The Netherlands always has been a country I never completely understood. Of course, their successful drug politics are outstanding and the fact that the record store concentration feels like paradise as does the world's biggest Record fair on its own already, held for years in Utrecht. The artistic collective "The Fool" speak for the colourful expedition a whole generation in NL took. Here in Germany, we had communes and all this too, but rath rarely, with a completely different notation and timely massively delayed. Getting on the track of "Nederbeat" it needs to be said, that the definition umbrellas - more than I first thought. It all started way before the first Nederbeat singles appeared around 1963. Similar to the US history of music, the Netherlands had a massive Instro & Surf Rock phenomenon. Differently to the US it were Indonesian immigrants that developed a unique sound mixing Surf, Instro & Hotrod music with their Indonesian musical background. (The Netherlands had a colony in Indonesia for hundreds of years and used to run tradelines until 1949). These circumstances apparently caused a similar sonic evolution as it happened at the same time in the Staates. Out of the Surf & R'n'R mixture, a Garage Rock sound crystallised. Besides, the British Invasion happened in NL too but had been present before a well. I'm guessing the short distance and overseas trading connection to the UK explains the fast and solid transfusion of Mod to the Netherlands. Since the strong native construction of a Garage attitude, Beat was adapted and included. This led to a sound that reminds me of the Rolling Stones. Still Beat, but quite garagy. What was very welcome in the Netherbeat, was the wilder UK R&B Mod like we know it from Van Morrison's "Them". However there are also straight Merseybeat sounding bands to be found in Nederbeat, but they are not the majority. Considering the Freakbeat movement that Nederbeat also umbrellas, the UK influences were much bigger than one might conclude when hearing the Garage Rock. I don't think it can be expressed in percentage, but to me, it appears quite balanced regarding these ... Read more

Although the 50's had a light growth in musical diversity, I think it were the 60's that lead to a stylistic explosion in the western hemisphere. Until the 50's it was quite easy to determine origin, location & nature of a genre, whereas the 60's started to become confusing with overlapping and mutually influencing genres and style-variations. In terms of this background, it seems a bit complex to get a clearer overview of what evolved and actually happened in music... Read more

First I had my difficulties with the term "Mod" because I tried to find the leitmotif in this Genré but there was none. I think the best way to look at Mod in the context of "Evolution of Genré" is to understand it as an umbrella term for a multiplicity of music styles, that the subcultural movement called "Mod" used to listen to. More confusing does it get when one look at the origins of the term itself. Mod is an acronym for "Modernist", originally a person from the Modern Jazz Scene. Modern Jazz was nearly out of date when the Mod culture started to take over London, Britain and eventually the whole world. Even Japan found itself in some mod revival hype in the '80s ("Bōsōzoku"). Before I continue with the actual "Mod-Music", let me draw you a more detailed picture of the subcultural correlation... Read more

Yé Yé could be described as a south European variant of Beat Music. It's a french flavoured version of "Yeah Yeah" - a synonym for Beat Music even my grandpa used to know. In contrast, it combines much poppier elements such as Sunshine Pop and Bubblegum. Those three were the main ingredients, although there were other influences like you'll see later on. Chanson is another major basis for the Yé Yé sound. Of course, in it's french version, it draws a quite typical cliché mood of a "happy-strolling-along" á la Simon & Garfunkel's "Feelin' Groovy" song. The greatest part of songs reflects a sweet, innocent and carefree image on the poppy Beat.... Read more