Bass music is a more general term for styles of electronic dance music, including dubstep, 4x4 garage, Miami bass, hardstyle, dubstyle, breakbeat, future jungle, the genres of jungle, drum and bass and certain forms of trance and house music, among others.

The phrase began to be used in response to the blending of sounds between genres and frequent misrepresentations of genre by casual fans. Dubstep pioneer Skream is quoted in an interview with The Independent in September 2011 as saying "The word dubstep is being used by a lot of people and there were a lot of people being tagged with the dubstep brush. They don't want to be tagged with it and shouldn't be tagged with it - that's not what they're pushing… When I say 'UK bass', it's what everyone UK is associated with so it would be a lot easier if it was called that."