Electro
Electro is an early style of electronic dance music built on Roland TR-808 drum machine beats, synthesizer funk and robotic, often vocoded, vocals.
It took shape in New York in the early 1980s, when hip hop and funk producers picked up the machine sound of Kraftwerk. 'Planet Rock' by Afrika Bambaataa and the Soulsonic Force, from 1982, is one of its founding records. The beats are syncopated and broken instead of a straight four-on-the-floor thump, which separates electro from house and techno. It fed directly into Detroit techno and Miami bass.
Artists it is known for: Afrika Bambaataa, Egyptian Lover, Cybotron.
- Family
- Electronic & Dance
- On Spotify
- A current genre
- What it is
- A genre
- From
- New York, early 1980s
- Also called
- electro-funk
- Trackify listeners who play it
- 4%
About 3,400 of 83,000 Trackify listeners with public profiles have electro among their top artists of the last four weeks. Rounded; updated 13 November 2026.
Electro artists
Daft Punk
Skrillex
Sir Mix-A-Lot
KraftwerkThe electro artists most Trackify listeners have in their top fifty. Each opens on Spotify.
Sources
The definition is written for this site from open sources, and was checked against them on 13 November 2026.