Indie dance is a term used for the genre of music combining elements of dance-pop (or other forms of electronic dance music such as house or techno) and indie pop. Indie dance music is typically predominantly electronic, with programmed beats from drum machines or sampled drum loops and sequenced synthesizer melodies, and thus musically very similar to commercial dance-pop. The indie element is most prevalent in the songwriting; unlike much dance music, indie dance typically contains lyrics, and, as in indie pop, these are often more thematically complex and/or less polished than those of commercial pop.
It could be argued that the seeds of indie dance were sown when New Order, inspired by Kraftwerk and the New York club scene, started combining sequenced electronic elements with their often dark and uncommercial lyrics. (Their best-selling single, "Blue Monday," is a prime example of this.) Other Manchester bands, such as the Stone Roses and the Happy Mondays continued the tradition of combining traditionally guitar-based indie music with electronic instrumentation and production; this culminated in the Madchester scene.
Indie dance gained in popularity after the Second Summer of Love, when the sounds of Acid House music had filtered through to and influenced the sounds of chart pop. Various people from a more indie background soon adapted the equipment and techniques of dance-pop, combining it with a more astute and less populistic songwriting sensibility. Well-known examples of this movement include Saint Etienne and Dubstar.
As both the financial costs and levels of musical virtuosity required to make passable-sounding electronic music drop under the influence of technological improvements, and people who grew up listening to electronic pop take up music, the electronic style epitomised by indie dance is increasingly becoming the mainstream of independent music, with the once dominant guitar-based form of pop that dominated low-budget independent recordings now becoming just another subgenre.
Alternative dance (known primarily as indiedance in the United Kingdom) is a term used for the genre of music combining elements of dance-pop (or other forms of electronic dance music such as house or techno) and alternative rock genres such as indie pop.
The indie element is most prevalent in the songwriting; unlike much dance music, alternative dance typically contains lyrics, and, as in indie pop or indie rock, these are often more thematically complex and/or less polished than those of commercial pop.
The seeds of alternative dance were sown when New Order, inspired by Kraftwerk and the New York club scene, started combining sequenced electronic elements with their brand of icy post-punk and often enigmatic lyrics.
Alternative Dance marries the underground sensibility and melodic song structure of alternative and indie rock with the electronic beats, synths and/or samples, and club orientation of post-disco dance music.
Those qualities put a more human face on alternative dance, as opposed to the more mechanized feel of much standard club/dance music; as a result, the performers are much more closely identified with their music, which often possesses a signature style, texture, or fusion of specific musical elements.
In addition to alternative rock, alternative dance was most heavily influenced by synth-pop, acid house, and trip-hop; each of those movements helped spawn a corresponding cachet of alternative dance artists, and had a major impact on Britain's late-'80s Madchester scene, as well as the pop crossover success of several indie-oriented trip-hop artists during the '90s.
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