death’s dynamic shroud.wmv – #NUWRLDの気持ち
Recommendation: ☀☁☁
#NUWRLDの気持ち1 is the eponymous album in death’s dynamic shroud.wmv’s (hereafter dds.wmv)2 NUWRLD series that dominated their output from 2014-2015. The fifth overall album from this vaporwave project that’s sometimes a trio, sometimes a duo, and sometimes a solo project from any of the members, #NUWRLDの気持ち is your soundtrack to a night on the tiles while lost in Geocities. It purposely plays up the extreme saturation and gaudiness that accompanies some strands of vaporwave, having the same effect as those memes floating around social media with barely-sensical content that look as if they’ve been xeroxed a hundred times before posting.3
On first blush, “NUWRLD” seems like it’d be influenced by wonky or noise music, but it’s more like hypnagogic mallsoft with heavy inspiration from video game culture.. Songs are constructed from video game and soundtrack samples that sound like they’ve literally come from a recycling bin. Several of these tracks are quite recognizable. Two are from Nintendo 64 video games: “美麗な画面” comes from the opening theme music to Pokemon Snap, and “普通預金口座” is from the menu theme of Goldeneye.4 Songs are very wall-of-sound on the production side and hyper-saturated in texture to the point of ambient music from being so heavily slowed down, equalized, and layered; like the “Slo-Mo” theme from the 2012 Dredd film.
Interestingly, #NUWRLDの気持ち has a lot in common with futurevisions. Both subgenre and series have similar themes and musical aesthetics. ＵＮＬＩＭＩＴＥＤ ＤＲＥＡＭ ＣＯＭＰＡＮＹ by Amun Dragoon has a similar overblown album artwork, and it (along with Shader by Sacred Tapestry) has a lot of the deep-fantasy ambiance that characterizes the NUWRLD series. The difference lies in futurevisions having some level of seriousness in world-building through evocative soundscapes whereas #NUWRLDの気持ち is anything but serious to the point of mental regression. The emphasis on video game tracks (likely from the producers’ pasts) gives the impression of some sort of goofy kids’ world, but brain-melting and mind-numbing in its lights and sounds.
#NUWRLDの気持ち is a hell of an album for the crowd who discovered dds.wmv through I’ll Try Living Like This, which was an equally-insane album but on the complete opposite end of the spectrum in being hyper-stimulating instead of hypo-stimulating with its focus on glitch-hop. However, those who have heard other NUWRLD releases or have tasted the monolith of DERELICTメガタワー will enjoy this one. Listen to it when you’re on your second hour of hitting “refresh” on your chosen memes page that you tell yourself you enjoy ironically but deep-down you know otherwise.
Tracklist
1. MACHINE死 – (2:47)5
2. ノーバディホーム – (2:35)6
3. NEWSPAPER – (1:03)
4. SPACEYガール – (3:03)7
5. 美麗な画面 – (3:40)8
6. リラックスENJOY – (5:31)9
7. ダンス – (1:59)10
8. NIGHT-T天 – (5:26)11
9. ノーバディホーム (パート2) – (3:31)12
10. 入力終了 – (0:18)13
11. 木WIND木 – (2:13)14
12. 『CRUELストーリー』 – (2:45)15
13. 近藤浩治 – (3:28)16
14. アップビートwwwwwww – (4:08)17
15. 街の時計 – (2:19)18
16. JETTING地下室 – (3:06)19
17. 彼女のGARDEN – (3:58)20
18. ノーバディホーム (パート3) – (2:19)21
19. 普通預金口座 – (3:32)22
20. またあとで会いましょう！ – (1:37)23
1Japanese translation: “NUWRLD Feelings”
2I’m not hurting that much for character count.
3Have you ever heard of ooer? Like that.
4The first game ever to have a zoomable sniper scope. Fun fact!
5Japanese translation: “(MACHINE) death”
6Japanese translation: “Nobody home”
7Japanese translation: “(SPACEY) girl”
8Japanese translation: “Beautiful Screen
9Japanese translation: “Relax (ENJOY)”
10Japanese translation: “Dance
11Japanese translation: “(NIGHT-T) heavy”
12Japanese translation: “Nobody Home (Part 2)”
13Japanese translation: “End input”
14Japanese translation: “Tree (WIND) tree”
15Japanese translation: ” ‘CRUEL STORY’ ”
16Japanese translation: “Kondo Koji”
17Japanese translation: “Upbeat wwwwwww”
18Japanese translation: “City clock”
19Japanese translation: “(JETTING) basement”
20Japanese translation: “Her (GARDEN)”
21Japanese translation: “Nobody Home (Part 3)”
22Japanese translation: “Saving account
23Japanese translation: “Let’s meet again later!”