When your songs are genre-bending wat
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@tawny249 Jan 2022
So I realize this is probably a more common problem than I think, but I feel like what I write kinda defies genre a lot of the time. I call myself a filker, so I guess what I write is filk, but aside from a group that is based entirely on self-identification, I'm kind of lost.
One year I thought it was mythpunk, but that seems to have fallen a bit by the wayside. Another it was more just straight-up folk, except that several of my songs were definitely techno-inspired. I change general topics and styles enough that I'm starting to confuse myself.
Given that I don't ever plan on being a professional songwriter, I'm not sure it matters, but is genre overrated? Can I just call music a lovely mess of pleasing noises and be done with it? Am I analyzing the crap out of this unnecessarily (yes. the answer to that one is yes)?
Take this word salad wherever you will. :P -
@metalfoot Jan 2022
Yeah. I feel this. I think of my music as being largely informed by my love for rock music but I do all sorts of stuff and I don't pigeonhole easily except for 'singer-songwriter' which says nothing about the music and everything about who is performing it.
Just do what you love and love what you do! :D -
@tawny249 Jan 2022
Yeah, "singer-songwriter" is basically a euphemism for "this person writes and performs music and we don't know what to call it." :D
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@dragondreams Jan 2022
I usually let @ajna1960 tell me what genre any particular track of mine turns out to be. I have no clue about such things! :-D
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@mandolinda Jan 2022
I thought that it was important when other people asked me to put a # on songs. I dont think so anymore. @crutherford said I was a punk once. I thought that was a cool label for me (at +65)
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@nadine Jan 2022
Sticking to a genre has been a trap for me and my creativity. I've always listened to nearly all kinds of music. Now I call myself multi-genre. I don't care if I write pop, metal or electro. The only downside is that you're not part of any scene and not everybody understands that you don't have one style but a dozen. But I still tag my songs cause not everybody is open for every genre.
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@zecoop Jan 2022
Absolutely all over and in-between genre here. I often cop out and say Indie-Rock or Indie-Folk, since that can mean anything, but I have songs that fit no specific genre I can think of many times too. :)
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@petemurphy Jan 2022
"is genre overrated?"
Yes.
I made an album a couple of years back, called "Die, Genre, Die!", because I hate the concept of 'genre'.
Diversity and self indulgence are my closest musical friends. -
@bootlegger Jan 2022
I personally seem to fall between a few different cracks genre-wise. And it doesn't help that every album I do seems to push or pull in a slightly different direction. I could be anything from folk, indie rock, post-rock, Post-emo, post-gaze, prog-ish. Idk. I'm thinking of making up a new genre and calling myself Slow-punk. Like a post-post-punk or something. Is there a post-modern genre? Haha I literally have the hardest time finding a place to fit in. Which for me isn't a huge deal other than I don't really know how to promote myself properly.
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@timfatchen Jan 2022
Sometimes I wonder if the modern tendency to split into multiple subsubsubsubsub-genres and then treat each splinter as a distinct genre is simply the old behavioural "if you don't know what it is, it demonstrates my superiority and I sneer upon you" syndrome!
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@timfatchen Jan 2022
Incidentally that fall back "singer-songwriter" always conjures images of singer with guitar suspended from shoulder strap. Really hard to pull that off with a grand piano...
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@coolparadiso Jan 2022
Oh [@timfatchen] i had a wonderful vision of you carrying that grand piano! I just say i make music, if pushed i say more popish style not classical or jazz.
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@celineellis Jan 2022
I totally blur the lines between genres - I find it difficult to categorise my music in one genre and honestly find it so difficult when uploading my new releases to pick a genre for streaming services to put me in. You could say i was Genre Non Binary
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@mikeb Jan 2022
Songs that blur the genre lines are sometimes hard to place on playlists. I just call all my stuff 'acoustic-electric folk-rock'. No one knows what that really means, so they have to listen!
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@ajna1960 Jan 2022
Personally, as someone who defines genres etc for clients as part of my sideline, I think genre only matters when it matters. The rest of the time STUFF IT !!!
When does it matter - If you're trying to get on Alex Rainbird's Indie Folk playlists... Or when you are listing your songs/tracks on a platform such as Songtradr and a prospective client is going to enter the genre they are looking for... and so on.
The rest of the time, if you are making music without a genre leaning purpose, then I don't think it matters, definitely not ! -
@ayehahmur Jan 2022
@timfatchen That's interesting because in *my* head the image of singer-songwriter has always been someone hunched over a piano (eg Gilbert O'Sullivan or Carole King)!!!
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@rebeleardeafcult Jan 2022
Everyone thinks their own music is really special and therefore too amazing to be categorised, when in fact an outsider listening would give it a genre instantly and also say that's pretty ordinary stuff.
