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Drum & Bass is a subgenre of Electronic music that is characterized by fast breakbeats, and it typically sits between 160-180 BPM. It started in the United Kingdom after emerging from the rave & jungle scenes during the early 1990s. It incorporates influences from many scenes, and its most major influences come from the Jamaican Reggae sound.

Drum & Bass has many different subgenres, such as Liquid, Techstep, Neurofunk, Jump Up, and more, described below. It has influenced many other genres of Electronic music, and has made its rounds across the international dance music scene.

The color associated with the genre before genre colors were phased out was: Red (Hex: #F21904) (RGB: 242, 25, 4)

Subgenres[]

Atmospheric Drum & Bass[]

Atmospheric Drum & Bass is a subgenre of Drum & Bass where the breakbeats are sped up and have reduced emphasis in the production, and instead focusing much more on the melodic aspects of the track, using slow, warm basslines, clean production and downtempo, atmospheric melodies inspired by Ambient and Ambient House productions.

Dancefloor Drum & Bass[]

In the current ecosystem of the Drum & Bass scene, Dancefloor Drum & Bass can be easily seen as the most standard (or "vanilla") and broadly encountered form of the genre. It focuses mainly on the heavily swung kick on beat one and snare on beat 2 groove (although some drum patterns within songs in this subgenre often use a double 8th note kick on beat one pattern) and melodic chord progressions through heavier tech styled bass leads being brought out within its production. Dancefloor Drum & Bass tracks target a festival audience, capturing an energetic and uplifting feeling.

Halftime[]

A style of Drum & Bass, mainly Neurofunk, that is written at half-tempo / halftime (as implied by the name), and influenced by many scenes such as Hip Hop and Trap. It is typically more experimental and diverse than other Drum & Bass subgenres. Two main currents distinguished themselves in the Halftime scene, one being a heavily neuro-influenced variant and, the other, a more experimental and ethereal variation.

Jump Up[]

A very energetic subgenre of Drum & Bass, characterized by the large use of more simplistic, less intricate melodies and a loud "wobbling" bassline. It has a lighter and warmer feel compared to other subgenres such as Neurofunk.

Liquid Drum & Bass[]

A more atmospheric side to traditional Dancefloor Drum & Bass, and somewhat similar to Atmospheric Drum & Bass, Liquid Drum & Bass makes use of more traditional Drum & Bass sound design, with vibrant melodic synths, busy percussion, and euphoric atmospheric elements while still keeping a more minimalist sound. The filtered reese bass is oftentimes accompanied by lighter, "tinier" and shorter drums. The subgenre places emphasis on the percussive structure to fill in the atmosphere.

Minimal Drum & Bass[]

Minimal Drum & Bass is, as the name would suggest, a subgenre of Drum & Bass which strips down the sound as far as it can go without wholly ceasing to be drum and bass. These tracks generally remain close to tempos of around 170bpm, but almost every other aspect of the music contrasts highly with contemporary trends in Drum & Bass; the closest similarities lie with Liquid Drum and Bass, with both making use of the same type of sharp and clear production. The genre takes far more from dubstep and future garage, with very sparse production and a restrained feel.

Neurofunk[]

A subgenre of Drum & Bass that spawned from Techstep. It can be considered one of the darkest forms of Drum & Bass, and makes use of heavy reese basses and snares layered with higher pitched impact sounds. Neurofunk features cold, dark, "sterile", heavily sci-fi themed atmospheres, fusing intricate syncopated rhythms with complex sound design chains. Among the staples of neuro sound design are included intense notch and bandpass filtering, detuning, heavy phaser alteration, liberal amounts of aggressive distortion / saturation, vocoding and multiband compression, coupled with copious amounts of resampling. "Sine compression" (a term popularized by Upscale Recordings' co-founder and artist, Frequent) is one of the well known techniques used to achieve the typical "wet", "squelchy", harmonically rich, boomy and distorted sound. The subgenre often employs short but snappy, hard hitting, sharp transient drums with the occasional metallic touch.

Techstep[]

Techstep is characterized by its futuristic and dark atmosphere influenced by science fiction. It makes use of deeper basslines, industrial foley and tambourine segments, very clean, polished breakbeat drum patterns, and special atmospheric synths, like pads, accompanied by deep bass to create a robust structure. The accent in this subgenre is placed on creating very deep, dark, off-putting, mystical landscapes. Techstep usually features less intricate and more repetitive patterns than Neurofunk, with more of an emphasis on the slower progression of a minimalistic main bass "melody", enhanced by uplifters and downshifters.

Trancestep[]

Trancestep is a fusion of Trance's melodies and structures with the fast tempo and breakbeats of Drum & Bass.


[ vte ] Alphabetical List of Drum & Bass Songs (Genre)
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VagrantValhallaVexVirtualityVoyage
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