Cyberpunk Music


Some common genres include:

Ambient

Ambient music is a genre of music that puts an emphasis on tone and atmosphere over traditional musical structure or rhythm. Ambient music is said to evoke an "atmospheric", "visual" or "unobtrusive" quality. According to one of its pioneers Brian Eno, "Ambient music must be able to accommodate many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular; it must be as ignorable as it is interesting."
    Biosphere
    Brian Eno
    The Future Sound Of London
    Global Communication
    The KLF
    The Orb

Asian Hip-Hop

Asian hip hop is a heterogeneous musical genre that covers all hip hop music as recorded and produced by artists of Asian origin.
    Keith Ape
    Kohh

Big Beat

Big beat is a style of electronic music that typically uses heavy breakbeats and synthesizer-generated loops and patterns common to acid house.
    Basement Jaxx
    Fatboy Slim
    Chemical Brothers
    The Crystal Method
    Propellerheads
    The Prodigy

Chillwave

Chillwave, sometimes also referred to as glo-fi or downtempo pop, is a genre of music whose artists are often characterized by their heavy use of effects processing, synthesizers, looping, sampling, and heavily filtered vocals with simple melodic lines. The genre combines the larger 2000s trends towards 80s retro music and (in indie music) use of ambient sound, with modern pop, as in electropop, post-punk revival, psych-folk, nu gaze, and witch house. It is often described as 'summer music.'
    Com Truise
    Neon Indian
    Small Black
    Toro Y Moi
    Tycho
    Washed Out

Cloud Rap

Cloud rap (also known as Trillwave) whose distinguishing features include ethereal, dreamlike beats (which often use wordless vocal samples, wherein singers harmonize or hold long notes, to produce a majestic effect) and abstracted, sometimes deliberately absurd, lyrics.
    A$AP Rocky
    Blank Banshee
    cLOUDDEAD
    Kitty
    Lil B
    Sad Boys
    SpaceGhostPurrp
    Spooky Black
    Thaiboy Digital
    Viper
    Yung Lean

Drum & Bass/Jungle

Drum & Bass is a genre of electronic music also known as jungle which emerged in England in the early 1990s. The genre is characterized by fast breakbeats (typically between 150–180 beats per minute with heavy bass and sub-bass lines. The "bass line" is usually created with sampled sources or synthesizers. The popularity of drum and bass at its commercial peak ran parallel to several other homegrown dance styles in the UK including big beat and hard house. Drum n bass incorporates a number of scenes and styles. A major influence on jungle and drum and bass was the original Jamaican dub and reggae sound. Another feature of the style is the complex syncopation of the drum tracks' breakbeat.
    Aphrodite
    Goldie
    Grooverider
    Kemistry & Storm
    London Elektricity
    LTJ Bukem
    Omni Trio
    Plug

Dub

Dub is a genre of electronic music that grew out of reggae in the 1960s, and is commonly considered a subgenre, though it has developed to extend beyond the scope of reggae. Music in this genre consists predominantly of instrumental remixes of existing recordings and is achieved by significantly manipulating and reshaping the recordings, usually by removing the vocals from an existing music piece, and emphasizing the drum and bass parts (this stripped-down track is sometimes referred to as a 'riddim'). Other techniques include dynamically adding extensive echo, reverb, panoramic delay, and occasional dubbing of vocal or instrumental snippets from the original version or other works. Dub has heavily influenced diverse genres of music like Ambient (The Orb) and Punk (The Clash).

Dub was prominently featured in the novel Neuromancer.
    King Tubby
    Lee "Scratch" Perry
    Scientist

EBM (Electronic Body Music)

Electronic body music (EBM) is a music genre that combines elements of post-industrial music and electropunk. It first came to prominence in Belgium and was considered a part of the European new wave movement. Original, or original-styled electronic body music is sometimes referred to as old-school EBM and should not be confused with aggrotech, dark electro or industrial music.
    A Split Second
    Front 242
    Front Line Assembly
    Haujobb
    KMFDM
    The Neon Judgement
    Nitzer Ebb
    Grendel

Future Garage

Future garage is a genre of electronic music that incorporates a variety of influences from UK garage and softer elements from 2-step garage, highly inspired by the work of Burial.
    Burial
    Clubroot
    FLVKE
    Joy Orbison
    Jamie XX
    SBTRKT
    Synkro
    Volor Flex
    BURG 

