I'm with stupid.

IDM as a term originally came about, I believe, as a result of it differentiating itself from "stupid" sounds like hardcore and diva house, and it originated as the name of an internet mailing list/discussion board. It's since become a blanket shorthand referring to most of the non-dancey end of electronic music, and as such its an acronym in search of a meaning--by now I don't honestly think anyone using the term "IDM" actually means "intelligent dance music," especially since most of it, post-Aphex Twin and especially post-Kid606, is so obsessed with childhood and/or emotionally retarded. (Hope they don't, anyway.) Sort of like how R&B doesn't really mean "rhythm and blues" anymore since there's almost nothing of the blues left in the music....

Surely IDM was coined as a reaction against the genre known as "Mindless Techno Bollocks"

It's a term as meaningless as "soul" or "rock 'n' roll" or "R&B".

Could be wrong, but I think IDM has become a loaded term for all the reasons that Billy and Michaelangelo mention -- I more often hear the term used by detractors than fans these days.

I like really stupid genre names because they make me laugh, if nothing else (that is to say I like them except when they're used with a totally straight face). IDM is funny. I have no idea what it means. Ditto for Emo and Math Rock. I mean, unlike, say, trip-hop, these terms aren't even evocative...they don't paint a picture. (Therein lies their greatness?)

SHM anyone? (Stupid Higbrow Music.)

Michaelangelo--I might challenge your line, "there's almost nothing of the blues left in the music," if I could think up a coherent way to do so (and if, indeed, I really understood what "blues" was/is).

"It's a term as meaningless as "soul" or "rock 'n' roll" or "R&B"."

If so, then surely as meaningful, as well? If you say a CD is IDM I know it won't sound like the Rolling Stones. Or any other number of helpful positive distinctions.

Meaning, you'll know what it sounds like, but that doesn't mean the terms actually mean anything. Is "soul" music the only music with soul? etc.

When they know the difference between the knobs.

Dreadful pretentious term, but we seem stuck with it.

we are stuck with it, but i don't mind it as an acronym. i just imagine it as a name per se rather than actually standing for anything. because i am opposed to what it 'stands for'. i have a similar problem with the unfortuante term 'braindance', although the acronym for that, 'B' just doesn't seem to work.

it's just not trance, prog house(which i always thought was about wizards n shit) or anything that you dance to club to normally. Not that it doesn't mean you can't dance to it it's just harder to that's all. A lot of IDM copies APhex, BOC, Squarepusher or Autechre. Or maybe it doesn't because if you don't have a completly different sound processor,whatever, compared to everyone else a comparison will be made. Thats whats bad about IDM. What does everyone else think?

i think i can't write properly--sorry

We are stuck with the IDM label, yes. And like the perceptive comment re R&B above, I think people will think much less about what the letters stand for over time. I certainly never think about what the letters stand for anymore.

One thing I would like to see is a narrowing of the what is labeled IDM. I don't think of Fennesz, at least recent Fennesz, as IDM, for example. I feel like IDM should have beats.

To Ian -- IDM is used by fans and detractors alike. There are, after all, at lease two emails lists crammed with IDM fans who use IDM in their titles (the original IDM@hyppereal, in addition to the now- superior IDM-M list.

As an aside, I believe the IDM list at hyppereal actually pre-dated the use of IDM in the media. It was started in '93 or '94 as a place to talk about Aphex & Autechre. Likely named after the "Artifical Intelligence" comp. on Warp. And over time, journalists began to incoporate it.

I'm curious to know if there's any musician who's happy to be labelled that way.-more:will ever electronic music have a pro-stupid sub genre as rock . metaphors of stupidity have been used in rock music ( blankness and nihilism in punk rock ...) to wash away stuff that was considered pretentious ....

Francesco -- How about a musician who's happy to be labeled, period?

everyone in this thread is entirely totally wrong except melissa (because she stole her answer from me, ha ha) and mark pitchfork.

Shortening to the initials was a smart move. The "Intelligent Drum 'n' Bass" tag likely helped to curtail prematurely a whole sub- genre. An issue I would like to explore further in a separate thread some day.

