Penthouse Apartment – Y2K Millenium Nightclub

Recommendation: ☀☁☁ Penthouse Apartment’s debut for TKX-Vault (then known as “Tokyo Exchange”) is an album of ambient techno that anticipates the ghost tech movement by almost two years. Tracks are skeletally rhythmic and often feature little more than sparse clicks and cuts that evolve into something akin to old-school IDM. It’s an unsettling release, but it’s not disturbing: Y2K: New […]

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death’s dynamic shroud.wmv – I’ll Try Living Like This

Recommendation: ☀☀☁ death’s dynamic shroud.wmv (hereafter “dds.wmv”) starts off with a quote from Kim Kardashian. If that isn’t ballsy, then what is? Vaporwave has always straddled the line between kitschy self-deprecation and hipster bullshit within the popular consciousness, and I’ll Try Living Like This sure as hell pushes that to the point where it straddles the line between straddling the […]

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Casino Gardens – Casino Gardens

Recommendation: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Casino Gardens’ self-titled album probably wouldn’t be attached to the vaporwave scene but for three reasons: 1) its release on the Beer on the Rug label, which hosted many of the well-known early vaporwave releases;1 2) its retro and super low fidelity; and 3) its faux-utopian framing. It’s actually the first album in the history of Beer on […]

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Shima33 – Release

Recommendation: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Don’t be fooled: under its stark exterior, Release is a love story. Shima33’s second album for Dream Catalogue opens and closes with short spoken word pieces that describe the wonders and the pains of falling for someone – and how love can color experiences as personal and intimate as music. The tracks don’t tell full stories; they’re little […]

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Contact Lens – Ice in tha Veins

Recommendation: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I almost didn’t take this one seriously based on the album artwork alone. That’s – wow. That’s some serious WordArt shit right there. I’m legitimately impressed; it’s got that amateur quality down pat, and it reminds me of spending so much time back in elementary school trying out different themes for papers.1 This is reflected in the music: […]

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全日本空輸 Co. Ltd. – 空港のための音楽 MUSIC FOR AIRPORTS

Recommendation: ✂ (“受託手荷物”) 空港のための音楽 MUSIC FOR AIRPORTS1 is an extended-play by Windows 98の, presenting here as 全日本空輸 Co. Ltd.2 If you’re expecting something akin to Brian Eno’s famed first installment to the Ambient series, then you might be surprised with this one: 空港のための音楽 MUSIC FOR AIRPORTS is three tracks of steadily evolving glitchy, hi-fidelity vaporwave music. All three tracks flow […]

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ニューシティ – METROPOLISからオーディオ

Recommendation: ☀☁☁ METROPOLISからオーディオ1 is the soundtrack to an imaginary cyberpunk anime in which our hero arrives in a utopian mega-city of 20XX. The only album by ニューシティ2 3 is a highly cinematic exploration of Anywhere, Japan that thrives in tension; short of vapornoise, this is one of the darkest releases in the TKX Vault discography – and that’s saying something. […]

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