What is the history of vaporwave?
Apr 17, 2022 · Who came up with Vaporwave? The term vaporwave was apparently coined in 2011 by music producer Will Burnett, who used it to describe a style emerging among artists like Vektroid, whose July 2011 album New Dreams Ltd. was an early influence on the sub-genre. Is Vaporwave from Japan? While vaporwave does use Japanese iconography to convey …
What is a vaporwave artist?
Jul 10, 2017 · Vaporwave, the vaguely named electronic subgenre, first hit the mainstream (and I say that loosely) in the early 2010s. Pioneered by artists like Ramona Xavier (of Vektroid and Macintosh Plus, among other pseudeonyms), the genre takes heavy influence from 80s Italian disco and chillwave, and relies heavily on its aesthetic to send the message across.
What is a vaporwave song?
Aug 11, 2020 · Vaporwave is a microgenre of electronic music, visual art style, and internet memes that appeared in early 2010. It is defined as an imitated embrace of internet culture and a sampling of soft jazz…
What happened to vaporwave fashion?
Oct 01, 2015 · History of Vaporwave. Vaporwave is a genre of music that spawned from a semi-underground internet aesthetic. On various internet forums, a small community of people bonded over their love of 80s and 90s pop culture, early graphic design, pixels, roman busts, Japanese culture, and music from the 80s, namely new age, funk, and smooth jazz ...
What was the first vaporwave?
The first album to be considered vaporwave proper was Floral Shoppe, released in late 2011 by the graphic artist/producer Ramona Xavier (predominatly known by the stage name Vektroid) but credited to her alias "Macintosh Plus." The previous albums pointed the way, but Floral Shoppe was it: the lodestone that embodies ...Aug 18, 2016
Who was the father of vaporwave?
Daniel Lopatin, an experimental electronic artist from Massachusetts, is arguably one of the founding fathers of the vaporwave movement.Oct 5, 2018
Who invented synthwave?
Among the first synthwave artists were the French acts David Grellier (College) and Kavinsky. These early artists began creating music inspired by famous 1980s score composers; music which was, at the time, largely associated with French house.
When was synthwave made?
Synthwave is a distinctly modern music genre begun in the mid 2000s as an homage to the pop culture sounds and imagery of the 1980s and early 1990s. Conceptually, this interest in the past manifests itself in two significant, and often interrelated, forms.Jun 24, 2021
What is vaporwave music?
Vaporwave is almost a meme in and of itself. The way it’s made seems simple enough—easy listening tracks are layered with heavy samples taken from a variety of genres, mostly lounge music and R&B, but the base of the music itself draws a lot of inspiration from smooth jazz and other easy-listening type songs. ...
When did Vaporwave come out?
Vaporwave, the vaguely named electronic subgenre, first hit the mainstream (and I say that loosely) in the early 2010s. Pioneered by artists like Ramona Xavier (of Vektroid and Macintosh Plus, among other pseudeonyms), the genre takes heavy influence from 80s Italian disco and chillwave, and relies heavily on its aesthetic to send ...
What was the Vaporwave movement?
Shortly after Floral Shoppe gained prominence, the Vaporwave movement went through a period of uninspired, largely disliked music that gave the movement a bad reputation to the general public. This downturn for Vaporwave arguably began when artist, Robin Burnett, known as Internet Club, released a number of projects that borrowed themes from Floral Shoppe but instead of condemning capitalism- promoted it.#N#While Internet Club’s approach to Vaporwave music was innovative and intelligent, those who followed after the artist were largely uninspired. Vaporwave albums effectively became a mish-mash of rehashed '80s and '90s advertisements with music that did it’s best to imitate Floral Shoppe’s major themes.
Who is the founder of Vaporwave?
Daniel Lopatin, an experimental electronic artist from Massachusetts, is arguably one of the founding fathers of the vaporwave movement. The Vaporwave genre actually originated on online forums as an aesthetic characterized by glitch art, '80s and '90s subculture and a surrealist/sarcastic perspective on pop culture and consumerism. However, in 2010 Lopatin’s release of Ecco Jams 1, under the pseudonym Chuck Person, served as one half of what would become the album that defined Vaporwave music.
