Intelligent Dance Music, the name might be replete with irony, but the concept altered the course of electronic composition. This introspective style splintered off the early 90s rave scene, instead favouring unique production techniques and orienting itself towards home listening. It encompasses a very niche market, and remains stubbornly hard to define, yet its influence can be heard throughout modern music...
The inception of Intelligent Dance Music (commonly referred to as IDM) as a subgenre can essentially be pinned to 1992 (FACT, 2014). It was then that Warp Records, an English independent record label, released a compilation album that would change the course of electronic music (Warp, 2019). Titled Artificial Intelligence, it featured some of electronic music's biggest names, though as a point of difference encouraged listeners to 'stay on the couch'. This becomes evident when looking at its iconic cover (pictured above) associated with the album's tagline, "Electronic listening music from Warp". The album art features a digitally rendered living room with an android slumped in an armchair in front of a stereo drifting off in stoned-out reverie. Subtly scattered on the ground are albums from Kraftwerk and Pink Floyd, an indication of the compilation’s modus operandi: this was electronic music for the home, not the rave – a notion that was largely foreign 27 years ago. It seems only fitting that to understand the roots of IDM one should first listen to this seminal album.
In the same year, Aphex Twin (contributing Artificial Intelligence's opening track under alias The Dice Man) later released his first full-length album (a regular rotation of mine - heard below) which cemented electronic music as a listening experience as well as a dance floor filler. Ultimately it was these two albums that opened up the space for a new kind of sonic experience, carving out a niche market that benefitted extraordinarily well from the rise of the internet.
It was the internet that really enabled this genre to flourish; even its awful acronym is thanks to an early 90s mailing list on web 1.0. The IDM List as it was called, was used as a platform to discuss the growing set of artists pursuing experimental forms of dance music (FACT, 2014). Music enthusiasts Alan Parry and Brian Behlendorf originally created the online message board in 1993 to discuss the output on Aphex Twin's own Rephlex Records. Quickly though, they decided to expand its charter to include similar music popping up, or else music made with similar approaches which might fall under different genres. In an archived email (B. Behlendorf, personal communication, August 3, 1993) Behlendorf revealed that they picked the word "intelligent" because it had already appeared on Artificial Intelligence, and because it connoted being something beyond just music for dancing (perhaps the inspiration also came from Rephlex regarding their previously uncategorised style as "Braindance"). Although many, including those who frequented the list, regularly comment on ironic stupidity of the name, eventually it was being used so much that everybody stopped fighting it and gave in.
The internet may have been in its infancy, but IDM was very much at home in a virtual world, and it was this embrace of new methods that became its cornerstone:
The development and proliferation of cheap (often free) music production software enabled a new wave of artists
The internet and The IDM List provided a platform of communication for a previously unconnected group
Early, buggy file-sharing programs allowed sharing or trading of tracks internationally
IRC (Internet Relay Chat) supplied an avenue for artists to share techniques and connect with labels
All of this, coupled with a desire from many of the artists to outdo their peers, resulted in the unique, experimental aesthetic that IDM has come to be known by (FACT, 2014). Artists that appeared in the first discussions on the list included Autchre, Atom Heart, LFO, The Future Sound of London, The Orb, as well as Rephlex Records artists such as Aphex Twin, μ-ziq and Luke Vibert. It even included now-renowned artists such as Orbital, Plastikman, and Björk (Davies, 2018).
By the end of 1996, 'Phase 2' of IDM had arrived, with artists and labels rushing in to supply the demand, the taste market, that Warp had stirred into existence (Reynolds, 2017). Around this time labels like Schematic Records and Planet Mu were among the usual topics of discussion, along with Skam Records featuring Boards of Canada; an artist that germinated in this discourse and has since developed a cult-like following. Interestingly, all of these artists and labels were from the UK. Consequently most of them knew each other socially (or at the very least e-socially) and often collaborated.
Whilst the first phase of IDM tended to be strong on melody, atmosphere, and emotion, the beats, while modelled on house and techno, often lacked the power or consistency required by DJ's. The second phase however, tended to be far more imposing and inventive with its drums. The mood shifted from misty-eyed reverie towards antic excess. Long-time music journalist Simon Reynolds (Reynolds, 2017) attributes this largely as a response to the emergence of jungle, "with its complex but physically coercive rhythmic innovations". The evolution of IDM tying in with jungle resulted in it still being unlikely to get played by main-room DJ's; fantastically maintaining its unique appeal whilst changing its trajectory. By now though, the genre had spawned its own circuit of "electronica" clubs on both sides of the Atlantic, while the biggest artists could tour as concert acts.
Phase 3 is where it begins to break down as structurally coherent, and is arguably no longer IDM (Reynolds, 2017). By this stage, it had become a melting pot of experimental ideas, drawing on numerous influences, often favouring the very things that IDM originally defined itself against. This early 2000's phase resulted in styles like breakcore and glitchcore, which had an international following and, for the first time in IDM's history, a strong creative basis in the United States. Here artists often made fun of first-wave IDM's Anglophilia, though resulting music often deviated far from it's foundations into other subgenres. Though it was around this time that IDM pulled of its peak achievement of mainstream penetration when Radiohead released Kid A: an album which Thom Yorke prepared by buying the entire Warp back catalog, and one where it's influence can be easily distinguished.
Almost two decades later and a lot of the original IDM crew continues to release sporadically inspired work. Autechre's discography has been incredibly consistent, Aphex Twin recently released new material after a hiatus, and Boards of Canada remain a treasure. Overall though it seems that IDM as a scene and a sound doesn't really exist anymore. Ultimately, the further we get from the Artificial Intelligence series, the harder it is to say who exactly is IDM among the fractured, ever-expanding array of electronic music sounds (Cardew, 2017). It is however still used to categorise any music that wants to break out of the formal structures of straightforward 'club music', and incredibly its spectral traces can be tracked all across contemporary music (Electronic Beats, 2017). Take for example Kanye's Real Friends, whose digital emotions serve only as a reminder of the 90's experimentalist sounds which have now been fully woven into the fabric of our musical lives.
While its peak has long since passed, IDM echoes on around us, often in the unlikeliest of places. Artists like Skrillex, Flying Lotus, Travis Scott, and Objekt are still referencing heavy influence from this era. It is a genre that has given the world a stupefying immensity of fantastic music, and its reverberations are yet to dim.
Stay Tuned
- TA
REFERENCES
Cardew, B. (2017). Machines of loving grace: how Artificial Intelligence helped techno grow up. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/jul/03/artificial-intelligence-compilation-album-warp-records-idm-intelligent-dance-music
Davies, S. (2018). The IDM List Gave Intelligent Dance Music Its Name and Geeky Legacy. Retrieved from https://www.vice.com/en_au/article/7xq4ga/idm-list-25-year-anniversary-warp-hyperreal-2018
Electronic Beats. (2017). Listen To The Classic Album That Made Dance Music Intelligent. Retrieved from https://www.electronicbeats.net/the-feed/listen-classic-album-made-dance-music-intelligent/
FACT. (2014). The 100 greatest IDM tracks. Retrieved from https://www.factmag.com/2014/09/22/the-100-greatest-idm-tracks-100-51/
Reynolds, S. (2017). Party in my mind: the endless half-lives of IDM. Retrieved from https://pitchfork.com/features/lists-and-guides/10011-the-50-best-idm-albums-of-all-time/
Warp. (2019). Artificial Intelligence. Retrieved from https://warp.net/releases/11548-various-artists-artificial-intelligence
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