With the popularity of Planet of the Bass I've noticed a lot of people getting eurobeat and eurodance confused. This is understandable but also REALLY funny to me as a eurobeat girlie. Reigning Eurobeat queen Odyssey (you may know her as the girl behind "Discord I'm howlin at the moon") has a good Twitter thread on the subject, but to add my own summary that's hopefully not too jargon-y:
It's PROBABLY EUROBEAT if:
- Main lyrical themes are cars/driving/going Very Fast, Touhou, My Little Pony, or Japan (though the latter is more of a grey area since Japan comes up as a theme in some eurodance as well)
- Between every verse is a synthesizer riff that sounds too fast to ever possibly be played live by human hands
- There's a section where all but the last word or so of every line is omitted (this is where "dancing, we wanna feel the light is flashing, I send the power to myself" becomes "dancing... flashing... to myself")
- There's an electric guitar solo (may or may not be synthesized)
- The rhythm is a straight four-on-the-floor beat, aka it sounds like WOMP WOMP WOMP WOMP
- There's car vroom vroom sound effects
It's PROBABLY EURODANCE (at least as opposed to eurobeat) if:
- There's a rapper
- Themes include world peace or partying (there are SOME party eurobeat songs but not as many, and it's not like eurobeat is pro-war, they're just driving too fast to think about it)
- It's more downtempo
- The rhythm is a shuffle beat, aka it sounds like WA-WOMP WA-WOMP
- It's in a language other than English or Japanese
It's DEFINITELY eurobeat if:
- The YouTube thumbnail looks like this or otherwise involves an anime character and a car
Eurobeat songs you may know include Running in the 90s, Deja Vu, Gas Gas Gas, The Top, Night of Fire, and an honorable mention to The Living Tombstone's remix of Odyssey's eurobeat remix of Discord.
Eurodance songs you may know include Every Time We Touch, Butterfly, Caramelldansen, Cotton-Eye Joe (yes, really!), Dragostea Din Tei, and Blue.
HOPE THIS HELPS!!!!!!!