Chosen Words: I is for Intelligent

a.k.a. World Cup Distraction Exercise: Fat Roland's A-Z guide to the most important words or phrases in electronica and their associated "facts"

IDM stands for 'Intelligent Dance Music', a phrase adopted to describe music produced by Aphex Twin and his contemporaries.

The 'intelligent' reference meant this was dance music that didn't just appeal to the feet: it affected the brain, the heart and lesser organs such as the spleen.

Some tracks released under the wide umbrella of Intelligent Dance Music include Venetian Snares' Winnipeg Is A Frozen Shithole, Chris Clark's Nostalgic Oblong and Kid606's thirty-second composition Dramatic Pause Of Silence To Signify The End Of The Album And Beginning Of Additional Songs Included On The CD To Make People Feel Better About Buying The CD Instead Of The Vinyl Version.

It could be said that not all IDM is intelligent.

IDM is not the only description for this particular form of electronic music. It is also known as the anatomically-startling 'braindance' and as 'techno' and as 'that bloody noise again, will someone shoot the drummer for crap's sake'.

Top five IDM pioneers:

- Richard D James
- Kirk Degiorgio
- The Black Dog
- Richard H Kirk
- Bay City Rollers (their blue period)

For more Chosen Words, click the tag at the bottom of this post.