Eurobeat
| Eurobeat | |
|---|---|
| Stylistic origins |
British Eurobeat: Contemporary Eurobeat: |
| Cultural origins |
British Eurobeat: Mid-1980s, United Kingdom Contemporary Eurobeat: Late 1980s, Italy and Japan |
| Derivative forms | |
| Regional scenes | |
| Other topics | |
| Para Para | |
Eurobeat is either a form of the British dance-pop variant of Eurodisco or Hi-NRG-driven Italo disco music that both developed in 1980s.
In the United States, Eurobeat was sometimes marketed as Hi-NRG and for a short while shared this term with the very early freestyle music hits. Italo disco was often referred to as Eurobeat, probably due to the negative connotations of the word "disco" in the United States in the 1980s.
"Eurobeat" is also directly related to the Japanese Para Para dance culture as it influences many song and business decisions.
The term "Eurobeat" was first used in the UK when Ian Levine's Eastbound Expressway released their single "You're a Beat" in recognition to the slower tempo of Hi-NRG music emerging from Europe. The majority of Hi-NRG songs tended to be from 124 to 138 BPM whereas the European releases tended to be from 108 to 120 BPM. Many European acts managed to break through under this new recognition, namely the likes of Modern Talking, Bad Boys Blue, Taffy, and Spagna. It was used commercially to describe the –produced hits by Dead or Alive, Bananarama, Jason Donovan, Sonia, and Kylie Minogue which were heavily based on the British experience with Italo disco during holidays in Greece and elsewhere. "Eurobeat" was also applied to the first hits from the Pet Shop Boys and other UK-based dance music and electropop groups of the time. Those "Eurobeat" hits had a European beat, topped the UK charts, and, in the USA, received radio airplay and contributed to the evolution of New York's Freestyle genre. "Braun European Top 20" on MTV Europe also aired on MTV USA during summer 1987 to 1989, spreading the UK's Eurobeat sound. But after the summer of 1988 (UK's summer of love), the style lost popularity, with the exception of Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan. By the summer of '89 the term "Eurobeat" was replaced by other labels and the music changed to 90s Eurodance and mostly Euro house. The term "Eurobeat" was also used only in the UK during 1986–1988, for specific Italian 80s Euro disco imports, such as Sabrina Salerno, Spagna, and Baltimora.
...
Wikipedia