If you’re interested in the darker, more cryptic side of vaporwave, you’ve probably noticed one name standing out more and more on the signalwave scene: victory over death. Also a member of Children of Vapor, one of my favorite artists, I personally discovered them a few years ago through Sunset Grid’s charity compilation IKIGAI (生き甲斐) . With raw yet delicate music, a gentle blend of broken transmission and ambient, this artist fascinate me. But before listening to their music, spend a little more time with us and discover 5 albums they chose to help us learn more about their inspirations.
As always these records are making their way into the Dungeon !
Exit Simulation by Infinity Frequencies
For whatever reason I gravitate toward music that works in extremes. At one end, I love things that are unbelievably complicated, like technical death metal. At the complete opposite end, I love the simplicity of loops, often in hip hop or certain strains of ambient and tape music. Within vaporwave, I connected with the work of Infinity Frequencies because it just allowed the loops to exist, there was already enough in them to be interesting. There is also a creative vision that is clear and powerful, and obviously influential. People treasure the Computer Death trilogy, but I think that Infinity Frequencies has only gotten better at identifying what makes a memorable loop. Exit Simulation I think is a great representation. I also feel like this album is one of the essential pieces of art from that post-pandemic period where people were obsessed with liminal spaces (I somehow just noticed that it was released the exact day that Kane Pixels’ original Backrooms video was posted). While I doubt Infinity was thinking too much about that stuff, considering they’d been working these themes for years, the album still arrived at a perfect time and outclassed so much of the other work that was trying to bandwagon on it.
nostalgia kills by DΛRKNΣSS
The albums I’m talking about in this article are recent, because I’m not young, and there are too many albums for me to sort through, so I wanted to talk mostly about what’s excited me lately. I was a year or two late to barber beats, or at least to when it was really surging. It was around its peak when I became aware of it, so there was just a ton going on. This album helped me see the appeal, and when I started digging into the genre, I had a similar feeling to when I was getting (back) into vaporwave around 2015, which is that there was this mountain of music for me to discover. It was exciting to me, and I had a lot of fun exploring it. I still love the visual stylings of the genre. This DΛRKNΣSS album was one of the first I really got into, and as I listened to more barber, I realized that the artist had carved out a unique sound with muddier production that was a little blown out. I tend to like barber albums where the artist is at least trying to put their own spin on it that isn’t purely visual. Also shout out to Mabisyo, Majestic 12 and PERMANENT//ZEIMP, who were important to me during this period as well. I keep wondering if there will be another artist to come along who has the influence of haircuts for men, where it’s not just finding a certain sample type, but having this whole creative vision that can spawn so many imitators who can do interesting things with it as well. I think vaporwave could use something like that now.
過去のエコー by PUDERPOLLI
I appreciate PUDERPOLLI so much, because he has done albums in so many different styles, but it is always unmistakably him, which is something I really value in art generally. Every album is a glimpse into his specific way of hearing things, whether he’s sampling from elsewhere or sampling himself, and he is uncompromising. It seems to me that he only puts out stuff that he truly connects to, I think there is a strong emotional link between him and his work. This album is a perfect example in my opinion and was extremely influential in how I came to view the possibilities of ambient vaporwave. It’s so beautiful and alien, with one of the best cover images. His work makes you think that there are endless possibilities in this corner of music and he continues to put out stuff that makes you wonder what exactly he’s doing, which is an awesome feeling. The artist is my hero in many respects.
のち by 空気系
I wanted to include this album because before I heard it, I hadn’t been exposed to much signalwave that had a bunch of tracks that were shorter than a minute. I thought right away that it was strange and cool, with this striking and inscrutable album cover. I think this artist has better albums and people really lean toward the ones that are, like, a half hour of stuff stitched together in one track. But there was something mysterious about these really short pieces, many of which had interesting textures, that I found inspiring. I wanted to try making something like this, which I did right away, because it seemed like a lot of fun, and every loop didn’t have to be some grand thing. You don’t have to overthink it! Having many short pieces like this creates its own kind of experience.
In Every Dream Home a Heartache by Romance and Dean Hurley
I am listening to this album in high-quality headphones as I write this, and I am already appreciating again how genius it is. While these artists would not label this vaporwave, you can see perhaps how some of what vaporwave was doing over the last 15 years has influenced the approach, which was to use nothing but soap opera clips pulled from YouTube. This was another album that blew my mind open to the possibilities of sampled music and was certainly part of why I wanted to start victory over death. The artists use thoughtful approaches to the material: stretching the samples, using effects in very intentional ways, using multiple clips at once, and putting brief snippets of dialogue over music to tell a story. Dean Hurley is a phenomenal sound designer who worked with David Lynch, and his ideas blend perfectly with what Romance does, which is this sparse and enigmatic take on ambient music. While I hear some of Ekkehard Ehlers in Romance’s solo work, I think Romance is really its own thing and is pushing ambient forward right now. I can’t recommend the Romance collaborations with the artist Not Waving strongly enough, as well, including “Eyes of Fate,” “Wings of Desire” and the other two albums they did together. I almost did Eyes of Fate here but it was a close call.
Thanks a lot to victory over death for his participation. Like Magdalene you can see victory over death at New Visions : Detroit on May 16th, presented by Doki Doki Beats and Hushtones alongside Luxury Elite, Christtt, FrankJavCee, Majestic 12, M31-ZERO, IMCOPAV, Yung Shiro and of course Magdalene !
Follow victory over death : https://vod123.bandcamp.com/music / https://www.youtube.com/@VictoryOverDeath2
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