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sadfly
Jan 27, 2011

aw man, did I kill the thread? :(

Beer on the Rug just released this:



(as a sidenote, gotta say I'm a sucker for optical illusion album art, even if it's a bit too common these days)

I've only heard the 3 songs they have up right now but I'll probably listen to it later tonight... really liked what I heard, though. wonder if they'll do a cassette (or at least CD) run of this?

I've also been listening to a record by Matrix Metals called Flamingo Breeze quite a bit as well... it's a lot like some of Ferraro's Last American Hero-era stuff, but a bit faster and more digitized (but only slightly). it came out on the same label as well- Olde English Spelling Bee, which I'm sure some of are familiar with and if not, you should go through their catalogue asap.

http://vimeo.com/8965524

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brainwashed
Apr 27, 2005

I hate to echo what others have said, but goddamn this really is one of the best threads on here. I'm def a fan of drone and ambient along the lines of what you described in your opening post (Fennesz, Richard Skelton), but I was totally unaware of alot of these artists. These songs are just so warm and beautiful. I'm also enjoying the passionately written, in-depth looks at the conceptualism behind the work (and the art-work is loving amazing too). Keep it up dudes.

o.m. 94
Nov 23, 2009

sadfly posted:

aw man, did I kill the thread? :(

Beer on the Rug just released this:



(as a sidenote, gotta say I'm a sucker for optical illusion album art, even if it's a bit too common these days)

Haha, this record is insane, the use of compression is so intense I feel like the air pressure is perpetually fluctuating. Artwork is basically Merzbow's Pulse Demon, though.

sadfly
Jan 27, 2011

oiseaux morts 1994 posted:

Haha, this record is insane, the use of compression is so intense I feel like the air pressure is perpetually fluctuating. Artwork is basically Merzbow's Pulse Demon, though.

I've listened to it probably five times since last night, some of the tracks are absolutely brilliant. Love that bouncy bass sound going on, and I went nuts when I realized the creepy scatting sound on Sister Mister was sampled from Freak on a Leash by Korn. I could listen to Fancyfastened Free all day.

Really hope they do a physical release for this.

slowdave
Jun 18, 2008

Masonic Youth posted:

Is there a good blog that keeps up with this sort of music and/or posts tracks or reviews or videos or whatever? I liked Altered Zones a lot while it existed, and I've seen some of these artists mentioned on Gorilla vs Bear from time to time, but is there an especially good site that I can subscribe to and be fed a constant stream of this stuff?

Sign up for the Boomkat/14tracks.com weekly newsletter. Also check out FACT mag, Dummy, The Quietus, 20jazzfunkgreats and read The Wire of course. Should keep you 'in the know'

acephalousuniverse
Nov 4, 2012
Just want to bump this by saying I'm loving Vektroid right now.

http://vektroid.bandcamp.com/album/polytravellers

This album rules. Great fuzzy ambient kind of atmosphere.

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.
Look's like Vektroid has a new album out on 4/20. She seems to be posting new songs or snippets daily on her YouTube page.

Also her old videos are really awesome, probably the best examples of that stolen VHS aesthetic I've seen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3tfzVJHoGw

o.m. 94
Nov 23, 2009

So I just came across article and I'm still reeling and unable to make a comment on it. I guess this is what happens when you put labels on music, they become a thing, and nascent teenagers hop on to it and it turns into something completely different before your eyes. Awful.

Zaburino
Jul 22, 2006
...
Yeah I saw that a couple weeks after it came out, but I wasn't so shocked by it. I mean, Metallic Ghosts is pretty lovely, but there has been a decent amount of new stuff that is just as good as the things Vektroid has been putting out in all her various guises. Music journalists (and many fans) always like to put down a marker to say when a scene is dead, but I don't think reality is supporting them this time. It's a futile battle to try and stop people from labeling music, even when it's still evolving right in front of them. Since the "vaporwave" aesthetic is fairly unique and distinctive, anyone working within the confines of the established tropes for years to come will most likely still be classified as such; worst case scenario the sound will be commodified and subsumed into standard pop production, which I'm somewhat ok with (cause I'll probably still like it).