Futurepop

Futurepop is a form of electronic dance music, an outgrowth of electronic body music, that evolved in the late 1990s with groups like VNV Nation, Covenant, and Apoptygma Berzerk. The term "futurepop" was coined while a discussion between VNV Nation lead singer Ronan Harris and Apoptygma Berzerk lead singer Stephan Groth to describe their sound at the time, and that of similar groups.
    Assemblage 23
    mind.in.a.box
    VNV Nation

Glitch

Glitch is a genre of electronic music that emerged in the late 1990s. It has been described as a genre that adheres to an "aesthetic of failure," where the deliberate use of glitch-based audio media, and other sonic artifacts, is a central concern. Sources of glitch sound material are usually malfunctioning or abused audio recording devices or digital electronics, such as CD skipping, electric hum, digital or analog distortion, bit rate reduction, hardware noise, software bugs, crashes, vinyl record hiss or scratches and system errors. In a Computer Music Journal article published in 2000, composer and writer Kim Cascone classifies glitch as a subgenre of electronica, and used the term post-digital to describe the glitch aesthetic.

 
IDM

Intelligent dance music (commonly IDM) is a genre of electronic music that emerged in the early 1990s. It was originally influenced by developments in underground dance music such as Detroit techno and various breakbeat styles that were emerging in the UK at that time. Stylistically, IDM tended to rely upon individualistic experimentation rather than adhering to musical characteristics associated with specific genres of dance music. The range of post-techno[5] styles to emerge in the early 1990s were described variously as "art techno", "ambient techno", "intelligent techno", and "electronica". In the United States, the latter is often used as a catchall term to describe not only downtempo or downbeat/non-dance electronic music but also EDM.
    Ellen Allien
    Aphex Twin
    Autechre
    Boards of Canada
    Clark
    Four Tet
    Prefuse73
    Squarepusher
    Amon Tobin

Industrial

Industrial music is a genre of experimental/electronic music that draws on transgressive and provocative themes. The term was coined in the mid-1970s with the founding of Industrial Records by Genesis P-Orridge of Throbbing Gristle and Monte Cazazza; on Throbbing Gristle's debut album The Second Annual Report, they coined the slogan "industrial music for industrial people". In general, the style is harsh and challenging. AllMusic defines industrial as the "most abrasive and aggressive fusion of rock and electronic music"; "initially a blend of avant-garde electronics experiments (tape music, musique concrète, white noise, synthesizers, sequencers, etc.) and punk provocation".
    Cabaret Voltaire
    Clock DVA
    Coil
    Controlled Bleeding
    Skinny Puppy
    Ministry
    Nine Inch Nails
    Throbbing Gristle

Industrial and Futuristic Hip Hop

Industrial hip hop is a fusion genre of industrial music with the rhythms or vocals of hip hop.
    Dalek
    Death Grips
    Deltron 3030
    The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy
    DJ Ten
    The KLF (early works)
    Meat Beat Manifesto

Industrial Metal

Industrial metal is a musical genre that draws from industrial dance music, thrash metal and hardcore punk, using repeating metal guitar riffs, sampling, synthesizer or sequencer lines, and distorted vocals. Founding industrial metal acts include Ministry, Godflesh, and KMFDM. Industrial metal developed in the late 1980s, as industrial and heavy metal began to fuse into a common genre. In the early years of the 21st century, groups from the black metal scene began to incorporate elements of industrial music. Industrial metal did well in the early 1990s, particularly in North America, with the success of groups such as Nine Inch Nails. The industrial metal movement began to fade in the latter half of the 1990s.
    Die Krupps
    Fear Factory
    Ministry (later works)
    Powerman 5000

New Wave

New wave music is a musical genre of pop/rock created in the late 1970s to mid-1980s with ties to 1970s punk rock. The wide range of bands categorized under this term has been a source of much confusion and controversy. The new wave sound of the late 1970s moved away from the smooth blues and rock & roll sounds to create music with a twitchy, agitated feel, choppy rhythm guitars and fast tempos. Initially—as with the later post-punk—new wave was broadly analogous to punk rock before branching as a distinctly identified genre, incorporating electronic/experimental music, mod, disco and pop. It subsequently engendered subgenres and fusions, including synthpop and gothic rock.
    Berlin
    The Comsat Angels
    Thomas Dolby
    John Foxx
    The Human League
    Billy Idol
    Mi-Sex
    Ministry (early works)
    Gary Numan
    Oingo Boingo
    The Police
    Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark
    Silicon Teens
    Visage

