Music's center of gravity is shifting again. With the sound of seismic drumbeats, blitzing synthesizers, and hypnotic sonic loops, electronic dance music has erupted into the mainstream, leaving many veterans of other genres to wonder if they, too, should get in sync. Like rap and disco before it, the latest surge of electronic musicrepresents a fork in the road for established acts.

That tension was on display when Muse, a British rock band that some call a successor to U2, performed a high-stakes set on "Saturday Night Live" last weekend. The trio showcased some of the electronic flairs on its new album, including a robotic voice that stutters the title of the song "Madness." Band member Chris Wolstenholme triggered the sound by batting his thumb along a touch screen he mounted on his bass guitar, mainly to spice up the performance and save him from "sitting at a keyboard, playing with one finger, looking really lame," he says.

The dilemma for rockers—catch a ride on a hot trend that could sputter, or opt out and potentially miss out on an era-defining sound—harks back to stars of past generations who tried to adapt. The results were mixed.

Consider the Rolling Stones, whose 1976 single "Hot Stuff" now sounds like dated disco opportunism. Yet their equally funky "Miss You," issued two years later, is part of the canon, and even made possible the recent Maroon 5 smash "Moves Like Jagger."

By collaborating with Run-D.M.C. on a 1986 version of "Walk This Way," Aerosmith resuscitated its career, helped make rap seem safe for the masses, and birthed an enduring party pleaser.

Then there was the 1993 soundtrack to "Judgment Night," which had bigger ambitions than the action movie it accompanied. The pairing of alt-rockers and second-wave rappers (Mudhoney with Sir Mix-A-Lot; sober-minded Pearl Jam backing weed-obsessed Cypress Hill) is remembered more as a novelty than a marriage of two important movements.

Top-40 acts like Nicki Minaj and Rihanna have latched onto the club-ready sounds of producers including David Guetta and Calvin Harris. Noting rap's eroding market share, hip-hop acts have teamed with electronic eclecticists such as Bassnectar and Diplo. Rock bands true to the holy trinity of guitars, drums and vocals are more vulnerable.

This week, for example, CBS Radio announced it had bought New York's only remaining commercial radio station geared toward contemporary rock, and would be switching it to sports talk.

Electronic dance music is often referred to by the catchall acronym EDM, but encompasses a textbook's worth of subcategories, from spacey "deep house" to gut-punching "dubstep," EDM's equivalent of heavy metal. All of it evolved out of the mechanized beats and primitive synthesizer lines of pioneers such as '70s minimalists Kraftwerk. In the U.S., electronic music has staged various mainstream incursions over the years, including the "techno"-driven boomlet of early '90s rave parties. But the current EDM land rush is happening on a much bigger scale. The shepherds for this online audience are the DJs, who do anything from mixing prerecorded songs on stage, to crafting original tracks using computers and synthesizers.

They usually offer their music for free, and have little need for big record labels and retail distribution. They're no longer faceless knob-twiddlers but branded stars. Their live performances have been maximized by high-energy festivals that can draw hundreds of thousands of people (more and more of which are being acquired by big promoters like Live Nation 

Some meat-and-potatoes rockers are already wading in. "I always knew there was more to it than 'm-cha, m-cha, m-cha, m-cha,'" says drummer Tommy Lee, imitating the repetitive, four-on-the-floor beat that DJs use to keep dancers moving. Though he still performs with the '80s hair-metal band Mötley Crüe, he has built a parallel career as a DJ. It wasn't easy to earn respect in a genre hostile to celebrity posers, he says. With his touring partner of seven years, DJ Aero, he opened concerts for one of the industry's marquee stars, Deadmau5, who last week ribbed Mr. Lee on Twitter when he turned 50.

"My biggest fantasy would be for the two worlds to somehow fuse together," Mr. Lee says. "There are some rock people who are stuck in a f---ing time warp, who think if the music doesn't have a guitar solo in it, it sucks." Two out of three of his Mötley Crüe bandmates are generally hostile to electronic music. Still, he's been able to inject some of it into the band's music. Witness the groaning samples he's been layering on his solos during Mötley Crüe concerts, in which Mr. Lee and his drum kit travel upside down on a roller coaster loop.

EDM could be the ultimate soundtrack for the post-Napster era. Many fans have never bought a CD in their lives; they go online and, like the DJs, create mixes and share them via sites like SoundCloud. It's participatory fandom, truly international, and unconcerned about layering in disparate musical references. And at a time when live music is where the money is, EDM festivals command hundreds of dollars a ticket with ease (and little overhead). Agents say A-list DJs can earn up to $250,000 for a night's work in a Las Vegas club, and sometimes more for a festival gig. Sales reports from this sector are spotty, but the trade magazine Pollstar says EDM is undoubtedly adding to concert industry revenues.

"I can't think of another scene where people made so much money and were so DIY," says Kathryn Frazier, a co-owner of DJ Skrillex's record label, Owsla.

