Editing Electronica (section)

== History ==
=== Early 1990s: Origins and UK scene ===
The original widespread use of the term "electronica" derives from the influential English [[experimental techno]] label New Electronica, which was one of the leading forces of the early [[1990s in music|1990s]] introducing and supporting dance-based [[electronic music]] oriented towards home listening rather than dance-floor play,<ref name="bogdanov" /> although the word "electronica" had already begun to be associated with [[synthesizer]] generated music as early as 1983, when a "UK Electronica Festival" was first held.<ref name="attritionrecollection">{{cite web |url=http://www.attrition.co.uk/history/recollection.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061008105131/http://www.attrition.co.uk/history/recollection.htm|archive-date=8 October 2006|title=Attrition reminiscence |last=Levermore |first=Gary |work=[[Attrition (band)|Attrition]] |date=March 2000 |accessdate=17 October 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Gregory, Andy |title=The International Who's Who in Popular Music 2002 |year=2002|publisher=Taylor & Francis Group |page=466 |isbn=9781857431612}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=International Who's who in Music Popular music. Vol. two|year=2000 |publisher=Melrose Press |page=429 |isbn=0948875070}}</ref> At that time electronica became known as "electronic listening music", also becoming more or less synonymous to [[ambient techno]] and [[intelligent techno]], and was considered distinct from other emerging genres such as [[Jungle music|jungle]] and [[trip hop]].<ref name="bogdanov" />

Electronica artists that would later become commercially successful began to record in the late [[1980s in music|1980s]], before the term had come into common usage, including for example [[the Prodigy]], [[Fatboy Slim]], [[Daft Punk]], [[the Chemical Brothers]], [[the Crystal Method]], [[Moby]], [[Underworld (band)|Underworld]] and [[Faithless]].<ref name="wired-method">"Crystal Method...grew from an obscure club-culture due to one of the most recognizable acts in electronica, ...", page 90, ''Wired: Musicians' Home Studios : Tools & Techniques of the Musical Mavericks'', Megan Perry, Backbeat Books Music/Songbooks 2004, {{ISBN|0-87930-794-3}}</ref>

=== Mid-1990s: Effect on mainstream popular music ===
Around the mid-1990s, with the success of the [[big beat]]-sound exemplified by the Chemical Brothers and the Prodigy in the UK, and spurred by the attention from mainstream artists, including [[Madonna]] in her collaboration with [[William Orbit]] on her album ''[[Ray of Light]]''<ref name="billboard1" /> and Australian singer [[Dannii Minogue]] with her 1997 album ''[[Girl (Dannii Minogue album)|Girl]]'',<ref>[[Girl (Dannii Minogue album)]]</ref> music of this period began to be produced with a higher budget, increased technical quality, and with more layers than most other forms of [[dance music]], since it was backed by major record labels and [[MTV]] as the "next big thing".<ref name="technoculture2">"Electronica reached new heights within the culture of rave and techno music in the 1990s." Page 185, ''Music and Technoculture'', Rene T. A. Lysloff, Tandem Library Books, 2003, {{ISBN|0-613-91250-0}}</ref>

According to a 1997 ''[[Billboard (magazine)|Billboard]]'' article, "the union of the club community and [[Independent record label|independent labels]]" provided the experimental and trend-setting environment in which electronica acts developed and eventually reached the mainstream. It cites American labels such as [[Astralwerks]] (the Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim, [[the Future Sound of London]], [[Fluke (band)|Fluke]]), [[Moonshine Music|Moonshine]] ([[DJ Keoki]]), [[Sims Records|Sims]], and City of Angels (the Crystal Method) for playing a significant role in discovering and marketing artists who became popularized in the electronica scene.<ref name="billboard" />

Madonna and [[Björk]] are said{{by whom|date=August 2016}} to be responsible for electronica's thrust into mainstream culture, with their albums ''Ray of Light'' (Madonna),<ref name="billboard1">{{cite magazine |url=http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/57759/us-radio-hangs-up-on-madonna |title= Billboard: Madonna Hung Out on the Radio |publisher=VNU Media |magazine=Billboard |date=July 2006}}</ref> ''[[Post (Björk album)|Post]]'' and ''[[Homogenic]]'' (Björk).

