The title of this post is a mouthful, but for me, it’s a good description of what’s been cool and interesting in electronic music in the past few years. These genres share intertwined histories, and have recently come together in beautiful ways. Rooted in hip-hop, drum & bass, idm, garage, dub, experimental, and lots elsewhere, they’ve changed the definition of cutting-edge underground electronic music. The most established and interesting producers like Starkey, Joker, Rustie, Harmonic 313, Disrupt, Rusko, Martyn, 2562, Hudson Mohawke, edIT, Flying Lotus and Kode 9 (and Lazer Sword as mentioned by Lifter Baron’s recent post) all succeed because they blur the lines and have cultivated their own bass-heavy, beat freaking, experimental sound.

The documentary above is a few years old, but captures the vibe of the rise of dubstep, which is the most popular of these new-ish genres. Its fan base has exploded, while the creativity of its producers has surged. All the while, most other dance music has become a bit of a formulaic bummer. This is the state of the art.

If you want a taste of the real goods, check out these 2 half-hour mixes that helped propel the art forward last year: Joker’s mix from Skream’s radio show, and

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mix. Bad, bad tunes.