Eleven genre-bending songs that prove music has no limits

Songs that cross borders between genres and artists that create them not only bring something new but create limitless creativity and create unique sounds that challenge our perceptions of music.

For listeners who enjoy diverse sounds and artists that create them, these songs challenge the conventional music landscape proving that music has no limits.

By embracing various influences and styles, genre-bending artists continue to shape the future of music, making it an exciting time for listeners and creators alike. Here are eleven such songs created in the late sixties that cross many genre boundaries as if they don’t exist.

Genre-bending songs that prove music is limitless

“Heroes and Villains” - Beach Boys (1967)

When Brian Wilson was attempting to create his botched masterpiece Smile, it was supposed to be a spectrum of American pop music known up to that moment. He recorded an infinite number of versions for each and every song that was supposed to be included, including this one.

While many of those versions were longer than the one that ended on The Beach Boys Smiley Smile album, that one was a true example of how you can perfectly join snippets of different musical elements and make them sound like an introductory soundtrack to American pop.

“Trevere” - Miles Davis (1974)

If there ever was an artist who grew within the realms of jazz and then took his musical imagination all over the place, then it was Miles Davis.

By this time in the 1970s, Davis was usually taking time to expand his ideas within his compositions, but here, on a song from his Big Fun album, he keeps it relatively brief (around five minutes), pushing sonic boundaries solely based on three chords that serve as a base to shoot into the stratosphere.

“This Must be the Place (N_aïve_ Melody)” - The Talking Heads (1983)

These Talking Heads had always quite a lot to say from their inception, and by the time they and their listeners entered the eighties, they were bound to cross as many musical borders as they could - from rock, pop, and new wave to funk and world music. This song exemplifies this approach, and David Byrne calls it an “essential feel-good song for anyone’s playlist.”

“Lithium” - Nirvana (1991)

How do you reference a Karl Marx quote and fit it in a post-punk/grunge song that can be a ballad and a rocker at the same time? It is something that a genius musical mind Kurt Cobain can come up with, addressing some serious mental health issues, and making it one of the most popular Nirvana songs at the same time.

“Around the World” - Daft Punk (1997)

When French electro-pop masters Daft Punk released this song on their Homework album, and then as a single, it proved its title by becoming a number-one dance hit all over the world. Literally. One of the reasons for the song’s success was the fact that the duo was able to fit as many different genres into it and still made people dance to it.

“Aquemini” - OutKast (1998)

How far can you stretch the limits of hip-hop, and are there any? Andre3000 and Big Boi working under the OutKast Monikers showed us that it just might be the latter. With the words playing the main part here, the duo proved that there’s a hefty substance there, influencing so many other artists who came after them.

"Afterlife" – Arcade Fire (2013)

Will Butler and his Arcade Fire engage another gender-bender here, LCD Soundsystem’s James Murphy, to move their music in the direction David Bowie, one of the band’s key influences, took on practically all his albums and blended them into a single song. A rock, synth-pop, and dance combination all in one.

"Six Feet Under" – Billie Eilish (2016)

Even with her earliest songs like this one, Eilish and her brother Finneas ditched any specific genre, combining pop sensitivities with some submerged beats that created a sound that was both pop and vocal ambient music. There is no typical pop, or anything else for that matter, here.

"Cranes in the Sky" – Solange (2016)

It is not that easy being Beyonce’s sister and trying to come up with music that is experimental at its core. Solange was working on this one for a period of eight years or so, creating a combination of deep soul, jazz and baroque pop that has both substance and atmosphere.

"Vroom Vroom" – Charli XCX (2016)

Talking about futuristic sounds these days, you can hardly miss this one that doesn’t shy away from experimenting with sound. Using pop as a base, it slips in everything - from glitchy beats and distorted vocals to creating very futuristic vibes, even eight years on.

"Borderline" – Tame Impala (2020)

Kevin Parker and Tame Impala were initially considered purveyors of modern psych rock, featuring within their music all the original elements of psych as it was. Yet with this song and the whole of the band’s album The Slow Rush it came from, Parker showed that you can infuse ‘old’ psych with elements of electro-pop and disco and make it sound completely new.

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