STVRCHLD Records

Bass house is a strain of house music that pairs a four-on-the-floor groove with aggressive, highly designed basslines drawn from UK bass, bassline, and electro house. It typically runs around 124–130 BPM, emphasizing tight drum programming, swung garage-influenced shuffles, and drops centered on modulated mid-bass riffs and weighty subs. Producers favor gritty synth timbres, call-and-response bass phrases, minimal vocals (often chopped one-shots or rap ad-libs), and DJ-friendly intros/outros. The result is club-focused, high-impact music that bridges UK underground sensibilities with North American festival energy.

Chillstep is a mellow, melodic offshoot of dubstep that emphasizes atmosphere, emotion, and cinematic sound design over aggressive bass modulation. It retains dubstep’s half-time rhythmic feel but replaces abrasive wobbles with warm subs, airy pads, and gently evolving textures. Typical tracks sit around 140 BPM (often felt as a spacious 70 BPM half-time groove), blending downtempo pacing with ambient spaciousness. You’ll often hear reverb-laden vocals, delicate piano or guitar lines, soft arpeggios, and field recordings, all arranged to create a soothing, introspective mood rather than a dancefloor peak.

Cyber metal is a fusion of industrial metal’s machine-like riffing with electronic music’s synthetic textures, sequencers, and cyberpunk aesthetics. It typically features tightly gated, down‑tuned guitars, precision double‑kick patterns (often reinforced with drum machines), and an array of synths ranging from EBM basslines to trance leads and cinematic pads. Vocals alternate between aggressive harsh styles and processed cleans or vocoder for a futuristic feel. Lyrical themes revolve around AI, dystopia, transhumanism, surveillance, and human–machine conflict, presented with a cold, high‑tech production sheen. Sonically, it bridges metal’s rhythmic punch and heaviness with techno/trance momentum and electro‑industrial sound design, creating a distinctly “mechanized” atmosphere.

Darkstep is a sinister, aggressive strain of drum and bass that emphasizes dystopian atmospheres, heavy breakbeats, and distorted bass design. It trades the jazzy or soulful edges of earlier DnB for a colder, horror-tinged palette built from reese-style basses, detuned pads, and metallic, industrial textures. Typically clocking in around 170 BPM, darkstep tracks feature hard-hitting kicks and snares framed by chopped “Amen”-style breaks, rapid edits, and tense build‑and‑drop structures. The aesthetic draws on sci‑fi and horror cinema, cyberpunk, and post‑industrial culture, producing a claustrophobic sense of menace and momentum suited to late‑night, underground dancefloors.

Dubstep is a bass‑centric electronic dance music genre that emerged in South London in the early 2000s. It is typically around 140 BPM and is defined by a half‑time rhythmic feel, sub‑heavy basslines, sparse yet impactful drums, and a strong emphasis on space, tension, and sound system weight. Hallmark traits include syncopated kick patterns, snares on the third beat of the bar, swung/shuffly hi‑hats inherited from UK garage, and modulated low‑frequency bass (“wobbles”) shaped with LFOs, filters, and distortion. Influences from dub reggae (echo, delay, and minimalism), jungle/drum & bass (bass science and sound system culture), and 2‑step garage (rhythmic swing and shuffles) are central. The style ranges from deep, meditative “dub” aesthetics (often called deep dubstep) to more aggressive, midrange‑driven variants that later informed brostep and festival bass. Atmosphere, negative space, and subwoofer translation are as important as melody or harmony.

EDM (Electronic Dance Music) refers to the mainstream, festival-oriented wave of electronic dance styles that rose to global prominence in the early 2010s. It emphasizes high-energy drops, ear-catching toplines, and crowd-pleasing arrangements designed for large stages and mass audiences. Musically, EDM typically sits around 124–130 BPM with a strong four-on-the-floor kick, wide supersaw leads, bright plucks, and heavily sidechained pads and basses for a pumping feel. Tracks are structured around tension-and-release: intros and builds lead to explosive drops, followed by breakdowns that rebuild energy. Vocals and pop-style songwriting frequently appear, enabling crossover success on radio and streaming platforms.

Electro house is a high-energy branch of house music characterized by distorted, buzzing bass leads, crisp four‑on‑the‑floor drums, and dramatic, festival-ready drops. It typically runs around 125–130 BPM, favoring aggressive, sawtooth-based synth timbres, heavy sidechain compression, and big, riff-like hooks over lush chord progressions. Production emphasizes powerful low-end, gritty midrange textures, noise sweeps and risers, and tightly structured builds and breakdowns that set up explosive drops. While rooted in house and electro traditions, its sound design borrows from techno’s intensity and big beat’s punch, resulting in a bold, modern, and club-focused aesthetic.