Post-Punk

Post-punk is a type of rock music that emerged from the punk rock movement of the 1970s. The term refers to music that draws inspiration from elements of punk, such as musical energy, ideological provocation or DIY approach, while moving beyond its particular sonic characteristics, preoccupations and cultural affiliations.
    Devo
    Joy Division
    Killing Joke
    Public Image Ltd
    Suicide

Post-Rock

Post-rock is a subgenre of rock music characterized by the influence and use of instruments commonly associated with rock, but using rhythms and "guitars as facilitators of timbre and textures" not traditionally found in rock. Post-rock bands are often without vocals.
    Explosions in the Sky
    God Speed You! Black Emperor
    Mogwai
    Sigur Rós
    Stereolab

Synthpop

Synthpop (also known as electropop and technopop) is a genre of popular music that first became prominent in the 1980s and features the synthesizer as the dominant musical instrument. It was prefigured in the 1960s and early 1970s by the use of synthesizers in progressive rock, electronic art rock, disco and particularly the "Krautrock" of bands like Kraftwerk. It arose as a distinct genre in Japan and the United Kingdom in the post-punk era as part of the new wave movement of the late-1970s to the mid-1980s.

In the late 1980s, duos such as Erasure and Pet Shop Boys adopted a sound that was highly successful on the US dance charts, but by the end of the decade synthpop had largely been abandoned. Interest began to be revived in the indietronica and electroclash movements in the late 1990s and, in the first decade of the 21st century, it enjoyed a widespread revival with commercial success.
    Alphaville
    Animotion
    Bronski Beat
    Chromatics
    Depeche Mode
    Erasure
    The Human League
    The Knife
    Kraftwerk
    Ladytron
    New Order
    The Pet Shop Boys
    Soft Cell
    Yazoo
    Yellow Magic Orchestra

Synth Metal

Synth Metal, sometimes known as Electronicore or Metalsynth, is a musical genre which incorporates many elements of industrial metal, progressive metal, math metal, speed metal and djent with IDM, synthwave, trance, and electro.
    The Algorithm (Rémi Gallego project)
    Master Boot Record

Synthwave

Synthwave, also called Retrowave or Outrun, is a musical style that emerged in the mid-2000s, influenced by 1980s soundtrack music.
    Electric Youth
    Futurecop!
    Kavinsky
    Miami Nights 1984
    Mitch Murder
    Perturbator
    Power Glove

Techno

Techno is a form of electronic dance music that emerged in Detroit, Michigan, in the United States during the mid-to-late 1980s. The first recorded use of the word techno in reference to a specific genre of music was in 1988. Many styles of techno now exist, but Detroit techno is seen as the foundation upon which a number of subgenres have been built.

In Detroit techno resulted from the melding of African American music including Chicago house, funk, electro, and electric jazz with electronic music by artists such as Kraftwerk, Giorgio Moroder, and Yellow Magic Orchestra. Added to this is the influence of futuristic and fictional themes relevant to life in American late capitalist society, with Alvin Toffler's book The Third Wave being a notable point of reference. Pioneering producer Juan Atkins cites Toffler's phrase "techno rebels" as inspiring him to use the word techno to describe the musical style he helped to create. This unique blend of influences aligns techno with the aesthetic referred to as afrofuturism. To producers such as Derrick May, the transference of spirit from the body to the machine is often a central preoccupation; essentially an expression of technological spirituality. In this manner: "techno dance music defeats what Adorno saw as the alienating effect of mechanisation on the modern consciousness".
    Jaun Atkins
    Carl Cox
    Cybotron
    Derrick May
    A Guy Called Gerald
    Moby
    Plastikman
    Kevin Saunderson
    Luke Slater
    Underground Resistance

Trance

Trance is a genre of electronic music that developed during the 1990s in Germany. It is characterized by a tempo lying between 125 to mid 140 beats per minute (BPM), repeating melodic phrases, and a musical form that distinctly builds tension and elements throughout a track often culminating in 1 to 2 "peaks" or "drops." Although trance is a genre of its own, it liberally incorporates influences from other electronic music styles such as techno, house, pop, chill-out, classical music, tech house, ambient and film music.
    Armin van Buuren
    Astral Projection
    Dance 2 Trance
    Infected Mushroom
    Jam & Spoon
    Juno Reactor
    Robert Miles
    Sasha & John Digweed
    Paul Van Dyk