"Every big management company. Every big [booking] agency. They're all investigating" how to integrate electronic music into their portfolios, says talent manager Tim Smith, whose clients are highly sought as producers and to remix existing tracks. Mr. Smith represents Zedd (23-year-old Anton Zaslavski), who has been working in the studio with Lady Gaga, and Skrillex (24-year-old Sonny Moore), the dubstep star—and former rock singer—who cemented the genre's status with five nomination at the 2012 Grammy Awards, including best new artist. (He didn't win, but took home three other awards.)

During the Grammy telecast last February, arena rock band Foo Fighters traded licks with Deadmau5, who bopped atop a glowing tower wearing his oversize mouse helmet.

DJs are wary of such arranged marriages. Skrillex had been asked to do the Grammy mashup. "Sonny immediately said it was not for him but I pushed for it," says Ms. Frazier. "While we were all sitting at the Grammys watching it, I felt great relief about that decision to pass."

Skrillex has worked with a handful of rock acts. He cut a track with the Doors, featuring a sample of Jim Morrison's spoken voice, after the Grammy committee hooked him up with the band's surviving members. And last year Skrillex and other dubstep producers made an album with Korn, a holdover from the "nu-metal" boom of the 1990s. Korn manager Peter Katsis says dubstep was breaking out in popularity while the album was under way, forcing them to rush to completion. "What was a fresh idea then might not have been if the album came out six months later than it did," hesays.

Still, the band (and Skrillex) was jeered by the EDM authenticity police. Mr. Katsis dismissed such talk, noting that Korn has a long history of commissioning dance remixes, and that the "Path of Totality" album sold about 55,000 copies more than the band's previous release and goosed concert ticket sales.

It's easy to see why outsiders would want to catch some of the momentum. Last weekend at the Manhattan nightclub Pacha, the DJs Zedd and Porter Robinson shared a cramped stage, bouncing like skinny, hyperkinetic cheerleaders and whipping up a young, densely packed crowd. The energy of the strobe-strafed dancers seemed to evolve but never ebb as the DJs bent over their laptops, triggering wave after wave of cresting beats.

"Why not take what you like about this and put it in your music?" said Zedd in an interview before his set began at 1:45 a.m. "I do the same thing in the opposite direction. Most of my inspiration comes from rock." Classically trained in Germany as a pianist, Zedd played in a metal band before his electronic compositions were discovered on Beatport, an online store. He said the song "Firth of Fifth" by progressive rock group Genesis "opened my mind" in the studio while working on his debut album, "Clarity," released last week to strong sales by Interscope, the label home of No Doubt and Lady Gaga.

Like any artist, however, Zedd worries about getting pigeonholed in EDM. "You make a piano song, and then what? I don't want to be judged someday for making a song that only has organic instruments."

Some see a significant gulf separating electronic music from more rootsy forms. "I would say most rock musicians listen to that stuff and immediately have no idea and no understanding of it at all. I gotta admit myself, a lot of it's really confusing to me," said singer and guitarist Jack White. "When you don't have a story inside of music—even the great instrumental hits of the past, like the Ventures and the Shadows, Link Wray—you have to really, really get very lucky in order for a song to penetrate into the culture. That is very difficult to do without words and a melody and a person telling a story, singing about it."

Industry executives are wary of a bubble, remembering another time when dance music dominated the pop market. "The pendulum swings back and forth. Right now we're in the resurgence of disco music, and we know what happened right after that," says Atlantic Records chairman and chief executive Craig Kallman, whose Big Beat label features core electronic acts.

Talent manager Cliff Burnstein, whose clients include Metallica, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and the Black Keys, sees young music fans currently "peeling off from your standard electric guitar sound" toward two extremes: the computerized sound of EDM, or the acoustic folk of groups like Mumford & Sons, the British quartet whose second album just sold an eye-opening 600,000 copies in one week. "You could postulate that we're in an era where the middle is dropping out," Mr. Bernstein says.

For Muse, who he co-manages, the gateway could be songs like "Madness," the first single from the band's album, "The 2nd Law," released last week. "What we have to do is promote the most commercial tracks more relentlessly to get them to a wider audience. It's really a mathematical question."

Formed by three school friends in year 1994, Muse is in a better position than some major bands to experiment with new sounds. The group is rooted in the operatic rock of Queen, but over the years has plunged into synthesized bass lines and rhythms. "In terms of contemporary rock bands I can't think of any that we take influence from," says singer Matthew Bellamy.

To be sure, only a few tracks on "The 2nd Law" draw on EDM trends. "Follow Me" was produced by the electronic act Nero. And "Unsustainable" is marked by a throbbing, menacing sound pulse, a hallmark of dubstep known as a "drop." The album debuted at No. 2, the band's highest chart appearance yet.

"Ironically that song has almost no technology on it at all. We used 80 musicians. Full orchestra, including brass and strings and a 40-piece choir as well. That was us demonstrating that organic instruments can compete," Mr. Bellamy said.

"But in a way they can't, since it took 80 musicians to get even close to what one person can do with a laptop in this day and age. If there was a point to made, it's more fun doing it with 80 musicians."