Problems with my genre identity

 G Howdy folks Greg Zeroin here from Sci-fi music. Today, I have a guest who is kind of upset about her genre identity, right?

I I am furious! (laughs)

G Ladies, gentlemen and beyond, I give you Imogen Reballion and her wrath. Imogen what made you this mad?

I Right. I am indeed enraged, because of the genre game in music. I have been playing music since childhood and I compose and record pieces all the time…

G Good. In what musical genre are you working?

I You see? That’s the first question people come up with once you tell them you do music.

G Well, perhaps they wish to form an idea about your work and they need a little help to place it somewhere on the vast landscape of music somewhere.

I Well that is too bad, because I am not on the landscape they have at hand.

G You cannot name any genre to specify your style?

I Guess what, I cannot. And I am tired of people giving me the looks for it and suspecting or implicating that it is my fault. That I should be able to place myself on their mental landscape or whatever they use to classify music. Why is that? What if whatever I am doing is not on that landscape? And even if it was, it would still fail to capture my work because it’s all over the place in other territories that are missing from your map as well!

G Is that so? Looks like you’re trying a little too hard to be original even at the cost of moving off the map of music. Am I right?

I I couldn't care less for originality. It’s just that I am genuinely interested and drawn to things that are new or poorly explored.

G Well, you are an artist, Imogen, do whatever rocks your boat.

I How many genres are there, Greg?

G I don’t know, about a thousand or so?

I Nobody knows because there are different classification systems. And the criteria for what makes something a genre is notoriously ill defined. Musical techniques, mood, spirit, cultural context, geographical origin and what not. Deep learning algorithms identified over five thousand of them. People can't name more than a few dozen. How do you think all these genres came to be?

G I don’t know, how?

I Well they certainly weren’t mentioned in the book of genesis, right? Folks, who did not fit in the cookie cutters of existing genres started to do something else.

G Folks, who did not fit in the cookie cutters?

I Oh come on Greg, you know what I mean. Almost every significant composer or musician or band was genre defying in the strong sense. And by that I mean not only that they mashed up multiple styles but that they created stuff that was uncategorizable at the time and guess what? Everyone loved that. And that's precisely how a style begins its existence. And that was for me always the interesting part of any artform.

G I see, you are trying to make your own genre.

I The hell I am. But imagine if you were to do something like that. Good luck, man. It seems that the age of genre defying creativity is over. If you are just coming up, your tiny audience, promoters, people trying to help you will all tell you to settle first. They perceive your creative efforts as you tripping over yourself, contradicting your previous piece with the next or worse, contradicting yourself in the same work. They want you to fit into their own conception of things. When you come forth and say, hey, listen to this track, they say give me the genre first. There's no promoter, marketer, publisher, pitch expert, anyone who would welcome you to submit anything without first identifying genre.

G You need to fill out a form, right?

I Precisely. Some places give you a list that is way too short, others give you a list that is way too long. Some places let you choose two or three genres... but they just would not start listening to anything without markings. Kind of curious, because they’re the ones who should know, right?

G They process a lot of music.

I They do. But they wish to play the game. And at first, it looks like a fun question. Am I indie electronic, post rock, alternative, avant-garde, experimental (people say experimental about anything that is new to them), electronic blues, low tempo, minimal, neoclassical or what? But it’s no longer fun when you submit something and the verdict comes back. Wrong genre! 

G Is that what they say?

I Ten out of ten times. And they go like "Jesus, I mean, girl, pull yourself together, it looks like you’re having trouble placing yourself"! They consider this to be the first step and inescapable as such. I mean it is almost comical for me to fill out forms knowing that they will say “wrong genre” inevitably, but most of the time it's making me nervous. I wish more people would be able to just enjoy music without placing it first in a pre existing box with all the preconceptions already attached.

G So what can you do?

I I am mad. (laughs) No, lately I think I started to feel at home in this genre description.

G Which one?

I Wrong genre.

G So does it look like you have finally found your style?

I Well as long as I am doing a million different things and it still stays in the “wrong genre” rebuttal realm, you are right, that way I will know that I am doing it right.

G But you won’t get signed anytime soon.

I Well, if that was the plan I would do different kinds of music instead.

G So you’re okay with this?

I I am okay with being mad at the whole genre game.

G Imogen, thanks for sharing your frustration with us.

I The anger was mine. (laughs)

G Imogen Reballion everyone! Folks, stay tuned for more interviews on your one and only Sci-fi Music!