Five bands that are their own genre
There was a time when genre was important. Rock, funk, soul, rap, psychedelic, and jazz were all necessary labels for music fans to pay attention to.
Music wasn’t as accessible as it is today. People would have to part ways with money to listen to an album, rather than committing a few minutes to a quick listen and deciding if it’s worth their full attention or not. As such, genre was important because people wanted to know what they were buying. As much as creatives might despise labels, they were necessary from the consumer’s point of view.
Things are different today. With music being more accessible than ever, we don’t need to adhere to strict labels quite as much; however, artists are inevitably assigned different genres, and it’s a way of being that people are unable to shake. Well… most people. There are some bands that are so unique, varied, and influential in what they did that they simply can’t exist under a label; they are their own beast.
So, who are the bands that remain undefinable, and as such, exist within their very own genre of music?
Five bands that are their own genre:
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard
When King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard removed all of their songs from Spotify, it accounted for about half of what was on the streaming service. Obviously, not really, but the fact remains King Gizzard are hardly a band that holds back when it comes to releasing a large amount of music. Whatever genre or style takes their fancy, they don’t just dabble; they excel in it, and as a result, have become impossible to characterise.
Whatever style of music you’re looking for, King Gizzard will have an album where they play it to perfection. Their attitude towards music is incredibly free, where they essentially are happy with pursuing whatever idea comes to mind and moving on to the next without a second thought. It’s refreshing, and it’s led to the creation of a band impossible to define, who sit within their own little pocket of sound.
Clipping
Clipping started off as a noise project. Producers Jonathan Snipes and William Hutson were big fans of noise music and so started making their own. During DJ sets, they would play inaccessible noise and loop rap lyrics over the top of them. After realising that the two things worked well together, they enlisted the help of rapper Daveed Diggs so that they could start writing original music.
The early work sounds like what you would expect upon reading the above, a blend of hip hop and noise; however, since then, Clipping have made multiple concept albums that straddle the line of science fiction and horror, as well as electronic and dance-infused noise. There is truly nothing else like this in the world, and Clipping remains their own tour de force.
Grateful Dead
Despite Jerry Garcia passing away in 1995 and the Grateful Dead not touring as much as they used to, the band continue to gain new listeners and be one of the most famous acts in the world. Why? Well, the quick answer is that there is no other band like them; they are their own sonic being, and come together to make a sound that no other band has come close to touching.
If you’re judging their studio work alone, then you can tell that Grateful Dead are evidently a band that were a big part of the hippy movement and made music which slotted into that sound incredibly well. That’s all well and good; however, when you listen to their live recordings, where songs are used as mere outlines for what unfolds, you realise this is a jam band that thrives in being undefinable. People keep listening, and the band keeps getting new listeners, all because nobody else has come close to doing what they do.
The New Eves
The New Eves released their debut album in 2025, and with it, they ushered in a brand new style of folk that people have obsessed over. The standard characteristics of folk music are still there: sweet-sounding and emotive vocals, excellent lyricism, and a lot of heart behind every second of sound; however, they bring so much more to the table than just these traditional elements.
Throughout their album, the band also touch upon a range of other sounds that, if used incorrectly, would come across as strange, but The New Eves manage to integrate them in a way that takes their folk sound and elevates it to something otherworldly. Using chants, screams, disorganised instrumentation and experimentation, they manage to create a record that doesn’t sound anything like what people might have expected. This is a style of folk that exists in one place and one place only, with the minutes of a New Eves song.
The Beatles
Shut up, I know it’s an easy pick, but if other people aren’t going to stop talking about them, then neither am I. There are two comments within the musical world that I truly hate: “The Beatles were overrated” and “I don’t like The Beatles.” The Beatles weren’t overrated, they paved the way for so many different styles of music and the world wouldn’t be the same without them. And if you don’t like the Beatles, you haven’t listened enough.
We can chuck the Beatles under the labels of “rock” and “pop” but that doesn’t come close to capturing the full scope of what they achieved in their short time as a band. The genres they transcended and the boundaries they broke with their music is unlike anything that has ever been achieved or will ever be achieved again. The Fab Four have a sound which is theirs and theirs alone; they are their own genre and remain so today, decades after people first uttered their name.