Is vaporwave a success?
Vaporwave is a rare success among internet subcultures and rightly so. Where most attempts at something similar failed, pioneers in the Vaporwave movement have managed to steer the development of its music, aesthetic and culture at pivotal moments.
What is the subculture of music?
The subculture’s music had evolved from a simple caricature and criticism of capitalism, to be a way of communicating a narrative through music. Following Romantic dream, a variety of sub-genres emerged from Vaporwave, one of which would emerge as the face of the genre for a time - Future Funk.
Who is Chuck Person?
However, in 2010 Lopatin’s release of Ecco Jams 1, under the pseudonym Chuck Person, served as one half of what would become the album that defined Vaporwave music. Lopatin released Ecco Jams one as a joke.
What is mall soft?
Mall soft can be considered the anti-thesis of Future Funk. Where Future funk deviated from traditional Vaporwave, creating a more upbeat, dance-centric style of music, Mall soft became the epitome of using elevator music backed by intense reverb to create music that fit a particular theme of particular places.
Who is James Ferraro?
Enter James Ferraro a musician, vocalist, producer and composer, known for his exploration of hyperreality and consumer culture. Around the same time that ‘Chuck Person’ released Ecco Jams 1, James released a project called Far Side Virtual, which true to his style explored consumerism through the lenses of globalization and internet culture.
Overview
History
Vaporwave originated on the Internet in the early 2010s as an ironic variant of chillwave and as a derivation of the work of hypnagogic pop artists such as Ariel Pink and James Ferraro, who were also characterized by the invocation of retro popular culture. It was one of many Internet microgenres to emerge in this era, alongside witch house, seapunk, shitgaze, cloud rap, and others. Vaporwave coi…
Characteristics
Vaporwave is a hyper-specific subgenre, or "microgenre," that is both a form of electronic music and an art style, although it is sometimes suggested to be primarily a visual medium. The genre is defined largely by its surrounding subculture, with its music inextricable from its visual accountrements. Academic Laura Glitsoswrites, "In this way, vaporwave defies traditional music conventions that typically privilege the music over the visual form." Musically, vaporwave reconfi…
Critical interpretations
Vaporwave was one of several microgenres spawned in the early 2010s that were the brief focus of media attention. Users on various music forums, as quoted by Vice, variously characterized the genre as "chillwave for Marxists", "post-elevator music", and "corporate smooth jazz Windows 95pop". Its circulation was more akin to an Internet meme than typical music genres of th…
Vaporwave was one of several microgenres spawned in the early 2010s that were the brief focus of media attention. Users on various music forums, as quoted by Vice, variously characterized the genre as "chillwave for Marxists", "post-elevator music", and "corporate smooth jazz Windows 95pop". Its circulation was more akin to an Internet meme than typical music genres of th…
Offshoots and subgenres
Future funk is a French house-inspired offshoot that expands upon the disco and house elements of vaporwave. It involves much of the same visual imagery drawn from 1980s anime, with reference points including Urusei Yatsura, Super Dimension Fortress Macross and Sailor Moon. Musically, future funk is produced in the same sample-based manner as vaporwave, albeit with a more upbeat approach. Most of the music samples are drawn from Japanese city poprecords from th…
See also
• Criticism of capitalism
• Culture jamming
• Dead mall
• Digitality
• Hyperconsumerism
Notes
1. ^ This included the synthwave music genre, also known as "outrun", although the latter term was later used to refer more generally to retro 1980s aesthetics such as VHS tracking artifacts, magenta neon, and gridlines.
2. ^ Author Emile Frankel cited the work as "a seminal release" and argued that Lopatin had captured "the affect of vaporwave" even earlier with the "highly influential" electronic album Betrayed in the Octagon (2007).
Bibliography
• Born, Georgina; Haworth, Christopher (2017). "Mixing It: Digital Ethnography and Online Research Methods--A Tale of Two Global Digital Music Genres". In Hjorth, Larissa; Horst, Heather; Galloway, Anne (eds.). The Routledge Companion to Digital Ethnography. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-1-317-37778-8.
• Frankel, Emile (2019). Hearing the Cloud: Can Music Help Reimagine The Future?. John Hunt Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78535-839-5.