=== Late 1990s: American inclusion ===
In 1997, the North American mainstream music industry adopted and to some extent manufactured ''electronica'' as an umbrella term encompassing styles such as [[techno]], big beat, [[drum and bass]], trip hop, [[downtempo]], and [[ambient music|ambient]], regardless of whether it was curated by indie labels catering to the "underground" nightclub and [[rave]] scenes,<ref name="billboard">{{Cite news | last=Flick | first=Larry | date=May 24, 1997 | title=Dancing to the beat of an indie drum | magazine=[[Billboard (magazine)|Billboard]] | volume=109 | issue=21 | pages=70–71 | issn=0006-2510 }}</ref><ref name="MIT">{{cite journal |quote=The glitch genre arrived on the back of the electronica movement, an umbrella term for alternative, largely dance-based electronic music (including house, techno, electro, drum'n'bass, ambient) that has come into vogue in the past five years. Most of the work in this area is released on labels peripherally associated with the dance music market, and is therefore removed from the contexts of academic consideration and acceptability that it might otherwise earn. Still, in spite of this odd pairing of fashion and art music, the composers of glitch often draw their inspiration from the masters of 20th-century music who they feel best describe its lineage. |title=The Aesthetics of Failure: 'Post-Digital' Tendencies in Contemporary Computer Music |author=Kim Cascone |author-link=Kim Cascone |url=http://subsol.c3.hu/subsol_2/contributors3/casconetext.html |journal=Computer Music Journal |volume=24 |issue=4 |date=Winter 2002 |publisher=MIT Press}}</ref> or licensed by major labels and marketed to mainstream audiences as a commercially viable alternative to [[alternative rock]] music.<ref name="NYmag">{{cite journal |journal=[[New York (magazine)|New York]] |date=April 21, 1997 |last=Norris |first=Chris |title=Recycling the Future |pages=64–65 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M-gCAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA64 |quote=With record sales slumping and alternative rock presumed over, the music industry is famously desperate for a new movement to replace its languishing grunge product. And so its gaze has fixed on a vital and international scene of knob-twiddling musicians and colorfully garbed clubgoers—a scene that, when it began in Detroit discos ten years ago, was called techno. If all goes according to marketing plan, 1997 will be the year "electronica" replaces "grunge" as linguistic plague, MTV buzz, ad soundtrack, and runway garb. The music has been freshly installed in Microsoft commercials, in the soundtrack to Hollywood's recycled action-hero pic ''The Saint'', and in MTV's newest, hourlong all-electronica program, ''Amp''.}}</ref>

[[New York City]] became one center of experimentation and growth for the electronica sound, with DJs and music producers from areas as diverse as [[Southeast Asia]] and Brazil bringing their creative work to the nightclubs of that city.<ref name="latin1">"In 2000, [Brazilian vocalist Bebel] Gilberto capitalized on New York's growing fixation with cocktail lounge ambient music, an offshoot of the dance club scene that focused on drum and bass remixes with Brazilian sources.  ...Collaborating with club music maestros like Suba and Thievery Corporation, Gilberto thrust herself into the leading edge of the emerging Brazilian electronica movement.  On her immensely popular ''Tanto Tempo'' (2000)..." Page 234, ''The Latin Beat: The Rhythms and Roots of Latin Music from Bossa Nova to Salsa and Beyond'', Ed Morales, Da Capo Press, 2003, {{ISBN|0-306-81018-2}}</ref><ref name="youth1">"founded in 1997,...under the slogan 'Musical Insurgency Across All Borders', for six years [Manhattan nightclub] Mutiny was an international hub of the south Asian electronica music scene. Bringing together artists from different parts of the south Asia diaspora, the club was host to a roster of British Asian musicians and DJs..." Page 165, ''Youth Media '', Bill Osgerby, Routledge, 2004, {{ISBN|0-415-23807-2}}</ref>