Macintosh Plus’s “Floral Shoppe”

Album cover of Floral Shoppe

This week, I’ve been listening to Vektroid’s 2011 album “Floral Shoppe” released under the alias Macintosh Plus. This album receives wide recognition for its early and continuing influence on the vaporwave micro-genre. Vaporwave originated in 2010, though was mostly developed through 2011-2012 with albums like “Floral Shoppe” and Chuck Person’s “Eccojams Vol. 1.” via interactions through music-based social networks.

From my outsider perpsective, Vaporwave comes as a human reaction to en-masse pre-millenial nostalgia interpreted through the internet’s kaleidoscope. The methods of vaporwave consist of manipulating samples of ephemera from the rise of cable television in the mid-80s to the emergence of the internet in 2001. Typically, though not always, these samples are looped, chopped, and slowed down. There’s generally tendency to find samples for which the limitations of the medium are evident. We hear not just the music from an old Pepsi commercial, but also the layers of cable broadcast artifacts, the aged VHS tape, and finally the artifacts of YouTube audio compression. The content is just as important as the distance between now and then.

リサフランク420 / 現代のコンピュー

With very rare exceptions, vaporwave artists create their tracks by manipulating samples. They typically choose to sample media that is decidedly dated; musically that early adopters of the internet (late 90s/early 2000s) may find nostalgic. Instrumetation in the original songs tend to feature 80s drum machines and FM synthesis. In this case, Vektroid has sampled Diana Ross’s 1984 cover song “It’s Your Move.

The samples then get Chopped and Screwed, a hip-hop remix technique developed by DJ Screw in the early 1990s. The “screwed” part refers to slowing down the original sample; This may or may not provide the feeling of drinking sizzurp, or lean (a cocktail made with codeine-based cough syrup). The samples are then chopped by cutting, looping, scratching, skipping, or otherwise interrupting and manipulating the flow of the song. Most vaporwave artists work with computers using DAWs or audio digital audio editors. This gives them further flexibility to alter the sound, often applying echo delay and reverb, and sometimes flange effects.

In “リサフランク420 / 現代のコンピュー,” Vektroid slows down the original sample and employs loops to repeat phrases of the original song. In this way, tracks on the album frequently make the listener feel stuck in time. By denying phrases their original resolution, new earworms are generated. These songs frequently recall the moments that we get a faint memory of something but can’t remember what. The music sits on the edge of background and foreground. In this track, further tunnels of repetition are created through the use of feedbacked delay, allowing the sample artist to build fills from source material that does not itself have a fill.

花の専門店

Vektroid built the third track on the album, “花の専門店’ mostly from samples from “If I Saw You Again” by late-1970s soft rock band Pages. The opening ascending synth arpeggio of the original provides the intro here, though slowed down. Hearing the Floral Shoppe version makes the original seem comically fast. After repeating the arpeggio four times, fading in. At the point the original song starts, this Vektroid throws in a series of rapid cuts mimicking the effect of a skipping CD player. We make a few passes through phases of the song, rapid short repetitions of about about 175 BPM, that’s 1/8th notes of a slow-rock song.

Vaporwave is often not afraid of tempo or rhythm changes. In other sample-based genres like hip-hop, the samples are almost always cut to apply the rhythm of the source material to the rhythm of the new song. Vaporwave often uses this same approach but does not consider it a hard-rule. Exciting, but jarring, new rhythms and textures are created by cutting and looping the original source material to create new rhythms. Time signatures fold in on themselves, erasing expectations and writing new patterns.

数学

I like the seventh track which feels like 90s cyberpunk television and a vaguely sinister dreamworld made of ephemeral memories. The track features slowed and chopped up samples of Dancing Fantasy’s track “Worldwide” from their album of the same name. The original mixes elements of 90s new-wave music that I hate and more atmospheric 90s industrial music, which I like. The strange rhythmic texture sounds oddly familiar, like I’ve heard it in something else. The rest of the original albums sounds like early 2000s JRPG soundtracks, which I love.

It opens with a short sample, looped at slow 72 bpm. With its atmospheric hum and soft metallic percussion, the effect is of a distant giant machine churning late into the evening. When living near a factory and plant, the citizens are constantly aware of their sound and presence of the industrious machines, but overtime they become part of the landscape, ignored.

Further percussions gets layered in. Most of the percussion is gentle, more rhythmic than percussive; all of it is synthetic. Synth woodwinds exchange brief melodic phrases, always with the constant drone of the machine. These waves of late-80s tv and cinema scenes when it was understood that a saxophone singing gently in the night made everything romantically cool, a beatnik shorthand.

