Free Jazz scene: taking on the genre with a heavier emphasis on relentless and angular improvisation, developing free jazz's sound to be even further removed from its origin.

Futurism

The futurist movement began in the early 20th century and extended across many art forms. Its starting point in music is considered to be Manifesto of Futurism written by Filippo Tommaso Marinetti in 1909, quickly followed by several manifestos written by Francesco Balilla Pratella, beginning in 1910. Futurism is largely a product of Italian and Russian composers.

Futurism can be characterized by a radical and militant attitude, rejection of Western Classical Music forms and traditional criteria of musical craft, search for non-conformity, and most importantly a fascination with machines, which futurist music often imitates or is inspired by. Painter, sculptor and self-taught musician Luigi Russolo, also with his brother Antonio, pushed this fascination to the extreme by inventing specific noise instruments called intonarumori, for which they composed several pieces. The first intonarumori concert was held in 1914 (and a similar approach to noise was exercised a few years later by Nikolai Foregger and his Orchestra of Noises). Russolo's developments are today seen as crucial in the evolution of Noise and Electronic music.

Other notable futurist composers include Luigi Grandi, Alexander Mosolov, George Antheil, Arseni Avraamov, and Arthur Lourié, while a futurist influence can be found in some works of Sergei Prokofiev, Arthur Honegger, Igor Stravinsky or Edgard Varèse.

Glitch

Glitch is a style of experimental Electronic music that uses the sounds created by malfunctioning digital technology - bugs, crashes, system errors, hardware noise, CD skipping, and digital distortion - as main technique of composition. This unusual method of musical creation arguably began in Germany in the early 90s, with artists like Oval combining the technique with Ambient music to help cement its place in modern electronic music history. At the other end of the Glitch spectrum, Japanese musician Yasunao Tone's use of damaged CDs created dense, extreme walls of sound, with Solo for Wounded CD perhaps being the best example. Modern glitch tends to use software to recreate these sounds, as opposed to genuinely defecting technology, and this increased ease of creation has resulted in the genre spreading out into other areas, such as Glitch Pop and Glitch Hop.

Gorenoise

(also known as Vomitnoise)

Gorenoise is an extreme variant of Goregrind that combines and subverts its goregrind and Grindcore elements with brash Noise music (typically utilising intense Harsh Noise). The style first began to take place in the late 1990s as goregrind was pushed to its extreme limits by bands such as Last Days of Humanity and Anal Birth.

As within goregrind, the vocals are heavily pitch-shifted down, often to the point of sounding like gargling or bubbling, or to imitate vomiting and other bodily functions. The drums are typically digitally programmed, chaotic, and at a high tempo; this often makes the sound comparable with Cybergrind.

Much like its goregrind roots, gorenoise musicians often utilise medical terminology in their band and song names, as well as using graphic and gory medical imagery in their cover art. Though mostly indecipherable due to the editing techniques used, gorenoise lyrics tend to focus on typical grindcore topics, with graphic violence, death, and bodily functions being the general focus.

The style became more notable in the 2000s, with bands specifically taking to and innovating the style directly. The mid-to-late 2000s saw the work of Bobby Maggard (an artist with several hundred gorenoise projects) and Phyllomedusa both further help define and develop the sound of the genre through their hundreds of releases.

Harsh Noise

Harsh Noise is a term applied to Noise music that seeks to take the genre to its natural limits, resulting in hugely aggressive walls of sound that assault the listener. It has strong links with Japan, with Hijokaidan, Masonna and Merzbow releasing many records key to the development of perhaps this most abrasive style of music, although related underground scenes exist worldwide.

Harsh Noise Wall

(also known as Wall Noise)

Harsh noise wall is a style of Harsh Noise that revolves around largely unchanging walls of Noise. The noise present in harsh noise wall is loud and distorted, but differs from other harsh noise in that it does not have much in terms of dynamic changes, instead often taking the form of long compositions that can vary from very slow, subtle change over time to no change whatsoever. Although relatively simple in concept, artists have varied in their approach to the genre. For example, some artists strip back the harsher textures in typical harsh noise wall, instead focusing on using lighter textures and Ambient composition within the noise wall framework.

Harsh noise wall primarily came into prominence through American noise artists and scenes in the 1990s. Artists like Skin Crime set a precedent of overloaded, monolithic sound that early wall noise artists, such as Richard Ramirez under the Werewolf Jerusalem pseudonym, would go on to pioneer the genre with. The genre soon spread around, where acts like Vomir and The Rita further popularized the genre in noise scenes around the world. The growing genre of harsh noise wall would spawn numerous festivals in the 2010s, such as Eyes Behind the Wall and Harsh Noise Wall Festival III, further proving the staying power of harsh noise wall in noise culture.

