Vaporwave
Vaporwave
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T H E F U T U R E I S H E R E , W H A T N O W ?
Vaporwave may or may not exist as an established art form or means of expression. Vaporwave works against itself to provide entertainment; the boundaries of irony are irrelevant here.
Vaporwave is said to be inspired by or similar to "sea-punk," however this is up in the air. The concept of Vaporwave is often considered to be commentary on the inevitable collision of corporate commercialism with what many consider pop culture, although this is ALREADY HAPPENING with corporations trying to hijack memes for commercial purposes OTI. Most Vaporwave consists of chopped and screwed 80s music, and slowed down elevator music that only hipsters would listen to otherwise. Popular Vaporwave artists include laserdisc visions, Vektroid, and MACINTOSH PLUS, who all happen to be the same person.
Eccojams
T H I S I S Y O U R W O R L D ^ | | | v T H I S I S Y O U R L I F E
Chuck Person's "Eccojams", Com Truise's "In Decay", and James Ferraro's "Far Side Virtual" are all "proto-vaporwave". They just are.
Origins of Vaporwave/FLORAL SHOPPE
MACINTOSH PLUS's album FLORAL SHOPPE is considered to be one of the first Vaporwave albums. Like all others, it consist of shitty 80s jams, chopped and screwed and mixed against crappier chopped and screwed Easy Listening elevator Muzak. Praised by hipsters and tumblr users alike, it is one of the most popular Vaporwave releases out there, inspiring countless shops and cover parodies, and even warranting a review by /mu/ traitor theneedledrop.
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HOPE Poster
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Alternate Cover
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Vaporub, not Vaporwave...
Things to Note About "Vaporwave"
- 80's samples - mostly cheesy, generic smooth jazz.
- Hypercapitalism isn't all that bad, sort of.
W H Y
L I V E
O U T
T H E R E
? ? ?
- Serial Experiments Lain
- 90's aesthetics - representing Windows 95 hard here.
Y O U ' R E
A L R E A D Y
D E A D
! ! !
- Not necessarily nostalgia.
Known Vaporwave Offshoots
- Future Funk - Strictly a musical art (thus far) - focuses on 80's funk and house music.
- Post-Vaporwave - music heavily influenced or inspired by Vaporwave. SAINT PEPSI's nu-disco album Hit Vibes would be an example of this.
- Vaporwaif - Strictly aesthetic (thus far) - vaporwave, but kawaii girls!
- Post-Internet Vaporwave - similar concept and sound but instead of relating to merging of corporatism with culture, it refers to the mainstreaming of the internet (think:myspace, memes, the wireless internet revolution replacing dial-up,and youtube) and nostalgism of past web culture, even though most of these artists weren't even around for it. INTERNET CLUB is a good example.
- Mallsoft - Music like Vaporwave, but meant to be played in the background rather than focused on. Often purely chopped and screwed elevator music.
- Yung Lean/Sadrap - Music isn't vaporwave, just shitty cloud rap about early 2000s pop culture and drugs. However entire image is based on vaporwave aesthetic.
What does it all mean?
Whether or not Vaporwave enthusiasts choose to acknowledge Vaporwave as a genre, movement, or whatever else it may be, Vaporwave has become an essential role in the transition into post-industrial culture (this is when industry becomes more obsolete as a result of technological advancement). Technology is progressing with no end in sight, so rather than becoming another cultural break in an era of perpetual movement, Vaporwave serves as a means of finding entertainment in the event horizon of globalized capitalism. A common misconception is that Vaporwave is ironic in nature; this is false because Vaporwave is actually an extreme form of postmodernism in which sincerity is embedded within genre-consciousness. Similarly, Vaporwave isn't nostalgic — it's actually speculative (but not science fiction either). 80s consumer culture is utilized as a means of reestablishing the concept of the "American dream" as a byproduct of the newly found (and never before seen) advancement of the 90s computer revolution. Additionally, Vaporwave isn't cyberpunk as Vaporwave embraces the cosmopolitan information e-mega-mall.
The big idea is that consumerism is almost on par with religion, so why not welcome it?
Can Vaporwave be actually defined?
Not really.
Video Albums
- Macintosh Plus - Floral Shoppe
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External Links
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Vaporwave is part of a series on Visit the Music Portal for complete coverage. |
| Featured article August 4th & 5th, 2014 | ||
| Preceded by Clarence |
Ｖａｐｏｒｗａｖｅ | Succeeded by Weird Al Yankovic |