What is IDM?

Max Tundra doesn't sound as IDM does it? It's like some progressive electronic zolo shit

he was on warp and had skittery beats what else do you want sheesh

pretty good list, glad to see clark - body riddle getting some credit, always felt like that one was underrated coming at the very very tail end of the genre's heyday

max tundra was on domino but released a single on warp /pedant

Max Tundra also out on Kid 606's Tigerbea6, and had an instrumental album before Pitchfork found out about him which is easiest to classify as IDM. Was definitely in the crew that included Kid606, DAT Politics, Blectum from Blechdom, and by extension, Kit Clayton, Sutekh, even Matmos

I enjoyed reading the list -- I don't think at the time I would have considered Kompakt type stuff (or minimal house at all) to be "IDM". IDM was always glitchier and wonkier to me

yeah I guess it's easy to make a case for that first album. in my opinion MBGATE and Parallax Error are better than most the albums on the list but they don't fit with anything on the top 10

I can't even think of any big names this is missing, so kudos on that. I would have went with the first Prefuse album tho.

And I guess I would rather have seen the Farmers Manual, Oval, Alvo Noto end of the spectrum represented instead of like making the case for JLin or w/e

So you guys are arguing whether some artist was a bit too wonky to be IDM and whether being on Warp qualifies him, but everyone disagrees with me when I point out that a straight-up Detroit techno album that was put out by motherfucking Tresor might not belong on the list?

tuomas you are a tresor

feel like richdork contributors are definitely cognizant that some of the entries do not fit the more classical definition of idm but willfully included some more diverse music

Would have loved to see Max Tundra on the list. Would love to see him in any list tbh... I guess I relate him more to weirdo synth pop than IDM but some of his songs would definitely fit with other artists on the genre... again that's the problem with IDM it's more related to certain labels like Warp than a particular sound.

NO MAX TUNDRA NO CREDIBILITY jk good write ups, Ned!

Thanks!

That top 10 made me smile so much

also now is as good a time as any to say that I think I've heard SAW maybe twice and couldn't tell you a damn thing about it

I'm still going to bat for the first Telefon Tel Aviv album as having aged the best out of more or less everything. You can tell what they were inspired by with the labored-over glitchiness, but setting it against half-time 808 beats was prescient (not to mention the melodies and general lushness of the record).

not a particularly great list, not a particularly bad one, would ordinarily be inclined to talk a bunch of shit out of principle but since they put urban tribe on it all is forgiven

I am glad a lot of bad things were omitted

No Confield OMG.

agreed, that record still sounds utterly alien 15 years later, it's fantastic

I listen to it rarely because there's at least one track that makes me feel physically unsettled

that one track is "Bine"

it is the aural equivalent of food poisoning

still awesome though

First off, I come in peace - this is overall a great list, especially for a genre with an offensive name that nobody from the golden age wants to admit being a part of.

"idm" for me is whatever the hyperreal list was biggin up '96-'02, so the list felt sorta narrow to me - no Amon Tobin, no Fennesz, no Vladislav Delay of any kind. And trust, every FSOL, Orbital and Orb release got the microscope treatment. Do you think Orbus Terrarum got more love in some other scene? Will any electronic track ever satisfy the cerebral idm fan's pretensions to symphonic glory more than The Girl With The Sun In Her Head? I understand why they didn't show up, but it feels like an incomplete representation of what idm heads were listening to.

On the other hand, I was surprised to see Drexciya. _Glad_, but surprised. I like to think that this is a nod towards the fact that "idm" was a gradual evolution from Detroit techno, not a drastic break. (Hm ... now why would the Detroit artists not get the "intelligent" tag? Hmmm ....)

Oh and Bytes >>> Spanners, what happened here.

I am thankful to this list for getting me to listen to Hard Normal Daddy today

me too, for Farben last two days

re: lukas - I thought the same thing about Fennesz not being there, especially as Jim O'Rourke showed up. Still, one good thing about the list was that seemed like a clear attempt to expand the IDM definition (FlyLo, Jlin, Jon Hopkins -- really anything after about 2005). It's not like this kind of stuff ever went away, just the specific genre tag did

a little disappointed that jon hopkins was the 'this is idm today' inclusion and not the much more adventurous and imo praiseworthy james holden record from the same year

just saw Squarepusher with his live band play like half of Hard Normal Daddy and it was the best music ive ever seen or heard in the history of music

lukas very otm (and how the hell did I miss the lack of Amon Tobin inclusion?!?)

I was the president of my own personal Amon Tobin street team back in the day and I totally didn't notice that he wasn't on this list, oops

no Cylob? Luke Vibert?

shit's wack.

https://cylob.bandcamp.com/album/cylob-music-system-3000

good Autechre choices, but their post-2000 material is where the real magic happens

I must be the only Autechre fan who hates Tri Repetae.

probably

I never thought of Amon Tobin as IDM, I guess? Too organic and sample-based. But it still fell into the left-field, non-functional electronic music I was into at the time, so sure.

(And I still feel like Foley Room and ISAM are underrated in terms of their influence on the current crop of sound design-heavy, cinematic, high-impact experimental club music)

Tri Repetae is not one of the more interesting autechres to me but it's the most 'listenable', in the same sense that a beer is 'drinkable'

Chiastic Slide/LP5 is my sweet spot for listenable + interesting

Oversteps + Move of Ten!!!!

Draft + Untilted + Quaristice :)

oh we're doing top Ae, in that case I choose Amber, Chiastic, Cichlisuite, EP7, Confield, Untilted, Exai and maybe elseq.

Basically anything post Tri Repetae can be the best autechre album, depending on my specific mood.

tri repetae definitely my favorite autechre. lp5 is good too

quaristice was rad too i thought

despite owning almost all of his albums and really really loving some of them ("coronus the terminator", what an amazing tune) i kind of hate flylo

me too, for Farben last two days

yea that farben album is so smooth

side note, just realizing list ignored a whole corner of post-IDM dance music from the likes of Zomby, Lone, Rustie, et al -- these guys have been vocal about being influenced by Aphex, BOC and the first wave of IDM, kind of surprising not to see at least one of them show up.

Lone and Zomby are on my albums list

I'm getting my threads confused...

I'm less surprised about those ones not showing, but I would have thought OPN would be on there

That's why I thought it was weird to crack the lid of that box just a little, there is soooo much that could be a whole separate list.

I'm putting on a night of classic electronica, IDM, glitch, breaks, drill'n'bass etc tomorrow. Got a fair bit of music lined up, but what would you include (preferably stuff that has aged okay and is generally upbeat enough to dance to, or at least tap your toes)?