Indeterminacy

(also known as Aleatoric Music, Chance Music)

Classical compositions leaving elements of composition, performance, or both up to chance.

Industrial

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Krautrock

"Krautrock" is a term coined by the British music press, and is generally used to refer to the progressive and experimental groups of late 1960s and early 1970s Germany.

These groups combined a variety of influences and styles, including British and American Psychedelic Rock groups, the Free Jazz of Ornette Coleman and Albert Ayler, and experimental classical composers (most notably Karlheinz Stockhausen as well as the minimalists Terry Riley and Steve Reich). The desire to eschew conventional song structure and melody also led to some groups developing a more mechanical sound and feel for their compositions, which also often made use of early synthesizers and other electronic instrumentation.

Although they all differed in their approach to their music, the underlying link between all the krautrock groups was the attempt to take the rhythm ("motorik" was the name given to the steady 4/4 beat used by many groups) and energy of American rock music and disassociate it as much as possible from its Rhythm & Blues roots, instead drawing inspiration from other sources.

Kraftwerk are far and away the most commercially successful of all the krautrock groups, finding major commercial success when they developed their sound into a pioneering form of Synthpop combining catchy synthesizer melodies with the motorik rhythm. Critically, however, many krautrock groups are held in high esteem by the vast majority of commentators. Albums by groups such as Amon Düül II, Can, Faust, NEU!, Popol Vuh and Tangerine Dream are regarded as classics in the Experimental Rock and Progressive Rock canon.

It should be noted that, although "krautrock" has come to be accepted as the general term for the music of this style, it was (and is) perceived by some as a xenophobic or derogatory term, since "kraut" is an ethnic slur against Germans. As a result, some of the so-called krautrock groups have distanced themselves from the term, instead referring to their music as "German progressive rock" or "Kosmische Musik".

Lowercase

The term "Lowercase music" was coined by Steve Roden to describe a new form of extreme sound art. Lowercase artists base their music on very quiet sounds and often use silence to juxtapose these sounds so as to amplify their intensity. Through the digital magnification of microsounds, lowercase artists may also reveal auditory experiences once inaccessible to the human ear. Examples of this include the recording of plants using amplified contact microphones, anthills and underground ant colony chambers, the sound of snow as it falls onto a sheet of ice, and bacteria being flash-frozen in a Petri dish.

However, lowercase hasn't remained just a matter of adjusted and treated Field Recordings. Artists from the field of Free Improvisation have also contributed to the genre and translated its aesthetic into a new sort of improvised music. Composed or improvised, lowercase's original intentions are still kept up and even Roden himself performs lowercase improvisations from time to time.

Microsound

(also known as Micromontage)

Also known as micromontage, microsound is the usage of sounds on an incredibly small scale. These sounds usually last from 10 milliseconds to less than a tenth of a second. By arranging and manipulating these sounds digitally, complex patterns and compositions can be made in ways that aren't possible via solely acoustic means.

Microsound shares some similarities with Lowercase, as both genres use microsounds and work to magnify and structure songs around sounds that would otherwise be inaudible or not focused on. However, microsound as a genre is focused almost entirely on being produced digitally, and is more structurally focused than the often improvised nature of lowercase. The genre also shares similarities with Glitch music, to the point where the terms "microsound" and "glitch" are often conflated. While glitch can be incorporated into microsound, microsound is more deliberate in its nature and does not focus on emulating malfunctioning technology or sounds in order to be created.

Examples of artists in the genre include Ryoji Ikeda (who also incorporates elements of Minimal Techno in his music, as well as incorporating his music in sound installations), Miki Yui, Bernhard Günter, Richard Chartier, and Curtis Roads, who penned the textbook Microsound (2001) describing the genre and its origins.

Musique concrète

Developed by Pierre Schaeffer, musique concrète refers to music or sound art which defies the common constraints and conventions music is associated with. Musique concrète makes the attempt to create music while relying mainly on environmental/real-world sounds and noises, though it can also use recordings of human voice and various instruments. Those sounds can be transformed (sometimes to the point the original source is unrecognizable) and are given certain musical qualities thanks to repetition, rhythmization, contrapuntal layering or other formal techniques.

The name "concrete music" contrasts with the traditional "abstract music". Whereas abstract music starts as an idea in the mind of the composer and is then turned into sound, concrete music begins with the already existing sounds, composition being the last stage of its creation.

