Indie Hindi, socaton, skurban. You may feel like you need a dictionary the next time you go shopping for music.

The music world is getting thick with hybrids, or cryptically named blends of established styles. Indie Hindi, for example, is traditional Indian vocals tinged with edgy American-style rock. Socaton is dance music that has elements of rap, calypso and reggae. The number of genres is up more than 40% over the past four years, by one measure -- Gracenote, which maintains the music-classification system used by major sites like Yahoo and iTunes, now recognizes more than 1,800 genres. It recently added "hyphy," a jittery form of hip-hop from the San Francisco area.

Defying standard genres has traditionally been a risky move for bands in part because it's difficult for retailers to figure out where to place them on the shelves. But increasingly, fans are finding music in less conventional ways -- like perusing strangers' online playlists, or following a trail of links on MySpace -- paving the way for bands to define themselves in more exotic ways. Bands are also keenly aware of the recent commercial success of blended genres like reggaeton, a Jamaican-Latin-rap mix, and popera, radio-friendly songs done with operatic vocals.

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