Someday soon we'll probably get a new genre of music that is constrained to one week of releases before people are saying its over.

o.m. 94
Nov 23, 2009

Zaburino posted:

Yeah I saw that a couple weeks after it came out, but I wasn't so shocked by it. I mean, Metallic Ghosts is pretty lovely, but there has been a decent amount of new stuff that is just as good as the things Vektroid has been putting out in all her various guises. Music journalists (and many fans) always like to put down a marker to say when a scene is dead, but I don't think reality is supporting them this time. It's a futile battle to try and stop people from labeling music, even when it's still evolving right in front of them. Since the "vaporwave" aesthetic is fairly unique and distinctive, anyone working within the confines of the established tropes for years to come will most likely still be classified as such; worst case scenario the sound will be commodified and subsumed into standard pop production, which I'm somewhat ok with (cause I'll probably still like it).


Someday soon we'll probably get a new genre of music that is constrained to one week of releases before people are saying its over.

I really don't have the mental fortitude to explain everything that's wrong with the above article, but the fact that Chaz Allen calls a track "casinowave" because it samples slot machines is indicative of his naive precociousness - "yeah that's right just created a genre in seconds - it's dead now. heh. i create scenes!"

Except Pink Floyd did the same thing in 1972, but they didn't call it "casinowave", on account of them not being shitlords

Quantum of Phallus
Dec 27, 2010

Money was the original Cash-Registercore track.

Zaburino
Jul 22, 2006
...

oiseaux morts 1994 posted:

I really don't have the mental fortitude to explain everything that's wrong with the above article, but the fact that Chaz Allen calls a track "casinowave" because it samples slot machines is indicative of his naive precociousness - "yeah that's right just created a genre in seconds - it's dead now. heh. i create scenes!"

Except Pink Floyd did the same thing in 1972, but they didn't call it "casinowave", on account of them not being shitlords

I guess my point was there will always be poo poo articles about nascent experimental genres, and to not get too disheartened that some silly teens got to say words that were printed :unsmith:.

alansmithee
Jan 25, 2007

Goodness no, now that wouldn't do at all!


oiseaux morts 1994 posted:

I really don't have the mental fortitude to explain everything that's wrong with the above article, but the fact that Chaz Allen calls a track "casinowave" because it samples slot machines is indicative of his naive precociousness - "yeah that's right just created a genre in seconds - it's dead now. heh. i create scenes!"

Except Pink Floyd did the same thing in 1972, but they didn't call it "casinowave", on account of them not being shitlords

TBH I think Pink Floyd was more casinocore rather than casino-wave. Although you could see that Allen track as post-casinocore in that case.

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.
Maybe I missed something, but isn't that crack at the end about "casinowave" making fun of the same thing that you guys are?

I suppose the difference between the progenitors of vaporwave (Far Side Virtual, Replica) is that you can delve into those releases and find a lot of thematic depth and numerous tiny details hidden within, coming away with a different impression each time. Both albums are asking the listener to think differently about the culture we live in, to step back and view it from a distance. The same can't really be said of many of the newer releasing being grouped under the same label, in general they're more interested in the aesthetic than saying anything with it. That's fine by me, though, since its something that happens to all genres and scenes eventually and I've enjoyed some of the bandwagon jumper's releases even if they're not as meaningful to me as the stuff Ferraro, Lopatin, or Vektroid have put out.

It occurred to me that I wrote that whole post summarizing Oneohtrix's main releases but I didn't really explain the unifying theme between all of them, which is playing with the listener's perception of time and place in three different ways. I went back and added some more analysis to that post.

Lord Krangdar fucked around with this message at 18:25 on Apr 15, 2013

alansmithee
Jan 25, 2007

Goodness no, now that wouldn't do at all!


Lord Krangdar posted:

Maybe I missed something, but isn't that crack at the end about "casinowave" making fun of the same thing that you guys are?