No Wave

No Wave was a short-lived movement in New York City in the late 1970s which took the ethics of Punk Rock but discarded melody and catchiness and replaced them with such features as extreme noise, distortion, feedback, angular rhythms, stream-of-conciousness lyrics, psychotic vocals, minimalism, abnormal tunings, dissonance and other unusual factors. The original movement essentially lasted from 1976-1979 and featured bands like Teenage Jesus & The Jerks, Mars, DNA and James Chance & The Contortions. The most well-known document of the era is the Brian Eno-produced No New York compilation.

While not part of the original movement, numerous bands have arisen which were influenced by the original movement and have themselves been labelled No Wave, such as Sonic Youth, The Birthday Party and Liars.

Noise

Noise is an Experimental genre that strays away from conventional music structure, tonality, and composition and - as the name implies - consists predominantly of noise. Such music can be created or generated with virtually anything, including acoustic and traditional instruments, non-musical objects and machinery, extreme vocal techniques, and electronic equipment. Noise is often cacophonous, improvised in its composition, dissonant, loud, and abrasive. These noisy techniques are commonly created with feedback, distortion, manipulation, computer generation, etc.

The origins of noise in music date back to the early 20th century and the Futurism movement. Luigi Russolo is credited for being one of the first artists to consciously use noise as a backbone of music composition. In his 1913 manifesto, L'arte dei rumori ("The Art of Noises"), he stated that artists should not limit themselves to traditional instruments, because there is an infinite number of different noises that can be used to enlarge and enrich the domain of musical sounds. He invented acoustic instruments called intonarumori (Italian for "noise makers"). In 1921, along with his brother, Antonio, the duo produced "Corale / Serenata", which is now the only surviving recording of these experiments.

Many Modern Classical and Musique concrète composers such as Edgard Varèse and John Cage continued to experiment with noise from the 1950s onwards. Cage and Max Neuhaus's Fontana Mix - Feed compositions of the 1950s/1960s utilised intense volume and feedback in order to take such Electroacoustic experiments to new extremes. In the early 2000s, Robert Ashley's Wolfman from 1964 and Pauline Oliveros's A Little Noise in the System from 1967 were both released, both being similar examples of intense feedback-driven noise music.

While avant-garde classical compositions and Electronic experiments of the early 1960s were steadily utilising noise more frequently, popular music was also starting to catch on to the style. In 1966, The Velvet Underground's John Cale recorded Loop, another track which honed in on audio feedback and Drone sounds. A similar approach was later used by Lou Reed on Metal Machine Music in 1975. Containing solely guitar feedback played at different speeds, the album had a huge impact on spreading noise through popular music. Another notable early example is 1973 Live, recorded by Keiji Haino two years before Metal Machine Music, but released later in 1993.

Forming in late 1975, Throbbing Gristle pioneered and named the Industrial style that would further influence and develop noise music. The band's extreme and abrasive performances incorporated large amounts of atonal and distorted noise. This initial industrial style varied from a more Ambient or airy, noisy approach (as heard in their debut gig, At the Air Gallery in 1976) to a dissonant collage of traditional Rock and Punk music instrumentation layered amongst home-made synthesiser-driven noise.

This industrial approach was expanded upon in various ways, taking noise and Industrial Music both to varying directions. Bands such as Whitehouse pioneered Power Electronics, a genre which hybridised the dissonance and rawness of both genres and took the sound further still. Because of its links to the then-growing popular electronic genres such as Synthpop, industrial music often incorporated more dance elements and put emphasis on rhythm. This led to the style dubbed Power Noise, with artists such as Esplendor Geométrico performing such rhythmic noise since the early 1980s.

Various genres began implementing noise music more predominantly, and such a sound spread to different parts of the world. Japan in particular began growing a noise scene (generally referred to as "Japanoise"), and further developed noise music within it. The scene was particularly important in helping to pioneer the Harsh Noise style, especially through the likes of Merzbow, Incapacitants, and 非常階段 [Hijokaidan]. Like others before them, these artists often performed as a form of dissonant Free Improvisation.

Since its inception, noise has evolved into and influenced a wide spectrum of genres and styles, across all levels of intensity. While some took it to their harsh extremities, such as the Harsh Noise Wall style of often-unchanging walls of static noise, other styles like Noise Rock and Noise Pop used noise in a more accessible way, retaining traditional rock song tropes. Similarly, Post-Industrial styles such as Industrial Hip Hop, Industrial Metal, and Industrial Techno all grew within the 1980s and 1990s, using noise music alongside their respective roots, and spreading the style to further audiences still.

