Poll: Dubstep. Music or not music?

rvbnut

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Jan 3, 2011
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My friends and I have been having a heated discussion whether dubstep is actually music created by musicians or if it is just a bunch of noise mashed together by people with too much time on their hands.

So, what do my fellow escapists think of dubstep?

EDIT: I should probably mention that I quite enjoy dubstep. It has to be done right (i.e. clean) but most I don't mind.

Also, this is probably the best cover of a dubstep song I have ever heard:

 

Pandalisk

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Jan 25, 2009
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"Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence"

So yeah its music, question here should be is it good music?

I like Liquid Dubstep anyway, though how they name the different dubsteps is beyond me
 

Froggy Slayer

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Jul 13, 2012
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No, it's music. I dislike it, but I'm not so narcissistic as to believe that the only things that are music are the things that I like.
 

Jazoni89

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Dec 24, 2008
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It depends on what style of dubstep you are talking about.

If it's the original Two-Step British style then I would say yes. I do love me some Burial.

If it's the mainstream American Brostep, then that's debatable depending on the person.
 

Tragedy's Rebellion

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Feb 21, 2010
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Music is about artistry, creativity, knowledge and performing a piece with grace and skill. I'd compare dubstep to a child's drawing, it's still a *painting*, but you wouldn't put it in an art gallery ;d (average child, not some wunderkind)
 

DoPo

"You're not cleared for that."
Jan 30, 2012
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Yes, it is. If somebody doesn't like it, that doesn't revoke its status.
 

Shadowstar38

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Jul 20, 2011
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Yes, it's music. This same argument is had with rap. As long as it has qualities of pitch, tempo, melody, and for songs that have vocals, some kind of lyrics. It's music. Plain and simple. Rather or not that music is good is another story.

I've heard people that listen to dubstep complain that a certain dubstep track they're listening to sounds repeatative. So the "bunch of noise mashed together by people with too much time on their hands" is the dubstep equivalent to any artist in X genre that you like that makes horrible music in that genre.
 
Dec 14, 2009
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Do I think dubstep is music?


Why yes, yes I do :D


Sturgeon's Law applies as much to dubstep than any other type of music, but when you find the good stuff, it's really good stuff.
 

WoW Killer

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Mar 3, 2012
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I lol'd. Not a proper IRL out-loud lol, but the kind of lol you use as a reply to pretty much everything that could potentially be described as mildly amusing while not having another appropriate response. I think the side of my mouth might have curled ever so slightly. So yeah. Fun.

I don't like it, but of course it's music. Don't be silly.
 

SlamDunc

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Aug 17, 2012
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I suppose it is technically music but I do not think it deserves to be considered music any more than the noise a dial-up modem makes should be considered music.

Edit: A cookie for anyone who an make a cool sounding song with nothing but that sound.
 

EscapeGoat_v1legacy

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Aug 20, 2008
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Absolutely. Just because some people don't like the sound, it doesn't make it not music. Admittedly, I don't like dubstep, but it of course it is music.

Finally, wub wub wub.
 

an annoyed writer

Exalted Lady of The Meep :3
Jun 21, 2012
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My friends and I are so nerdy that the first thing we usually say when we hear some particularly bad dubstep is "music.exe has stopped working". And this is from a few nutjobs that absolutely love electronic music. It's when a song actually seems to be doing something good until it really fucks up with the whole "generic bass drop, add in random noises and cuts at random intervals" thing where it starts to really piss me off. Like the Bombers Over Ibiza mix on the Dark Knight Rises Soundtrack. Great buildup, but as soon as you get to the bass drop it kinda shits itself and dies. As you can tell, I'm not much of a fan, though it may just be that I've been exposed to more American Brostep than I feel safe to admit.
 

JochemHippie

Trippin' balls man.
Jan 9, 2012
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There's stuff I will refuse to call music...
Looking some commercial junk.

But for the most part, anything goes.
 

GoaThief

Reinventing the Spiel
Feb 2, 2012
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I think it's because nustep (dislike the term brostep, it's not exactly accurate) has largely got big thanks to the internet and the USA's re-embracing of electronic music in general.

Of course it's music, you may not like it -I'm not a big fan of nustep- but it's certainly not anything else but music. It'd be more interesting to hear if people regard the following as music;

 

omega 616

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May 1, 2009
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Pandalisk said:
"Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence"
You could have just described anything from the chatter of a waiting room to the cars passing on a motorway to the sound of typing in an office ...

On topic. When I was at school we were taught about musical instruments, among which was not the decks or the computer! It takes absolutely fuck all skill to make dubstep, all it requires is money for the equipment and a taste similar to everybody else's (or a majority at least).

You could spend 1,000 hours perfecting the "song" then all you have to do at a live performance is press play.

I define anything as art (or in this case music) as something which takes skill to do, such as playing a guitar in time with everybody else in the band. Take art for example, I wouldn't consider a white canvass with different coloured horizontal stripes art 'cos any fucker can do that! I would call the Mona Lisa art 'cos that is a skillful thing.

The only exception I have to dubstep not being music is beardyman, who does something called live looping. He makes a sound, records it, loops it makes another sound, records it, loops it, layers it over the first sound, then repeats till he has a full song going.

That takes skill to do! This isn't live looping but it is harder to do.


EDIT: After being quoted many times about my opinion, I can safely say not one of you has changed it.
 

IamQ

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Mar 29, 2009
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For christs sake... just because you don't liket the music, doesn't mean it's not music.
 

Scrustle

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Apr 30, 2011
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Yes it is music. It's terrible music, but it's music.

Through my life when I've told myself certain things don't count as music (or sometimes other art forms) and then tried to justify why I tried to say that I've always found I'm talking out of my arse. I just didn't want to count these things as music because I thought they sounded awful. They are still awful, but they are music. There's nothing wrong with calling something music even if it's as bad as dubstep, but just to say it's not music simply because it's bad is arrogant and juvenile.

I define music as sound which follows a regular tempo which usually contains a variation of pitches and tones which form a melody. I say "usually" because this is a point I found myself stressing over when I was trying to justify not including a certain genre as music. I said that music should always have pitch, tone and melody, but if that was true then it would omit all music that is purely percussive, like tribal drumming and such. I didn't want to do that, so I had to accept that what I detested was in fact music. The same can be said for dubstep.
 

Aerosteam

Get out while you still can
Sep 22, 2011
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If it has a melody, (it may be hard to believe it but yes, dubstep does have a melody) then it's a song.

This is a stupid question.
 

w9496

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Jun 28, 2011
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It's just as much music as making fart noises with your hands and armpits.

It could be called music, or it could be called a semi full of keyboards and drums driving off of a cliff for 3-5 minutes.