Seems to be a good time to post this, even if I wanted to make it a bit better like. I just wanted to get there first! A couple of threads are asking for this to be the answer, so here it is in a thread of its own, and quite rightly so.

BEHOLD! Your genre for the year: WITCH HOUSE

...and your bands (in alphabetical order):

/// /\/\/\ \\\
//TENSE//
/\
†‡† (cross, double cross, cross)
oOoOO
Gr†ll Gr†ll (crosses)
Mater Suspiria Vision
Modern Witch
PWIN /\ /\ TEAKS
tearist
twYIY<ght>ZoNe
WHITE RING

(question marks are probably crosses. I put /\ instead of an actual black pyramid which is what it should be)

Ghost Drone, Spectral Pop, Were House – Ready yourselves for some supernatural genres for the rest of the year. The Summer will be dominated by this occult oriented downtempo chopped and screwed italo-house sort-of-extension-of Chillwave. There’s a bit of variation in these bands sounds – some straighter electro rock, some totally abstract, sampled and degraded into noise, but there are distinct central themes that make it a genuine happening.

Geometrical, upper/lower case and punctuation riddled band names. A reference or inclusion of sigils, symbolism, talismanic and/or ritualistic adornment…and by extension of this, a sense of –

Mystery.

Remixing – Chillwave might have had a few remixes and remixers, but this is next level. 80’s tracks and modern pop are the main sacrificial lambs of this genres and they are being eviscerated down to their essential elements in order to be recast as ghostly, demonic apparitions of their original forms. It’s a bit nepotistic in that respect, Mater Suspiria Vision seems to be the go-to guy for Ghost Drone edits involving an awful lot of reverb.

Women – Nearly all these bands involve female members or collaborators. By definition it is a genre that necessitates the inclusion of women (Witch) yet is not actually defined by sex as such. This is massive, seriously. Riot Grrrl was all about the Grrrl aspect, as in Girls doing the Rioting. This is not, it so subtley dependant on femininity it doesn’t need to force the issue. I didn’t really explain that as concisely as I realised it the other day, but that’s the gist.

Finally – where do you go to get it? The locus of the genre is DISARO Records in Houston. Go see their myspace for links to all these bands, downloads, images and more:

www.myspace.com/ffdisaro

You only need this one link for everything here, that's why I didn't link out to all those other bands.

If this thread dies it WILL come back to haunt you so there’s no point ignoring it.

GxMx