Onkyo

(also known as Onkyokei)

Onkyo is a form of Japanese Experimental music that focuses on the exploration of the physical traits of sound rather than music as a form of expression. Since onkyo is based solely on these actions of the musicians with their works, the genre is inclusive to a variety of different musicians and aesthetics. Still, performances are minimal with the inclusion of large gaps of silence; as well, these performances often tend to be stoic in nature.

To illustrate just how vast the onkyo spectrum is, it's important to note the wide variety of instruments that notorious performers use. Musicians like Taku Sugimoto, Masafumi Ezaki and Kazushige Kinoshita are known for their use of acoustic instruments in their solo projects and their collaborations, as opposed to artists like Sachiko M and Toshimaru Nakamura, who have carved out unique aesthetics for themselves using electronic instruments. Generally though, the electronics used in onkyo performances are not conventional. For example, Nakamura has exercised purposeful misuse of technology to create feedback loops within his music, while Sachiko has pioneered the usage of an empty sampler that is only able to use and control the sampler's test tone sine waves. She has also been experimenting with the usage of contact microphones, which is another instrument that is used often within said scene. The owner of the venue known as Off-Site, which was vital to the genre's development, encouraged quiet, improvised explorations of sound.

Often, musicians will use vibrating objects against these contact microphones to record the otherwise inaudible vibrations produced by these objects. This is one of many ways that onkyo has ties to Lowercase. However, this style also has ties to Free Improvisation and EAI, due to the fact that many onkyo performances are improvised, often with EAI instrumentation. Composed onkyo pieces are very rare, and as a result, most onkyo releases consist of live, improvised performances.

Plunderphonics

Plunderphonics is a term invented by John Oswald in his essay, Plunderphonics, or Audio Piracy as a Compositional Prerogative, and refers to the compositional technique of utilising and manipulating one or more pre-existing audio sources to create a new composition. It is an Experimental form of sound art that uses similar techniques found in Sound Collage. Where plunderphonics differs from sound collage is usually in the execution/composition and the end result's links to more traditional music genres. A plunderphonics song could essentially be a soundscape of assorted layered samples in the same way a sound collage piece is put together; it could just as easily be a rhythmic Electronic piece made up entirely of pre-existing materials, such as is heard on The Avalanches' Since I Left You.

In his essay, Oswald describes this form of modern sample-based music as an extension of previous modes and methods of traditional composition. For example, he compares the instruments used by traditional musicians - such as the piano - as being a vehicle for composition. In the world of plunderphonics, the digital sampler is the vehicle for composition. This is compared to the Hip Hop method of scratching and sampling vinyl records within their songs as being a vehicle for composition. However, music containing samples and sample-based plunderphonics are still radically different fields. Plunderphonics itself is driven almost entirely by the sonic desires of the composer, using the samples as an instrument in their own right, as opposed to using them as an added "extra" within a song.

An overarching theme of both the essay and the music of plunderphonics on the whole - as the name implies - is the legality of sampling itself. Oswald attempts to justify the use of manipulation pre-existing sounds (legal or more commonly illegally acquired) with comparisons to traditional music tactics, such as indie bands attempting to sonically "copy" the sounds of more popular artists. A quote by Igor Stravinsky is included, "A good composer does not imitate; he steals." This extends to examples such as James Tenney's Collage #1 [Blue Suede], which is a Tape Music manipulation of Elvis Presley's song "Blue Suede Shoes" (the essay also refers to this song as being "borrowed" from Carl Perkins, who composed it originally).

One of the biggest arguments for sample-based music being justifiable is the plethora of popular music utilising pre-existing musical elements in new compositions, such as the example given of Herbie Hancock sampling Led Zeppelin on his track "Rockit". Lastly, in his essay Oswald argues that all Pop (and Folk) music essentially exists in the public domain due to how persistently one is bombarded with it, attempting to justify the manipulative usage of these recordings.

As a result, many musicians within the world of plunderphonics employ almost anarchistic mindsets in creating their sample-based compositions. Many releases focus entirely around the usage and legality of sampling, such as prominent sound collaging band Negativland's No Business. Band member Don Joyce also coined the term "culture jamming" in 1984, around the same time as the concepts of plunderphonics were being developed. The act itself is a form of guerilla anti-consumerism, which extends to music in the form of satirical jabs at culture and industry (such as the band's Dispepsi album, focusing entirely around soda giant Pepsi).

