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Since this article goes through the timeline I thought I'd give my thoughts on how I see it. I feel like it's hard to emphasize, or even remember how subversive

Since this article goes through the timeline I thought I'd give my thoughts on how I see it. I feel like it's hard to emphasize, or even remember how subversive the tracks felt in the early days. Listening to easy-listening tracks poorly chopped was just not cool, it was weird, even other online people thought you were weird and that the music you were listening to was bad, and that was a lot of fun. I think the bad chopping is one of the most sorely missing things from the newer songs. When the tracks were more actively alienating or punishing to listen to, it made them more interesting, and helped justify the liberal sampling. There was an effort to make the easy listening become harder to listen to. I wouldn't say it lost its "political" roots because I'd like to think it was more than mere political music, but it definitely did lose something where tracks often felt like ideas, like each was saying "what about this? Isn't this weird and interesting? Does this make you feel something about the modern world, consumer culture, the job you have or the one you will be applying for, etc.?" That has seemed to turn into mostly pure nostalgia, rather than anything challenging or interesting. I think those characteristics are why people sensed its impending doom early. A genre about ideas can't survive the race-to-the-bottom effect of popularity, especially if a core component is engaging with feelings of alienation by actually being alienating. That's why future funk quickly sprouted alongside, and eventually cannibalized vaporwave, because we wanted the non-alienating version. But all that was was straightforward sampling of great pop music we hadn't heard of with no attribution, which eventually lead people to listen to the original Plastic Love 10 years later because it turns out to be better than the remix. Despite everything I wrote, a recent album by desert sands feel warm at night did really blow me away.

mock-possum 3y ago
Which desert sands album was that? Asking for a friend. ;)
zimpenfish 3y ago
I think DSFWAT are probably one of the best musical discoveries I've had in the last couple of years. One of the few times YouTube has actually recommended something I liked.
nkozyra 3y ago
Like a lot of flash in the pan genres a little bit peels off and makes its way to other genres. Vaporwave was seemingly on the way out months after it became a thing but a lot of what it was doing made its way into music. DJ Sabrina the Teenage DJ has a lot of the same sampling approaches and the aesthetic has been VW inspired too.
111111IIIIIII 3y ago
> it definitely did lose something where tracks often felt like ideas, like each was saying "what about this? Isn't this weird and interesting? You can say this (and people do say this) about literally any music genre, and you will be missing the mark every single time for the lowest common denominator. Vaporwave died because of this lack of critical thinking which reads it as merely random or experiments but it wasn't, and of course it wasn't. No worthwhile art ever is.
- neverthe_less 3y ago
  I think you're really picking that quote out of context. I also did not use the two words you scare quoted, not sure where those are coming from.
  - 111111IIIIIII 3y ago
    > I think you're really picking that quote out of context Sure, because it is the meaningless part of what you said and exemplifies the whole softening effort. One can do this softening with any cultural value, and we are all incentivized to under capitalism. This is literally what vaporwave was about. The default Cisco hold music is the greatest vaporwave track because it embodies the brutality of the softening that the subject craves as a haven for comfort in a heartless world. In a sense, corporate purpose-made music is the only genuine vaporwave. This is why vaporwave cannot exist as a living art form. Vaporwave is the art we cannot have. It's the beauty in the brutality. But without the brutality, it's just nothing. Edit: No you didn't use those words. I was just referencing other comments here and other common takes about vaporwave. I will edit the comment and remove the scare quotes.

mock-possum 3y ago

Which desert sands album was that? Asking for a friend. ;)

zimpenfish 3y ago

I think DSFWAT are probably one of the best musical discoveries I've had in the last couple of years. One of the few times YouTube has actually recommended something I liked.

nkozyra 3y ago

Like a lot of flash in the pan genres a little bit peels off and makes its way to other genres. Vaporwave was seemingly on the way out months after it became a thing but a lot of what it was doing made its way into music. DJ Sabrina the Teenage DJ has a lot of the same sampling approaches and the aesthetic has been VW inspired too.

111111IIIIIII 3y ago

> it definitely did lose something where tracks often felt like ideas, like each was saying "what about this? Isn't this weird and interesting? You can say this (and people do say this) about literally any music genre, and you will be missing the mark every single time for the lowest common denominator. Vaporwave died because of this lack of critical thinking which reads it as merely random or experiments but it wasn't, and of course it wasn't. No worthwhile art ever is.

neverthe_less 3y ago
I think you're really picking that quote out of context. I also did not use the two words you scare quoted, not sure where those are coming from.
- 111111IIIIIII 3y ago
  > I think you're really picking that quote out of context Sure, because it is the meaningless part of what you said and exemplifies the whole softening effort. One can do this softening with any cultural value, and we are all incentivized to under capitalism. This is literally what vaporwave was about. The default Cisco hold music is the greatest vaporwave track because it embodies the brutality of the softening that the subject craves as a haven for comfort in a heartless world. In a sense, corporate purpose-made music is the only genuine vaporwave. This is why vaporwave cannot exist as a living art form. Vaporwave is the art we cannot have. It's the beauty in the brutality. But without the brutality, it's just nothing. Edit: No you didn't use those words. I was just referencing other comments here and other common takes about vaporwave. I will edit the comment and remove the scare quotes.