The music of vaporwave often embraces these clichés while acknowledging their artificiality. Like being caught in that very brief moment when learning how a magic trick is performed, but still believing it was was real.

Arcade Fire’s “Funeral”

Album Cover for "Funeral" by Arcade Fire

This week, I’ve been listening to Arcade Fire’s debut album “Funeral” from 2004. I loved this band from the first time I heard them. I believe Yahoo Music introduced them to me; it was probably the song “Rebellions (Lies).”

“Funeral” consists of individual songs, a suite of songs, that form a unified whole. There’s some repetition of musical ideas, especially the rhythms used to convey driving emotion. With a few brief rests in the twilight, a driving rhythm marches throughout these songs.

The music and lyrics elevate the troubled restless thoughts of our more meek moments; Arcade Fire gave voice to these emotions and filled them with a triumphant sense of purpose, even if that purpose was just to carry on. With universal lines like “Our bodies get bigger, but our hearts get torn up,” it’s no wonder this album resonated with so many. The message is affirming by recognizing the fragility of life and emotions.

Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)

Arcade Fire open the “Funeral” with the “Neighborhood” suite of four songs, with an additional track between Neighborhood #2 and #3. I don’t know if this is an interlude or part of the suite. I suspect the band grouped the songs more out of acknowledgement that they loosely shared the theme of neighborhoods more than an intentional concept. The song “Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)” begins the suite.

Arcade Fire emphasizes every beat throughout much of the album. We’ll hear a lot of four-on-the-floor rhythms. This starts immediately with the first track with pizzicato strings, which then become staccato bowed on the beat. Piano tinkles and then plays a six note motif that will be repeated after stanzas of the verses. At 35 seconds, the vocals and kick drums join simultaneously, with the kick on every beat 1-2-3-4. This is how that march happens. Instruments one by one join in, adding to that continuous rhythm, combined with the rising intensity of Win Butler’s vocals.

The lyrics present a scenario where there’s so much snow that it buries the neighborhood. The (presumably teenage) speaker makes plans to meet their beloved when their parents begin to cry. The song offers some visuals like a wondrous children’s book that’s magical yet vaguely sad. The grown-up plans they make are remotely childlike, frightening and playful. The lyrics make use of repetition, sometimes just a word or two, like a stutter, or pulling back to explain; Occasionally there’s rhyme of the last two lines of each stanza, but not always.

And if the snow buries my, my neighborhood
And if my parents are crying then I’ll dig a tunnel
From my window to yours
Yeah, a tunnel from my window to yours


You climb out the chimney and meet me in the middle, the middle of the town
And since there’s no one else around, we let our hair grow long
And forget all we used to know
Then our skin gets thicker from living out in the snow

Une année sans lumière

One of my favorite songs has always been “Une Annee Sans Lumiere,” even though I’ve had no idea what the French lyrics means. So today, I finally looked them up. So, the lyrics are about a young couple; the girl’s father either can’t see or understand their love. I like the sound of the vocals; In addition being half in French, they are also sung more softly and carefully than on other songs. While there’s still a driving rhythm, they break from the four on the floor pounding that happens elsewhere. It’s gently pretty and I’m bobbing my head to it.

The verses follow a I-IV-V-iv-I-IV-V-I-VIb-VI-V-I chord progression. The I-IV-V sections have a strong movement (“Hey, the streetlights all burnt out” ; the sections between the I-IV-Vs are played as an aside (”
Une annee sans lumieres”) with the male vocals joined by Regine Chassagne’s female vocals. I especially like the way the rhythm relaxes for the chorus, where we hear a I-VIb-IV-iv-I-V#-V-I chord progression. The use of borrowed chords, combined with the lack of drums gives the chorus a suspenseful yet weak feeling; It’s somewhat haunting.CBbF Hey, your old man should know FmC If you see a shadow G#GC there’s something there

Hey, your old man should know
If you see a shadow
There’s something there

Rebellion (Lies)

I like to consider “Rebellion (Lies)” as the last song, becuase I don’t like the actual last song. Immediately, the kick drum pounds in on the four-to-the-floor beat. A piano drives along hitting at a constant eighth note rhythm. This song ends the album on an uplifting anthemic march, strengthened by the repetition of a I-IV-I-vi chord progression and a few upward key changes. Again, as with other songs, instruments join one at a time at the beginning of bars. And as the song progresses, those instruments intensify their emphasis of the beat.

The lyrics deal with slightly-dark universal themes of the cultural deception and mythology, ending with an affirmation that things will be alright anyway. At a surface level, it’s a rebellion against the parental commandment to get sleep: “People say that you’ll die faster than without water, But we know it’s just a lie to scare your son and scare your daughter.” Further, it’s a proclamation that maybe we don’t need to hide our selves in the darkness of night, under the covers, under the control of society and our parents.

