It has become very difficult (impossible?) to distinguish one genre from another. Identifying a song as being within a particular genre should provide some understanding, but often has the opposite effect. For example, we read that a song by Grizzle Bear is a “fascinating blend of freak folk and baroque pop.” Oh, that's good to know, I think!
One tool for gaining a better understanding of genres is the listing of “Rdio New Releases by Genre.” The listing is available at http://www.furia.com/misc/rdionew.html. [Update: Sadly, this site has been taken down, at least temporarily.]
McDonald describes his work as:
“This is an algorithmically-generated non-analytical map of the musical genre-space. Genres and artists are positioned by code and data, adjusted for legibility, but the underlying vectors are less interesting than the juxtapositions and clusters that they produce, so the axes have been deliberately left unlabeled and uncalibrated. You are invited to imagine your own qualities and magnitudes that the geometry might be expressing.”
A screen capture of the site is below:
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