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@adforperu Jan 2022
Ahh I dunno, I have a few vibrant sounds in my locker
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@mosley Jan 2022
Hahaha @rebeleardeafcult that’s a funny way to put it, but it’s so true!
I think understanding what genre you’re actually trying to work in helps focus the direction of a project.
Most small micro-genres can easily fit under the larger umbrella of more commonly conversational genre names. -
@tawny249 Jan 2022
@rebeleardeafcult Lol, I wasn't saying that my confusion made my songs amazing or superior in any way. I was saying it made me confused. XD I'm guessing most of my songs would classify as folk-y to an outsider, but I do have a few really weird outliers with more rock/metal/techno vibes, and it just throws me for a loop when trying to say "x is MY genre".
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@billwhite51 Jan 2022
genre is short for generic. it is a good thing not to waste your talent on genre, re, generic, songs. let each song determine its own form. if you are writing genre, you are just filling in blanks.
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@candle Jan 2022
I have to agree with @petemurphy & @billwhite51. Sure, I gravitate towards the umbrella genre of "Rock", only because I play an electric guitar. I find "genre" only helps to classify your music for others. I mean, really, that's all it does. When someone asks you "What kind of music do you make?" they don't want a thesis on music theory & recording techniques. A simple "I dabble in experimental guitar-based music" (as simple a reply as that actually is ;) ) often suffices.
See You In The Shadows… -
@fuzzy Jan 2022
But...but... @rebeleardeafcult, my own music *IS* special and amazing!
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@rebeleardeafcult Jan 2022
I think some people misunderstand me here. I only offer an insight into difficulties in (for example) choosing a genre when a songwriter naturally develops a big personal involvement with their songs.
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@rebeleardeafcult Jan 2022
@fuzzy I look forward to hearing your special and amazing music on February 1st!
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@pbtaylorjr Jan 2022
Genre is an invention. We as people like to classify things. It's easier to find what you are looking for when you put things into groups. (making "genre" also more of a marketing thing.)
You are you and your sound is you. It might sound like Eminem's vocal style over Beethoven's piano accompanied by Travis Barker's drums - but that doesn't make it rap, classical, or pop-punk. Or maybe it does. Who gives a shit?
If you need to tell someone what you sound like without having the ability to just play them a song and "I'm a country music artist" won't cut it maybe "I sing about Nintendo over acoustic guitar" will work?
But if you are really pressed just call yourself "indie." It's a word that's lost all meaning anyway. -
@billwhite51 Jan 2022
any song i write can be adapted to whatever style is convenient. i the 80s, i wrote a lot of rap, but played them as rockabilly songs. in 78, i took a handful of sngs i was playing on acoustic guitar in coffeehouses, started a band , sped up the songs and played them in punk clubs.
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@yam655 Jan 2022
I like to say that my improvised acapella stuff taps in to the sort of music that used to be super common, back before radio and the phonograph made it easy for people to hear "good" musicians.
These days I call the genre "folk acapella" -- which is a genre title you're free to use as well as the "folk" is more "of the people" than a reference to the current folk genre.
Hundreds of years ago my type of music still had a genre name. When the only genres were "sacred" and "vulgar" my type of music was vulgar. Feel free to preface any of your songs with, "Back in the day, they called this vulgar music." -
@elainedimasi Jan 2022
Nodding my head in agreement with both @rebeleardeafcult and @billwhite51 . I love seeing how a song can be repurposed into different styles, it's especially interesting to me how one develops the phrasing and the spaces in the words.
As a listener, I care very much about "genre" and can personalize and interpret it for my listening.
I've trained a pandora station to play 80s new wave and post-punk for me, with surf guitar tracks thrown in for good measure. I want the algorithm to curate songs like those so when I turn it on that's what I get. The surf is in there because of a distinct experience I had. There's memories. And a new-wave-adjacent track produced in 2010 may not get to be in there, no matter what pandora says is in its dna. What comes out is still a really big variety of song types and singer styles.
I also have a yacht rock station. I also have a way to stream trance. I have something to feed me north/west african music, a mix of mandinka and blues. I don't want any of them to be shuffled together, and if the algorithm serves me up something unique, interesting, and special, I will try to put it into a station where I'll welcome that song making an appearance when I've decided to play that station.
So if I write and tag a song, I'm trying to help a listener who shares this attitude, I suppose. Of course for FAWM, sometimes I've just tagged them, #song. -
@judypie Jan 2022
I don’t know enough about music to be able to identify genre! Unless it’s one of the biggies. I think I can just about pick out rap :D Means I find it real hard to label my songs with anything other than singer-songwriter! Not because they’re special, just cos I have no idea what all the words mean! Surf? Folk? Indie? It’s all Greek to me :D