Dave Seaman: "One man's trance is another man's techno ..."

Dave Seaman calls out industry press for its "obsession with labeling, pigeonholing and the general sub dividing of dance music..." Seaman points out that "the lines between [genres] has become so blurred that they don't actually mean anything anymore," and that "it's all electronic house music at the end of the day and the minute you try to break it down and intellectualize it is the second you strip away its soul and spirit."

Let me play devil's advocate here. True, genre-labeling and the like can be pretty annoying, but it's a necessary evil. After all, in order to talk about and adequately describe this music that we all love, some degree of classification and discrimination is required. To the extent that we're all human and speaking in a language limited in its means to convey the infinite complexities of life, less-than adequate labels are going to have to suffice. So while I agree that in general, labeling is lame and will never do descriptive justice to that which it labels, it's inevitable, and complaining about it accomplishes nothing.

Dave also wrote about his annoyance at the term 'progressive house' "being used as a dumping ground for any old lifeless, generic rubbish that comes along." Dave wrote that he had "always thought progressive to be more of a spirit than a genre." I agree, but again, I see no point in getting worked up over what people are calling things.

Therapy Sessions Volume 3 Tracklist

The tracklisting for Dave Seaman's upcoming Therapy Sessions compilation with Lexicon Avenue. Click here to see it. Both tracklistings look rather promising with some great tunes included. Nice to see a couple of Shiloh productions included on Seaman's disc, as well as a new production from Stel. It'll be nice to hear something other than glitchy breaks from the guest mix as well. The compilation is due out September 25, 2006.