Trip-hop

Trip hop is a genre of electronic music that originated in the early 1990s in the United Kingdom, especially Bristol. Deriving from later idioms of acid house, the term was first used by the British music media and press as a way to describe the more experimental variant of breakbeat emerging from the Bristol Sound scene, which contained influences of soul, funk and jazz. It has been described as "Europe's alternative choice in the second half of the '90s", and "a fusion of hip hop and electronica until neither genre is recognisable". Trip hop music fuses several styles and has much in common with other genres; it has several qualities similar to ambient music, and its drum-based breakdowns share characteristics with hip hop. It also contains elements of R&B, dub and house, as well as other electronic music. Trip hop can be highly experimental.
    Bjork
    DJ Krush
    DJ Shadow
    DJ Spooky
    Gorillaz
    Massive Attack
    Portishead
    Pretty Lights
    Thievery Corporation
    Tricky

Vaporwave

Vaporwave is a music micro-genre that emerged in the early 2010s. It is often characterized by a nostalgic fascination with retro cultural aesthetics, commercial fragments, and technology, as well as a critical or parodic preoccupation with consumer capitalism, popular culture, '80s yuppie culture, and new-age tropes.
    Fuji Grid TV
    Infinity Frequencies
    Internet Club
    Macintosh Plus
    Macross 82-99
    Midnight Television
    New Dreams Ltd.
    Saint Pepsi
    Stereo Component
    Vektroid

Witch House

Witch house (also known as drag or Haunted house) is an occult-themed dark electronic music genre and visual aesthetic that emerged in the late 2000s. The music is heavily influenced by chopped and screwed hip-hop soundscapes, industrial and noise experimentation, and features use of synthesizers, drum machines, obscure samples, droning repetition and heavily altered, ethereal, indiscernible vocals.

The witch house visual aesthetic includes occult, witchcraft, shamanism and horror-inspired artworks, collages and photographs as well as significant use of typographic elements such as Unicode symbols. Many works by witch house visual artists incorporate themes from horror films such as The Blair Witch Project, the television series Twin Peaks, and mainstream pop culture celebrities.
    Black Ceiling
    Clams Casino
    Crim3s
    Crystal Castles
    Glass Teeth (stylized as GL?SS †33†H)
    Grimes
    Holy Other
    oOoOO
    Purity Ring
    Ritualz (stylized as †‡†)
    Salem
    Zola Jesus



Albums and Artists of Note:

Kraftwerk

Kraftwerk are a German band whose lyrics and music focus on concepts such as computers, pocket calculators, robots, highways, trains and other products of the technological age. They pretty much invented the idea of synthpop and electronic dance music.

Billy Idol

In the early 90s, Billy Idol released an album called "Cyberpunk". It was a concept album inspired by Billy Idol's at the time fascination with Mondo 2000 style "cyberdelic culture" that was popular in an underground scene in California then. It was critically panned at the time of its release, due to it being a substantial break from Mr. Idol's established style.

Sonic Youth - Daydream Nation

Sonic Youth was heavily influenced by William Gibson's fiction on this album, to the point of naming one of the tracks "The Sprawl"

Deltron 3030

Deltron 3030 is an alternative hip hop supergroup composed of producer Dan the Automator, rapper Del the Funky Homosapien (portraying the character 'Deltron Zero' for the project) and DJ Kid Koala.

U2 - Zooropa, Pop and Achtung Baby

U2 have cited the works of William Gibson and Cyberculture in general as being a huge influence on this trilogy of albums. U2 also appear in the No Maps for these Territories documentary and their music was featured on the Neuromancer audiobook that's read by Gibson. William Gibson also wrote an article on U2 for Wired magazine and the fictional band Lo-Rez in Idoru bear quite a few similarities to U2.

Steely Dan

Steely Dan named themselves after a reference to William S. Burroughs' Naked Lunch. William Gibson has cited their lyrical themes as huge influence on his writing and he references them in his work often (Razor Girl, Gentleman Loser, Puma Blues, etc).

Neil Young - Trans

In the 80s, Neil Young, who before was known for his traditional rock sound, released an album made entirely with synthesizers and vocoders. At the time it alienated his hardcore fans but fans of electronic music will find it interesting. The entire project came about because Young's son was born with cerebal palsy and unable to talk and Young hoped that synthesizers could enable him to.

Also:
David Bowie - Outside
Warren Zevon - Transverse City
Nine Inch Nails - Year Zero
Laurie Anderson - Big Science