Genres

In class today, we were discussing Taylor Swift and Shania Twain being categorized as Country artists. While both artists have some Country influence, their sound is more closely linked to Pop music than it is to Country. For this reason, I have often seen both artists, as well as others such as Carrie Underwood, referred to as Country Pop.

The problem lies in the fact that the mainstream media and casual music fans are often too general in their descriptions. While genre classifications can be tedious, and are partially subjective, they are still very useful in grouping similar sounding artists. As we discussed, Hank Williams and Taylor Swift both fall under the umbrella of Country music, but sound very little alike. As a result, subgenres and fusion genres, such as Country Pop, are helpful in narrowing our focus. Especially since fans of one may not be fans of another.

Similarly, in Punk, Metal, Jazz, and pretty much any other major genre you can think of, there are dozens of subgenres. For example, Wikipedia lists 30 different subgenres and crossover genres of Heavy Metal. It may seem like overkill (and at times, it is), but fans of Thrash Metal, for example, may not be interested in sifting through hundreds of Death Metal or Doom Metal bands to find something new.

So yeah, that's my mini-rant on genres. I'm kind of a nerd when it comes to music and classifying music (I probably have 80 or more "genres" labeled on my iPod). It's far from a science, but it makes it easier to find exactly what I'm in the mood for.