Actually the term 'Drum and Bass' originated out of the Jamaican
reggae/dub scene, but whatever...
The reality is that labels are needed to a certain degree (ie. record
store filing, etc...) but it does get a bit out of hand at points. The
biggest danger is that some how you are deemed un-cool (ie. "ohhh acid
jazz that's so last year") due to some vague association that you never
asked for in the first place even though you're still making awesome
tunes. I'm all for genre descriptions being made based on the output of
the label...Ninjaesque, MoWaxish, Impulse-like, Blue Note-sounding,
etc... that way the genre rolls with the label over time and the majors
get screwed because nobody would care if every Arista release was filed
together at a shop. Or do what we do at Ninja and just invent really
stupid genre descriptions that will never hold up (errr...okay some of
them actually have). The reality is that it's not that big a deal. Any
serious music fan isn't really influenced by catagories anyway and buys
on the basis of whether or not the musics good. If I owned a store I
would file records under things like 'Skronky-Jazz Snob Section',
'Elitist Noise Section', 'Drug Influenced Noodling Section', 'Releases a
Company Spent a Lot of Money to Convince You Were Good but Actually Suck
Section', etc...
Jeff