Darksynth & Dark Bass

Darksynth

Darksynth is a heavier, more aggressive offshoot of synthwave, the retro-leaning electronic music that recreates the analogue synthesizer palette of 1980s film scores. Where synthwave is warm and nostalgic, Darksynth is distorted and menacing. It draws its tonal world from 1980s horror and cyberpunk cinema and, crucially, from heavy metal with several of its founding producers coming from black metal bands. It emerged in the early 2010s, centered around French producers Perturbator and Carpenter Brut with Aphasia Records and Blood Music as early labels promoting the genre. It gained recognition largely on the back of the video game Hotline Miami whose 2012 soundtrack carried the sound to a wide audience. Built on pulsing arpeggios, blown-out drums and a metal sensibility in its riffs; Darksynth found much of its audience among heavy-music fans and has been used widely in game and film scoring.

Dark Bass

Dark Bass, also called midtempo or space bass, is a strain of heavy, distorted electronic bass music that developed in the North American scene through the 2010s, running broadly between 100 and 140 beats per minute. It is characterised by saturated, aggressive sound-design, physical sub-bass and a deliberate sense of weight and space while prioritising menace over groove. It grew out of the wider bass and dubstep world, with artists like Rezz, Deathpact and 1788-L shaping its early direction. Though it emerged separately from Darksynth, the two share a heavy, distorted, bass-driven and cinematic aesthetic and they converged over the decade as their artists began collaborating and cross-pollinating. The convergence is especially visible in the French underground with producers like Noizinski, Owl Vision and ZABO sitting right at the point where the synthwave and bass-music lineages merge.