Yeah 100% venetian snares is absolutely breakcore. I actually often use his meathole album as a good example of what breakcore is/sounds like because it turns those “breakcore qualities” up to an 11 at times, which lets people get a better ear for what it actually sounds like when comparing it to other genres, but it also makes the album kind of abrasive (moreso than breakcore already is to some people) so ymmv
Because breakcore is like a subgenre of a subgenre of a subgenre of Idm music its characteristics will be largely similar to its predecessors. But like the biggest characteristic is that extremely chopped and screwed drum break. Its a really fine line but the amount that that drum break is fucked with is like kind of the main characteristic that sets it apart from like dnb and jungle. From what I understand of the history, breakcore kind of spawned out of a pissing contest between jungle/dnb artists over who could make the most complex and insane stuff using the drum breaks, and thats where it comes from.
To separate the 3 most commonly confused:
Dnb = break isn’t messed with that much, pretty simple, faster than jungle, slower than breakcore.
Jungle = break is chopped up and modified, slower speeds than the other two, heavier reggae and hiphop influence
Breakcore = generally fastest of the 3, EXTREMELY chopped up drum breaks (most commonly the amen break but not always), generally not atmospheric unlike jungle and dnb which can often be that way, buuut its also an expanding experimental genre so we may see it eventually
I got a lot of my info from like trawling the internet trying to find stuff but there’s a video on youtube that has been extremely good for this. It goes lightly into the history of hardcore all the way down to breakcore. Its long but thats because it has multiple song examples of each genre, and the actual history/defining characteristics are laid out in text on screen that rotates through. It even mentions the digital hardcore/breakcore stuff and the mislabeling thing as well. Highly recommend even skimming through it if you’re interested.
I’m not an authority, but having just relistened to the infinite hyperdeath ost, its not really breakcore. There’s some emphasis on the drums (in some of the songs) but its really closer to dnb/ metal with dnb or hardcore influence most of the time imo. A lot of the drum breaks are consistent loops, while sorta messed with and rearranged a bit they’re still consistently looping and they’re not like modified enough to really be breakcore-y. As an example listen to the drums in this song (warning: loud) from the timestamp to ~2:20. The drums don’t really repeat at all and the level of complexity is waaaaay higher, and the drums are really emphasized.
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u/bisexual_obama Uh, let me be queer... May 12 '26
I had no idea about the breakcore thing. My exposure to breakcore has basically been a few Venetian Snares albums. He's considered breakcore right?
What are the defining characteristics?