Expanding on the concept of turntable-based hip hop sampling, artists from the 90s onwards explored the idea of creating a mashup of stems/layers of other songs into a new piece of music. Danger Mouse's The Grey Album helped to popularise the concept, leading to a number of underground mashup mixes, even breaking into the mainstream with authorised and legal mashups such as Collision Course. Mashups are generally a less radical or experimental form of plunderphonics, usually danceable and often humorous in their approach. However, the concept of pop recycling is still apparent, such as is heard in the Radio Soulwax DJ mixes of 2 Many DJ's, which are solely made out of mashups of different pop songs (usually to a House beat).

With the increase in home computer use, the higher speeds and abilities of the internet, as well as both the underground and more public access to content piracy, sample-based music has become much easier to produce. While early composers used Musique concrète and other avant-garde and usually tape-based sampling to create their plunderphonics music, modern compositions often utilise manipulations of digital audio files. The counter-cultural mentality is still apparent in many recordings, but many artists use plunderphonics as a mode of creating their own sonic concepts, ignoring potential copyright violations in the process.

Post-Hardcore

Following the emergence of Punk Rock in the late 1970s, bands began to expand upon its aesthetic of 'loud, hard, and fast' musical and vocal technique. Mixing together elements of their forebearers from Hardcore Punk (largely Black Flag and Dead Kennedys), Experimental Rock bands like The Velvet Underground and The Residents, with a helping of the sounds of its close cousins in Noise Rock and Emo, Post-Hardcore has undergone a continual expansion and shifting in what constitutes its musical identity.

Post-Hardcore can be considered to have begun in earnest in the mid-'80s. These bands were based on Hardcore Punk's aggression and dynamics, but many of them expanded it through longer and more complex arrangements with an ebb and flow of building tension and release both in the music and vocals. Notable bands of this early era are Big Black, Hüsker Dü and Minutemen. It should be noted that many of these bands were simply called Hardcore bands in the '80s and the term post-hardcore emerged later.

Soon after, a second wave of Post-Hardcore emerged. In addition to the traditional influences, this owed an equal debt to the addition of Post-Punk bands like Television and Wire, with a sprinkling of Dub, Funk, or Jazz-Rock. Some bands, Fugazi for instance, have straddled both styles.

Post-Hardcore today encompasses both of these previous incarnations, and has incorporated what can be considered a third-wave set of artists who took cues from first-wave bands, and added an aggressive mix with Emo, known as Screamo. Envy and Off Minor are good examples of this style.

Post-Punk

With its roots in the mid to late 1970s, post-punk emerged alongside the initial Punk Rock explosion in the United Kingdom. While retaining punk rock's focus on trimming away excess, post-punk tends to place more importance on creating atmosphere and usually has more complex songwriting than punk rock. Musicians tend to be much more experimental, often incorporating influences from Dub, Funk, Krautrock, Art Rock, Experimental music, and Electronic music. Unlike New Wave, its more pop-based counterpart which emerged around the same time, post-punk often deals with more serious subject matter.

Stylistically, the genre has a general backbone consisting of a prominent, pulsating sound and rhythm section of bass and drums. On top of this arrangement are atmospheric, spiky, interweaving lead guitar lines commonly described as "angular", creating a cold and melancholic tone with extensive use of minor key melodies. Vocals tend to be menacing, monotone and in some cases, even robotic.

Public Image Ltd, formed after the implosion of Sex Pistols, are often heralded as the first post-punk band, although artists in the New York punk scene like Television had been much earlier playing an experimental style of punk rock that would later be classified by some as post-punk. Other (mostly British) bands followed, including Joy Division, Talking Heads, Gang of Four, and Wire and the genre came into its own in the late 70s, reaching its underground peak in the early to mid 80s.

Post-punk's underground popularity helped create many offshoots. Its sorrowful atmosphere was merged with increasing theatrics and influences from Glam Rock to create Gothic Rock, which bands like The Cure and The Sisters of Mercy leveraged to great chart success in the late 80s and helped form the pervasive Goth subculture. The bouncy syncopation and overall funkiness of post-punk bass is exploited to its maximum in Dance-Punk which saw mainstream popularity in the mid 2000s. Coldwave, popular in continental Europe and especially France, was a colder, more methodical affair which took influence from the avant-garde and science fiction. No Wave was a New York-based movement which took influence from post-punk and punk rock but focused on experimentation above all else. Post-punk's first wave saw a decline in underground popularity after the mid 80s as it was subsumed by new wave, gothic rock, Alternative Rock, and Alternative Dance, all genres which took heavy influence from the original post-punk movement.