I suppose the difference between the progenitors of vaporwave (Far Side Virtual, Replica) is that you can delve into those releases and find a lot of thematic depth and numerous tiny details hidden within, coming away with a different impression each time. Both albums are asking the listener to think differently about the culture we live in, to step back and view it from a distance. The same can't really be said of many of the newer releasing being grouped under the same label, in general they're more interested in the aesthetic than saying anything with it. That's fine by me, though, since its something that happens to all genres and scenes eventually and I've enjoyed some of the bandwagon jumper's releases even if they're not as meaningful to me as the stuff Ferraro, Lopatin, or Vektroid have put out.

Fwiw I think that in most "critical" readings of various media, it's not always good to look at authorial intent. Not saying that the later releases are as vital, or do have the depth, but just because those who came later only were aping the aesthetic rather than anything else doesn't mean that there's not theme or other details contained therein (and it can also be seen as an indictment of the initial sources, that the only real "touchstones" were aesthetic). Also you could even look at it as sort of a meta-commentary about the state of society where everything new or original is quickly consumed and spit out into some easily replicable, "memeable" form.

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.
Of course, and I can't claim to know the intentions of these people anyway. When I say "they're more interested in the aesthetic than saying anything with it" I mean that's the impression I get from the releases in question (the music and context like artwork or videos), not that I really know the intentions behind them.

To me a really great album is more than the sum of its parts; the music, concept, aesthetic/artwork, song titles, flow between songs, and context all work together in a greater whole. It doesn't really matter if the connections between all those elements were intended from the beginning. Mulholland Drive is my favorite film, and that was cobbled together from a failed television pilot but in the end all the elements came together for my viewing, and it only seems more unified on subsequent viewings. Another example is Oneohtrix's Rifts, which seems thematically unified to me even though its really just a compilation of various tracks from other small releases.

For an example to do with vaporwave, this album (Vektroid - Starcalc) is a good example of a release that works for me. It's all in the details, like the artwork connects nicely with the interludes throughout the album of beach sounds and Carl Sagan's musings on the universe. For a counterexample, there is Girls Only by ESPRIT Fantasy. I enjoyed listening to this the other day, but there seems to be no unifying ideas there (except maybe "stuff associated with Vaporwave"). You could call it a meta-commentary, but that still seems at odds with the actual musical experience and therefore unsatisfying.

Lord Krangdar fucked around with this message at 18:51 on Apr 15, 2013

Maguro
Apr 24, 2006

Why is the sun always bullying me?

Did you guys already talk about VHS Logos?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLIJ6xlNSEU

https://soundcloud.com/vhslogos

Mike_V
Jul 31, 2004

3/18/2023: Day of the Dorks
I can find stuff like that and Vektroid pleasing to listen to, but I still don't get hit with the same conceptual complexion that a lot of Ferraro's earlier stuff does. Like, and this may sound stupid as hell, I feel like James' stuff alternately feels like falling in and out of sleep with Videodrome playing on television, but also late night infomercials. Again, musically VHS Logos and Vektroid interest me, but not in the deeper way that JF's stuff does.

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.
This new Hype Williams song/remix is genius:

http://soundcloud.com/pvt/vertigo-hype-williams-slapback

Also here is a picture of Dean Blunt's (one of the fake members of the band) recent gallery show:



Yes, that is an "All Dogs Go to Heaven" DVD taped to the wall.

Lord Krangdar fucked around with this message at 05:25 on Apr 19, 2013

Zaburino
Jul 22, 2006
...

Mike_V posted:

I can find stuff like that and Vektroid pleasing to listen to, but I still don't get hit with the same conceptual complexion that a lot of Ferraro's earlier stuff does. Like, and this may sound stupid as hell, I feel like James' stuff alternately feels like falling in and out of sleep with Videodrome playing on television, but also late night infomercials. Again, musically VHS Logos and Vektroid interest me, but not in the deeper way that JF's stuff does.

