Tech house is a subgenre of house music that mixes elements of minimal techno into simple, 4-to-4 beats found in soulful deep house. The genre came to prominence in the late-1990s atmosphere of American  clubs as soul influenced Detroit-style techno that also borrowed elements from house before reaching Europe. As one reviewer for Amazon.com suggested, this style fuses steady techno rhythms with the soul and accessibility of house.

Unlike progressive house that arose on European dance scene during the same era, tech house does not represent a breakaway from electronic simplicity, but rather takes it to a new level, by experimenting same simplicity in techno subgenres. Reaching mainstream popularity worldwide around 2001, tech house eventually fused with electroclash to create electrotech — the proponent of electro house genre.

Characteristics

As a mixing style, tech-house often brings together deep or minimal techno music, the soulful and jazzy end of house, some minimal techno and microhouse (especially with a soulful feel, such as Luomo’s music), and very often some dub elements. There is some overlap with progressive house, which too can contain deep, soulful, dub, and techno elements; this is especially true since the turn of the millennium, as progressive-house mixes have themselves often become deeper and sometimes more minimal. However, the typical progressive-house mix--which might integrate some funky house, trance, and even some hard techno at times--has more energy than tech-house, which tends to have a more “laid-back” feel. Tech-house fans tend to appreciate subtlety, as well as the “middle ground” that adds a “splash of color to steel techno beats” and eschews the “banging” of house music for intricate rhythms.

Also in contrast to most progressive house, which tends to have a progression over the course of the mix ending in an ecstatic release of energy at the end, tech-house often aims at achieving an even “groove.” Although there might be dips and peaks in the energy level — any interesting mix will have them, after all--they will be more on the restrained side. As such, tech-house is found to be as enjoyable a "headphone experience" as it is a dancefloor one, a fact not lost on the creaters of such music - a classic release by the duo MRI on the Force Tracks label was their 12" titled "Nightclubbing at Home". Later tech house tracks include "Dirty Vegas - Days Go By" (2002) and "Fab Four - Last Night a DJ Blew My Mind" (2003).

Musical structure

As a musical (as opposed to a mixing) style, tech-house uses the same basic structure as house. However, elements of the house 'sound' such as realistic jazz sounds (in deep house) and booming kick drums are replaced with elements from techno such as shorter, deeper, darker and often distorted kicks, smaller, quicker hi-hats, noisier snares and more synthetic or acid sounding synth melodies from the TB-303, including raw electronic noises from distorted sawtooth and square wave oscillators.

The well known tech-house producer, Jean F. Cochois, also known as The Timewriter, has often used jazzy, soulful vocals and elements, and equally as much raw electronic sounds in his music. However, a rich techno-like kick and bassline seems to be a consistency amongst tech house music.

The term tech house has proved controversial over the years as some say that the use of the expression has mutated to represent a very particular and narrow style of music (see above), rather than the broad-minded attitude and approach to DJing and production that the tech house scene once was during the mid-nineties. For this reason, certain artists such as Asad Rizvi no longer attach the term with their work, as they feel that popular perception of tech house is a vastly inaccurate representation of their work.