All Music Guide to Electronica: The Definitive Guide to Electronic Music

by Vladimir Bogdanov

Miller Freeman's All Music Guide series has become both the industry standard and a popular success. The series has been redesigned and printed in a larger trim size for easier reading and handling. This comprehensive guide profiles the careers of hundreds of major artists such as Aphex Twin and the Prodigy, and reviews thousands of the best electronica recordings. Incisive essays explore electronica's widely varied subgenres.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction

Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

Reviews

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm sort of cruising my way through this book alphabetically, skimming to read about bands/artists that seem like they might be interesting to me.

I had started hearing about 'electronica' back in the '90s but was so far out of touch with trends in pop music at the time that I couldn't tell whether electronica meant Tangerine Dream & Kraftwerk clones, or acid house & techno bands, or...whatever. This is a great guide, and maybe the best part is the section in the back with genre definitions and 'family trees'. These show the connections (or lack thereof) among (e.g.) Seventies disco, Chicago house, 'hard house', drum 'n bass, jungle, gabber, techno, industrial, trance, illbient, dub (i.e., reggae dub), electronic, etc.

A must for the aging music geek who lost the thread around the time acid house & new jack swing disappeared.

[Kelvin Hayes · Rating 3 out of 5]

I contributed to this book.

[Axel Barceló · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is how electronica was understood by the end of the nineties, so some bands that we might consider important from that era are missing and some that are now forgotten are raved about. As usual, a little too heavy on rock bands