I feel like the depth and complexity of Ferraro tends to be a double edged sword, since it rarely inspires me to listen to his stuff on repeat like many of the more derived artists or projects do. I enjoy intellectualizing his music like I did when I had to listen to modern composers for class, but that doesn't particularly make me want to put his songs on a playlist and carry them around.

o.m. 94
Nov 23, 2009

TMT have a reputation for some awful journalism, but I love this article about the virtual plaza having comparisons with de Chiricoan dreamscapes.

quote:

Rather, he is producing a series of radical ruptures in the pop landscape. In pop music, it’s not enough to simply confuse the boundaries between high and low culture, because pop music is always already low culture, by definition. In 2011, it is no longer possible to effect a transvaluation of outmoded musical genres like disco or folk; this has been done to death. Any contemporary pop connoisseur has a few essential disco records in their collection, and it’s no longer subversive to exalt the virtues of a Pentangle album. In order to innovate in the post-music blog world, one must radically challenge fundamental assumptions shared by virtually all pop cognoscenti. This is why Ferraro and many of his contemporaries have chosen to focus on genres that have been generally deemed unfit to even wear the mantle of music: elevator jazz, commercial jingles, New Age relaxation tapes, library records, Windows startup sounds, royalty free MIDI baubles, and cheesy ringtones. The more generic the sounds, the better to disrupt the experience of listening and call into question the medium itself.

o.m. 94 fucked around with this message at 22:09 on Apr 19, 2013

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.
Two new Vektroid (Prism Corp) albums have been released by Beer on the Rug today:



Home: http://beerontherug.bandcamp.com/album/home-tm



ClearSkies™: http://beerontherug.bandcamp.com/album/clearskies-tm

sadfly
Jan 27, 2011

Lord Krangdar posted:

Two new Vektroid (Prism Corp) albums have been released by Beer on the Rug today:



Home: http://beerontherug.bandcamp.com/album/home-tm



ClearSkies™: http://beerontherug.bandcamp.com/album/clearskies-tm

Well that certainly is some goddamn gorgeous cover art. Can't listen to it just yet but I'll be sure to write something up when I do--- I did peek a track or two earlier and really dug what I heard. This should be an interesting year for BOTR. I'm really hoping they do some more physical releases.

Koholint
Jan 1, 2010

~Neck Angels~
The first track on Home is literally a midi version of Phil Collins's Easy Lover and the rest is just about as funny from what I've listened to so far. Is this the same person that did Macintosh Plus?

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.

Koholint posted:

The first track on Home is literally a midi version of Phil Collins's Easy Lover and the rest is just about as funny from what I've listened to so far. Is this the same person that did Macintosh Plus?

Yeah, she has releases under the names Vektroid, Macintosh Plus, Laserdisc Visions, and 情報デスクVIRTUAL among others.

dutch wife abc
Apr 25, 2012

Lord Krangdar posted:

Two new Vektroid (Prism Corp) albums have been released by Beer on the Rug today:


I'm genuinely loving this trend of cover art that looks like the music comes on three floppy disks.

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.
New Dean Blunt (of Hype Williams, as well as Dean Blunt & Inga Copeland) album came out today and blew me away. I'm a big fan of Hype Williams but this is something else, like they stopped holding back or hiding and went all out. Don't get me wrong, its still rough around the edges and filled with Blunt's unapologetically off-key crooning. But now he's backed by a fuller array of instrumentation and the album is anchored by a simple yet emotional underpinning that contrasts nicely with the typical prankster hi-jinks the duo usually indulge in. Best part so far is the sudden solo of horror movie violins in the title track which may or may not be sampled from actual horror movies.

Everybody listen to this album. It's streaming on Pitchfork for some reason (they panned his last release) and available to download on Boomkat (maybe iTunes too, by now).



Pitchfork Stream

Boomkat

If anyone is wondering what is up with the whole Hype Williams thing, here is a pretty good article that sums up their appeal and enigma.