I've always hated the term IDM, but hearing it came from a email list gives it a lot more credibility i recon'..
Better that way than from an NME journo.. (?)

Scott: just to clear up, I'm not questioning R&B's validity in any way--just that when the term was coined it referred to jump-blues stuff (Louis Jordan and the like) as opposed to straight blues (Howlin' Wolf, say), and has since carried over to being a blanket term meaning just about any popular black music. The term's stayed the same, the music's changed. Something similar applies to IDM-- originally it meant the stuff you heard on Warp's Artificial Intelligence comps, as Mark pointed out, now it's applied to anything not meant to be danced to, or that couldn't possibly be.

I like some of the music, I sometimes write about it and I occasionally play it on my radio show. But I have never ever used the term IDM. It is too stupid. I prefer to just call it techno (maybe armchair techno or headphone techno) because that is where it came from and what it still is, essentially. Another possible genre name was electronica, until that was hijacked by American media circa 1997 to indicate any kind of electronic dance music.

Francesco -- How about a musician who's happy to be labeled, period?
I am sure the Strokes are quite happy to be labeled as they are. It beats "mediocre". ;-)

Michaelangelo - I get your drift, thanks, but what I thought you were saying (and what I think might still be implicit in what you say--I'm not too schooled in the history of pre-rock genres) didn't have anything to do with the validity of modern r&b, but rather, with the existence or non-existence of "blues" in today's rhythm 'n' blues. I think it's there (and not always in just the most obvious places-- Erykah Badu, Jill Scott, D'Angelo, et al.)...uhh, IDM...hmm.

I'm tired of watching IDM take constant critical drubbing because it had the balls to identify itself as 'highbrow' Why on earth shouldn't we have a 'highbrow' dance music? Do all of you want to listen to disco house every time you go out? Sheesh...

Anyway, if what's being argued here is more about the label than the content, in a certain sense I agree--the name 'IDM' lacks a strong evocative quality. But so does 'House.' or 'Drum & Bass' The lable 'Jungle' has no relationship with any inherant quality in the music it represents. Labels in Dance music seem to be less about evocation (okay, we do have trance--though in my opinion it would be better IDd as 'Yawn') than convenient if slightly disinformational 'handles' used to divide the stuff up at record stores.

As with any other genre, IDM really doesn't provide an accurate umbrella term for most of the music it represents. Artists like Kid 606 or Cex or Bogodan Raczinski may be in the IDM section in your local record store, but the music they make is really less about 'intelligence' than adolescent wackness. Granted, someone who seeks out Kid 606 is likely to have a broader scope of musical interests than your average Paul Oakenfold buyer, but this is really no indication that Kid 606's stuff is 'intelligent.'

So-UDM (underground dance music) anyone? Nah-that's lame...what about ODM (odd...)? Bah. There really isn't any better alternative...

scott--"blues" as I'm using it simply means 12-bar form, gtr. riffs, etc., though a lot of the melisma and "blue" intonation of the artists you cite has a lot to do w/it too.

Turner: why can't 'disco house' be intelligent?

M Jemmeson has hit the nail on the head vis a vis my problem with the label IDM, ignore the music for the time being. The assumption behind calling something intelligent is that there must be some less intelligent form of music. It seems to me to be arrogant and presumptuous to assume that 'highbrow' ideas can't work in a 'lowbrow' metier. The Ramones were way smarter than ELP after all.

The other thing is that in a lot of cases it is a smokescreen which detracts from the thinness of the ideas and their execution. And just to reiterate it's not the music I have a problem with only the label.

Despite all the above I would love to hear some intelligent rockabilly music.

Okay, Booty House than. I was just trying to think of a universally 'non-highbrow' dance genre to contrast with.

Billy-I agree about 50% with your last post. While it's true that highbrow ideas can be used in a lowbrow format (in which they become subversive, ironic, etc..) I think it is possible to identify certain genres as more the province of 'lowbrow' content (eg booty house).