Synthwave vs Retrowave: Can you even sub-category?

You hear a cool tune that reminds you of that sci-fi B-movie you used to watch on VHS in 1989. Spotify lists the genre as synthwave, so you search YouTube for a synthwave playlist to make your 10 p.m. drive to Walmart a bit more epic. Simple, right?

Not so lucky.

Steering wheel in one hand, streaming device in the other, you feel the first rumblings of panic in your gut (or was that your stomach rejecting that week-old burrito?) as the search returns a stack of words suffixed -wave.

There, at the top, is the synthwave you're looking for, but paired with an unfamiliar term: retrowave. Before you can fully think through the question of whether retrowave is a synonym of synthwave, a type of synthwave, or a separate genre altogether, you also see chillwave, darkwave, and then...darksynth.

Your finger hesitates over the playlist, second-guessing whether the original song had been mislabeled. What if it isn't a wave at all? What if the operative term is synth? And how dark is dark? Should you have calculated and written down the number of lumens emanated by that cool track you heard the other day?

Too Many Labels

These "waves" represent just one corner of the vast ocean that is electronic music. At times it seems that every individual artist's style becomes its own niche. Just take a look at the infinite offerings at di.fm. The streaming service does provide a convenient menu of overarching categories: trance, EDM, dance, house, lounge, chillout, techno, bass, ambient, deep, classic, vocal, hard, synth. But as you begin to browse the channels, confusion sets in fast. Under chillout alone, you've got chillout, chillstep, chillhop, chill EDM, chill house, psychill, etc.; and then you start to realize that certain channels are cross-listed under multiple categories. It is a labyrinth of weirdly specific styles that probably could have, maybe even should have, all fallen under a handful of names.

Self-Identifying Your Music

This overabundance of genres makes it difficult for artists to answer the question, "What style are you?"

Yesterday, I put the finishing touches on a synthwave piece. But if I assume the synthwave label, fans might feel deceived when they hear a Maximus Monk song that sounds like synthpop or a chiptune or ambient. The result is that I retreat to the general category of electronic music (or alternatively, synth). This might aggravate electronic music fans who crave insanely specific sounds they want to listen to over and over again, but the label has the advantage of always being correct. Everything I write, perform and produce is electronic music.

The bottom line: There are too many labels, and every time an artist feels the urge to invent a new name to distinguish his or her music from everything else... DON'T. Just stop doing it. You're making life harder on all of us.

Consider this the opening salvo of the war against the over-compartmentalization of music. Let the revolution begin!