Hardstep is a mid-1990s strain of drum and bass that tightened jungle’s frenetic breakbeats into tougher, more rigid, "stepping" drum patterns. Where early jungle leaned on chopped Amen edits and reggae signifiers, hardstep foregrounds punchy two‑step rhythms, heavyweight sub‑bass, and gritty midrange tones. The style is club-focused and percussive, emphasizing forward drive and impact over lush atmospheres. Hip‑hop’s influence is felt in the head‑nod swing of the drums and occasional MCing, but the overall aesthetic is darker and more industrial than classic ragga‑jungle. Hardstep helped bridge the gap from jungle to the colder, techier forms of late‑’90s drum and bass.

Melodic dubstep is a song-oriented, emotionally expressive branch of dubstep that blends the genre’s half-time drums and sound-design-heavy drops with lush chord progressions, cinematic atmospheres, and vocal-led songwriting. It typically sits around 140 BPM (often written and perceived in half-time), using supersaw stacks, plucky arps, and wide pads drawn from trance and progressive house, while retaining dubstep’s punchy kicks, snare-on-3 backbeat, and bass-focused drops. Compared to aggressive brostep, melodic dubstep prioritizes memorable toplines, warm harmonies, and dramatic builds that culminate in cathartic yet tasteful drops. It often features lyrical themes of longing, hope, and resilience, making it common in vocal collaborations and festival-ready singalongs.

Melodic techno is a strain of techno that centers emotive, memorable melodies while retaining the hypnotic, steady pulse of club-oriented techno. It typically sits between 120 and 128 BPM, employs long-form arrangements, and favors minor-key progressions, evolving arpeggios, and lush pads over aggressive distortion. The style blends techno’s linear groove with the harmonic storytelling of progressive house and the suspended euphoria of trance. The overall palette is sleek and cinematic: warm analog leads, rolling sub-driven basslines, crisp 909/707-inspired drums, and extensive use of reverb, delay, and automation to create tension-and-release without resorting to maximal drops. Compared with big-room or festival trance, melodic techno tends to be darker and more restrained; compared with progressive house, it is often more minimal in its drum writing yet more insistent in its ostinatos and motifs. Its mood is frequently melancholic yet uplifting, making it effective both in late-night clubs and on large festival stages.

Pop is a broad, hook-driven style of popular music designed for wide appeal. It emphasizes memorable melodies, concise song structures, polished vocals, and production intended for radio, charts, and mass media. While pop continually absorbs elements from other styles, its core remains singable choruses, accessible harmonies, and rhythmic clarity. Typical forms include verse–pre-chorus–chorus, frequent use of bridges and middle-eights, and ear-catching intros and outros. Pop is not defined by a single instrumentation. It flexibly incorporates acoustic and electric instruments, drum machines, synthesizers, and increasingly digital production techniques, always in service of the song and the hook.

Psychedelic is an umbrella term for music that seeks to evoke, emulate, or accompany altered states of consciousness through sound, arrangement, and studio technique. It emphasizes timbral color, drones, modal harmony, surreal or mystical lyrics, and immersive production, often using tape manipulation, extended effects, and non‑Western instruments (notably from Indian classical traditions). The result ranges from delicate, dreamlike textures to dense, kaleidoscopic soundscapes intended to expand perception and dissolve conventional song form.

Riddim dubstep is a minimalist, loop-driven branch of dubstep that emphasizes hypnotic repetition, half‑time drums, and lurching mid‑range bass motifs. Instead of flashy, constantly changing sound design, it focuses on a few tightly sculpted “wub” phrases that evolve through modulation, filtering, and subtle rhythmic variation. Rooted in UK sound‑system culture and the Jamaican concept of a reusable “riddim,” the style typically sits around 140 BPM, pairing a powerful sub with syncopated, percussive bass stabs. The overall feel is dark, bouncy, and relentlessly dance‑oriented—built for double‑drops, blends, and long DJ transitions on large rigs.

Rock is a broad family of popular music centered on amplified instruments, a strong backbeat, and song forms that foreground riffs, choruses, and anthemic hooks. Emerging from mid‑20th‑century American styles like rhythm & blues, country, and gospel-inflected rock and roll, rock quickly expanded in scope—absorbing folk, blues, and psychedelic ideas—while shaping global youth culture. Core sonic markers include electric guitar (often overdriven), electric bass, drum kit emphasizing beats 2 and 4, and emotive lead vocals. Rock songs commonly use verse–chorus structures, blues-derived harmony, and memorable melodic motifs, ranging from intimate ballads to high‑energy, stadium‑sized performances.