After a period of declining interest in the 1990s, a mainstream Post-Punk Revival emerged in the early 2000s centred around the New York City scene, with bands like The Strokes and Interpol spearheading a movement which took influence earlier post-punk bands but had an increased focus on indie rock and pop song structures. This approach allowed the revival to quickly spread worldwide, with bands outside New York joining the fray, including Franz Ferdinand and Bloc Party. The movement was incredibly successful with multiple bands obtaining chart hits and was heralded by publications such as NME as a "new rock revival", although it ultimately proved to be short-lived as other strains of indie rock took over by the mid 2000s. An underground resurgence of interest in the genre developed in the early 2010s with bands like Preoccupations and Protomartyr eschewing the earlier revival's focus on accessibility and returning to the punk and experimental ethos of first wave post-punk.

Post-Rock

Post-rock is a term popularized by music critic Simon Reynolds. In Reynolds' words, it refers to "using rock instrumentation for non-rock purposes, using guitars as facilitators of timbre and textures rather than riffs and power chords."

A succinct description of the genre's sound is difficult because of the diverse influences bands in the post-rock scene employ, but one can generally say that it derives primarily from a mix of Ambient, Space Rock, Experimental Rock, Krautrock, and styles on the "wall-of-sound" end of the Alternative Rock spectrum, such as Shoegaze. Some post-rock bands also dabble in Math Rock, Tape Music, Minimalism, and various forms of Jazz, but application of these styles is by no means uniform.

Reductionism

Reductionism is a form of experimental music that centers around quiet dynamics and use of silence. It is an umbrella term for several scenes which arose concurrently in the 90s, such as the Berlin scene (briefly called "Berlin Reductionism" and later "Echtzeitmusik" as their aesthetic began to expand), the London scene (sometimes called the "New London Silence"), the Tokyo scene (called Onkyo), the Lowercase genre, and the work of composers who make up Edition Wandelweiser Records.

This approach is often confused with lowercase; however, lowercase, like Microsound, is highly based in its sound sources and process. Where lowercase necessitates amplifying quiet and mundane sound sources, reductionism doesn't and often involves acoustic instruments, even classical instrumentation, as in the case of many works by the Wandelweiser composers. Similarly, the reductionist approach is used quite often in EAI; however, reductionism is not necessarily electroacoustic, nor is EAI necessarily reductionist.

Around the turn of the millennium, these scenes started to become highly collaborative with one another, mutually exchanging ideas and approaches. Many musicians formerly focused on improvisation, with many musicians alternating between or blurring the lines between improvisation and composition.

Rock in Opposition

(RIO)

RIO, or Rock In Opposition, emerged from a number of European groups (Stormy Six, Samla Mammas Manna, Univers Zéro, Etron fou leloublan), under the direction of Henry Cow, to combine their energy to reveal their radical approach. This music is characterized by great complexity in writing and an avant-garde take on contemporary classical music, the most modern jazz or urban music. The movement is far less active since the beginning of the 1980s.

Sound Art

(also known as Sound Installation & Sculpture)

Sound art is an interdisciplinary branch of contemporary art that began in the late 20th century, incorporating elements from Experimental music and visual arts, with sound utilized as its primary medium and subject. Typically, sound art works take form of sound installations or sound sculptures which are self-playing and continuous, with no beginning or end. They do not require performers, though they can include elements of audience participation. Sound art is particularly focused on spatial and conceptual sound design. Sound art's use of primarily non-musical sounds combined with its unorthodox nature has led to an association with experimental music. It is also closely related to other art forms, such as sculpture and performance art. Traditionally, sound art works are presented in art galleries, although there are notable exceptions, many of which utilize Field Recordings in a site-specific fashion. Several musicians have made forays into sound art, one popular example being Brian Eno's audiovisual installations.

There are certain characteristics that are commonly shared between sound art works, although none of them are absolutely essential:

First, works of sound art usually do not follow a specified timeline, much like other forms of visual art; audiences may choose to experience a sound art piece in as much time as they deem appropriate. As an example, Céleste Boursier-Mougenot's installation clinamen comprises a pool populated with porcelain bowls that collide spontaneously. Recorded media is thus sometimes seen as limiting in sound art, as it constrains the work to a fixed duration and often removes the context of the piece.

Additionally, the concept of space is a commonly explored topic, and it is not uncommon for sound art pieces to incorporate field recordings or to interact with their installed space. For instance, the sounds of Harry Bertoia's sound sculptures were produced by wind and natural phenomena. Bill Fontana's works, on the other hand, often combine carefully placed loudspeakers playing prerecorded sounds with natural phenomena such as flowing water to create a multi-layered soundscape that emphasizes different sounds depending on the listener's position.