Also please don't let this thread die :pray:

Lord Krangdar fucked around with this message at 06:09 on May 3, 2013

o.m. 94
Nov 23, 2009

Thankyou, Lord Krangdar. Dean Blunt's album is something very special. I think Ferraro was hinting at it with his orchestral interludes on COLD, but he missed the mark. This is real poo poo. It's a beautiful album

o.m. 94 fucked around with this message at 02:04 on May 3, 2013

o.m. 94
Nov 23, 2009

This thread may die, but we've learned so much

HorseRenoir
Dec 25, 2011



Pillbug
Thanks for linking the new Dean Blunt album. Hype Williams hasn't really done much for me in the past, but this new album feels much more developed and interesting than Dean's earlier stuff.

emdash
Oct 19, 2003

and?
That new Dean Blunt is beautiful. "Flaxen" is the best thing I've heard in a while

sadfly
Jan 27, 2011

Just got Ferraro's Clear as well as a couple Skaters albums on vinyl recently... OM, did you know he released a DVD?



Gonna check out that Dean Blunt album in just a bit. Been hearing about it all over the place.

sadfly
Jan 27, 2011

By the way, I popped in to SPF420 the other night and it was kind of a lot of fun. 회사AUTO played an incredible set and everyone in chat was in good spirits. Still not a big Metallic Ghosts fan (thankfully Chaz wasn't around much throughout the night, tbh)

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.

sadfly posted:

Just got Ferraro's Clear as well as a couple Skaters albums on vinyl recently... OM, did you know he released a DVD?

Here it is on Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/41372360

Answers Me
Apr 24, 2012
Just read this pretty cool article that I think would be of interest to this thread:

http://www.electronicbeats.net/2013/05/06/adam-harpers-pattern-recognition-vol-1-the-new-online-weird/

It introduced me to some names I wasn't familiar with too, like a i r s p o r t s

sadfly
Jan 27, 2011

So I'm a bit late to the party, but I've been listening to the new Dean Blunt a lot the past few days. just wow. So many exotic emotions are stirred up throughout it. This one is definitely gonna stick with me for a while. Still not even sure if I've wrapped my head around it yet.

sadfly fucked around with this message at 16:48 on May 11, 2013

o.m. 94
Nov 23, 2009

Cryptic rumours abound that OPN has signed to Warp and will release an album this year. 2013 year of supremacy

Quantum of Phallus
Dec 27, 2010

Gagging for a new OPN, I can only spin Replica so many times.

Lord Krangdar
Oct 24, 2007

These are the secrets of death we teach.
Well, he released Instrumental Tourist and Music For Reliquary House since then. But yes, I really want to hear the next step for his proper albums.

Here is the only clue we have on the sound of his new material (as far as I've seen):

quote:

The performance, titled Reliquary House, with visuals by Nate Boyce, has been done before at MoMA, but we were given a huge shock right beforehand: The program director made his announcements and then casually ended with, “I just talked to Dan, and he said he has mostly new material tonight.” Before that massive news could even really be processed by any of us, Lopatin and Boyce came out and started.

A reliquary is a sort of shrine that houses ancient relics, and in this case, these relics are commercials: bruised, beaten, broken, and warped in all their beauty. And, with the all-new material (a new album is coming soon, but no details have yet been revealed), Oneohtrix Point Never has progressed the style of Replica beyond anything I could have imagined. The music is a massive collage of memories that are at times stunningly beautiful, sad, dissonant, and spiritual, all of it paired perfectly with Nate Boyce’s hyperreal digital sculptures projected above them. The pairing is very appropriate due to the way OPN’s new songs sound so three-dimensional, ebbing and flowing from overwhelmingly dense to airy and smooth. This time around, he gives the samples more room to breathe, with moments of tremendously heavy beats that just explode out of the mix. Ghostly samples of choirs haunt tracks, and to see him trigger samples in his intense way is genuinely exciting to watch.

From http://www.tinymixtapes.com/live-blog/oneohtrix-point-never

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Quantum of Phallus
Dec 27, 2010

Instrumental Tourist could never live up to my insane expectations. I should give it another listen someday. But the idea of OPN and Hecker jamming was too much for me.

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