When Korn made the decision to go Brostep, it was only natural that they worked with Skrillex. Find a live clip of him performing "First of the Year (Equinox)" and it's not all that different than watching a video of Korn playing "Blind" in the late '90s. There's a subdued intro that slowly becomes more complex until the vocalist screams and the song drops, only instead of asking "Are you ready?" the voice yells "CALL 911 NOW!" When that happens, the crowd becomes a big sweaty collection of people hitting each other instead of the rhythmic dances moves we typically attach to EDM. These are not the raves we are used to.

At 1:27 in the above video the song really kicks in to gear and the sound that most defines Brostep comes in. Just like the subgenre, that machine noise has a mocking label too: Transformers sex. I don't know how and if Transformers reproduce, nor am I particularly interested, but what I do know is this: while the Transformers reference is incredibly obvious it's also the exact right word to attach to the music.

Much like Michael Bay and his cinematic works, Brostep is spectacle. It's loud and in your face. In fact, the complaint that many Dubstep purists have with it is that it's too aggressive. Take what Brostep pioneer Rusko had to say on the subject:

It's not about playing the hardest, hardest tracks for an hour and a half. It's like someone screaming in your face for an hour- you don't want that. A lot of dubstep fans just come 'cause they just wanna hear the most disgusting, hard, dirty, distorted music possible and that's not what it's about.

Just because Skrillex is nominated for a Grammy against indie darling Bon Iver doesn't mean that Brostep is the new dominant force in music. If anything, we should be happy that the notoriously old fashioned NARAS is recognizing new genres of music as being worthwhile. After all, even Armageddon is part of the Criterion Collection.