Lastly, works of sound art are generally not "performed" in the musical sense. They are frequently aleatory, generative, or involve looping if playback is involved. Automata play an important role in sound art, such as Max Eastley's installations that rely on mechanical parts, or previously mentioned pieces that rely on input from nature, such as the Aeolian harp. It is also not uncommon for a sound art piece to rely on input from participants, such as Christina Kubisch's works that utilize headphones that pick up electromagnetic induction from the environment.

Sound Collage

Sound collaging is a musical technique where various sound pieces are layered and essentially "glued" together in order to create an auditory art piece. Arguably sound collage dates back to classical pieces such as Charles Ives' Central Park in the Dark, which featured layered melodies to create a specific atmosphere. These musical collages arguably pre-date the physical art collages for the early 1910s. However, collaging is generally seen as an Experimental Electronic artform, dating back to the late-1920s with avant-garde filmmaker Walter Ruttmann's piece Wochenende [Weekend].

With the creation of magnetic tape as a form of media storage, artists within the Musique concrète schools were able to create abstract collages of various sounds recorded to tape. Tape Music and Electroacoustic's development furthered the growth of collage-style music - however most of these were confined to the avant-garde and classical music fields, with artists such as Iannis Xenakis, John Cage, Brion Gysin, William S. Burroughs, and Terry Riley utilising collaging as a catalyst to drive their artistic ideas forward. It wasn't until the late-1960s to 1970s (with more tape and media technology becoming readily available) that artists began making collage pieces primarily as collages in their own right.

The late-1970s and 1980s saw the rise of sampling within music, with bands like Negativland leading the way for sample-based, collage-style music. John Oswald wrote about and developed this musical style into Plunderphonics, a genre focused entirely around the use of samples to create new pieces of music. The rise of Industrial music also saw the use of collaging, with acts like Throbbing Gristle, Nurse With Wound, and Big City Orchestra creating haunting pieces of music made from collaging samples with original material.

With the rise of the availability of personal computers, digital collages became commonplace from the 1990s onwards. Music pirating allows for the rapid collection of many audio sources to be recycled and re-used in collage pieces. This also led to the creation of Microsound collages (dubbed "micromontages"), where groups of sounds less than a second are layered together to create multifarious results (though usually in the form of glitchy ambiance).

Spiritual Jazz

Spiritual Jazz is a style of Avant-Garde Jazz music which emerged in the 1960s. It is closely associated with the musical and spiritual philosophy developed by John Coltrane in the mid-1960s (manifested as early as his seminal A Love Supreme album) which was passed on to his collaborators Alice Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders.

Stylistically, spiritual jazz is marked by a mixture of jazz with approximations of ethnic music styles (often a blend of styles evocative of African, Indian, and East Asian musical traditions), religious music of non-Christian traditions, and the ecstatic, transcendental aspects of Free Jazz. This radical style was closely linked to various African-American political and spiritual movements, such as the Nation of Islam and Afro-Centrism, the introduction of Zen philosophy and yoga in America, a resurgence of Egyptology, as well as the Civil Rights and Black Power movements.

Spoken Word

Spoken word recordings consist of usually unaccompanied vocal readings. While not all are unaccompanied by musical backing, the focus is always on the reading (such as the prose, inflection, or intonation) of the words being read. Spoken word pieces can be Speeches, a form of Poetry, an audio narrative (such as a Radio Drama), or even an Interview recording.

The most-often form of writing for Spoken Word pieces is poetry. Poetry is a broad term that encompasses many forms of literature that use style and rhythm to evoke ideas and emotions further than the prosaic meaning of the literature itself. Examples can be found in most languages, periods, and cultures. These cultures have created the subgenres of Spoken Word Poetry pieces, including:

Beat Poetry
- A stream-of-conciousness style which originated with the Beats in the '50s like Allen Ginsberg and William S. Burroughs. It is sometimes recited with a jazz backing, often concerns graphic sexual imagery, anti-establishment and social dissections, but can be totally meaningless.
Dub Poetry
- Consists of performing poetry over reggae and dub rhythms, originating from Jamaica in the 70s.
Jazz Poetry
- Jazz poetry emerged during the 1920s as a form of poetry incorporating the style and the rhythms of Jazz, which simultaneously began to expand amongst the African-American communities of the US. The earliest so-called jazz poets, such as Carl Sandburg, only included jazz in their poetry as a thematic element, predating the first wave of authentic jazz poetry in which authors such as Langston Hughes embraced the musical aspects of jazz, especially its rhythm and repetition. Hughes' first book, The Weary Blues is considered the first collection of genuine jazz poems. Some authors, like Lawrence Ferlinghetti, usually collaborated with jazz ensembles, giving rise to the definitive fusion of jazz and poetry. During later decades, a third wave of jazz poetry was spearheaded by Gil Scott-Heron and Jayne Cortez with different approaches. While the former included jazz elements as a mere artistic device used to evoke his Afro-American origins, the latter focused her poetry on the melodic patters and cadences of jazz. Scott-Heron's work preceded the rise of Hip Hop, amongst whose derivative forms is Jazz Rap, which encompasses many formal aspects of poetry jazz, and renders them with modern hip hop production methods.
Slam Poetry:
- Characterized by enthusiastic, typically dramatic and energetic performances of stream-of-consciousness poems that tend to last between two to five minutes, usually without conforming to regularized rhyming schemes or poetic structures. They are often simpler than most written poetry, trading lyric complexity for straight-forward, emotive displays of the poet's emotions or message. Slam poetry quickly became popular among young poets of diverse backgrounds, becoming a highly politicized art form that commonly drew upon racial, economic, and gender injustice subjects. Slam poems are made to be recited, performed in front of a crowd, and certain poets have incorporated traditional theatrical devices like shifting voices and tones, choreographed movements, or meta-commentary. Even though slam poetry is almost always entirely vocal, it's occasionally accompanied by musical instrumentation, especially in the case of artists who record their poems into albums.
Sound Poetry
- Poetry where emphasis is placed upon phonetics and the sounds of syllables rather than the meaning of the words themselves. Kurt Schwitters and Raoul Hausmann were among the pioneers of the genre.

Poetry has roots in ancient oral tradition and Folk songs, which used rhythm and repetition to make stories easier to recall and retell. Because of this, poetry has always been closely related to music; in fact, much of the earliest known poetry was in the form of Hymns or chants.

Tape Music

The invention of the magnetic tape brought about new possibilities in the realm of Experimental music, namely Musique concrète, Electroacoustic and Sound Collage. Tape music composers capture raw real-world sounds, recordings of musical instruments or synthesized sounds on tape to present the sounds as acousmatic compositions, distinct from the Western Classical Music tradition of musical notation which results in different performances each time. These composers may also proceed to manipulate the sounds using methods characteristic of electroacoustic music. Some composers such as Steve Reich and William Basinski have combined Minimalism and tape music by looping snippets of audio using tapes.

Turntable Music

(note: not hip-hop turntablism)

Turntable music, in general terms, has its roots in the early half of the twentieth century, with experimental artists such as John Cage and Pierre Schaeffer using the turntable (as well as the vinyl records it plays) as a distinct musical instrument in the creation of compositions. However, aside from the Hip Hop-rooted Turntablism, it has been modern improvisational musicians that have most exploited the turntable's capacity to create unique and unusual sounds; such musicians include Christian Marclay, Otomo Yoshihide, Martin Tétreault and Philip Jeck, most of whom combine the techniques of turntable music with elements of Free Improvisation and Noise. Examples of these techniques are extremely wide-ranging. Marclay, for example, has made a name for himself by piecing together different records to create jarring sounds and cutting holes off-centre so as to warp the music, though the capacity for artists to push the turntable far beyond its intended purpose is perhaps limitless.

Yass

Yass is a term coined at the beginning of 1990s by Polish Avant-Garde Jazz musicians Tymon Tymański, Mazzoll and Tomasz Gwinciński to describe the cross-genre, frequently arrhythmic, improvised music they played with e.g. Miłość, Łoskot and Mazzoll & Arhythmic Perfection. Yass comprises the stylistics and elements of genres ranging from Folk to Punk Rock.

The Yass scene emerged in Tricity (an aggregate of the three neighbouring towns of Gdańsk, Gdynia and Sopot) and Bydgoszcz whose Mózg became the "home venue" for Yass performers (e.g. Koncert w Mózgu) with its own label releasing a number of Yass productions.

A good overview of the Yass scene comes with the compilation album Cały ten Yass! released by Jazz Forum magazine just after the genre's heyday.

Zeuhl

Zeuhl is a style of Avant-Prog created by Christian Vander, founder of the French band Magma, in the early seventies. With the band, Vander fused Jazz, Progressive Rock and Modern Classical music and constructed a language of his own, called Kobaïan, from which the genre takes its name ("Zeuhl" can be translated as "celestial"). Greatly ambitious in scope, Zeuhl often uses large ensembles and choirs to create heavily disciplined, majestic music, often incorporating lyrics in Kobaïan. Originally, the term "Zeuhl" only referred to Magma, but a great number of modern bands have also been given this label, such as Japan's Koenji Hyakkei and Ruins.

Definitions courtesy of rateyourmusic.com

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