Now here’s the sun, it’s alright!
Now here’s the moon, it’s alright!
But every time you close your eyes, lies!

The Strokes’ “Is This It”

Album cover for The Strokes' "Is This It"

This week, I’ve been listening to The Strokes’ debut album “Is This It” from 2001. I kind of remember when this came out and I didn’t think much of it. In retrospect, I don’t know why I had no interest in The Strokes. Somewhere I must’ve picked up the wrong impression of them and wrote them off without actually hearing them. They are totally a type of band that I love and would’ve really been into in 2001 as well.

The very first day of my listening week, I pretty much fell in love immediately. Here’s a group of people the same age as me, their formative years took place during the grunge and britpop eras of the 90s. While certainly influenced by those styles, it’s clear that they particularly appreciate vintage New York City rock n roll. That’s stuff like The Velvet Underground, Television, and Patti Smith. The Strokes manage to be inspired by these greats while still producing their own sincere rock n roll without pastiche. Lead singer and principal songwriter Julian Casablancas told producer Gordon Raphael that he wanted his voice to sound “like your favorite blue jeans.” To me, this indicates that the Strokes romanticized the cool spirit 70s American rock rather than simply seeking to emulate their heroes. That makes all the difference.

The Modern Age

The second track “The Modern Age” opens with floor toms played on the downbeat and slightly-overdriven guitar giving quick syncopated chord strums on the up-beat. These are joined by bass that thrums on the tonic, and another guitar steadily beating out chords. This over-driven constant rhythmic accompaniment sounds somewhat like a dirtier Velvet Underground. The vocalist then sings the opening lines, up against the mic and in our face without reverb and dirtied up by a cheap amplifier and speaker.

While we can hear some natural room, the instruments on this album are notably dry. There’s not much, if any, additional reverb added. They’ve also mixed the drums in a more traditional rock way; that is the way drums were mixed before disco encouraged produces to bring the percussion to the front. Part of the joy of this album is that it frequently feels more like a great recording of a band rehearsing in the basement than a studio album. The band sound loose and authentic, like a band more concerned with playing than with getting a perfect take.

The lyrics are somewhat flippant nonsense with a quality of rock poetry. There’s a clear feeling and emotion that comes across in the words and delivery, but the specifics are vague even with the disjointed apparent details. The use of rhyme comes and goes where convenient, almost more for the attitude than a devotion to structure. The lines pull from the language of rock n roll and teenage New York sidewalks, not from books of poetry and literature. What’s more important is the emotion and attitude.

Oh, in the sun, sun having fun
It’s in my blood
I just can’t help it
Don’t want you here right now
Let me go, oh let me go

Last Nite

I believe that “Last Nite” was the Strokes’ biggest hit in the United States. It’s certainly the song I already knew before this week. I love it. It’s both knowing and adolescent, which so much great rock n roll can be.Like the above song, the lyrics hint at some mixed emotions, romanticized angst and indecisive confusion. But they also come across so vaguely affected that they can be nonsense that suits the sounds more than communicates anything specific.

The song opens with a single fuzzy electric guitar playing an octave chord at a continuous 1/8 note pattern. OK, so technically, we can’t call it a chord if it’s only two notes, and that’s probably especially true when they are the same note an octave apart. Eh well. The drums and two more electric overdriven guitars join in, the drums are dry and centered, the two guitars are panned hard left and right. The drums play a basic rock pattern, with a kick drum fill at the end of every second measure. The two new guitars play the same pattern, but this time adding a sus4, higher up on the neck. A bass then joins playing the same tonic note, then up to the third, and back to the tonic. This all adds up to a mechanically basic rock n roll sound, somewhere between the Velvet Underground and Stereolab.

When the vocals of the first verse, the two guitar panned to the left begins playing a riff that reminds me of something. It’s somewhat like the Bo Diddley, but I think it may actually be something else. I can’t place it. The guitar on the right, starts playing choppy syncopated chords. These two rhythms interact in a rather angular way with each other; This exciting interplay creates a unique stereo effect and strong movement. The bass provides some melodic movement to the accompaniment.

Julian’s energetically disinterested vocals maintain focus throughout the track. The melodies are pretty simple, but the rhythm and delivery more than provide interest. Again, they too are a little fuzzy, just pushing the equipment to the breaking point without getting into unpleasantness. They have a delightfully dirty gritty sound. With the lyrics, the rhymes are again present, but not in a literary poetic way. More as a casual product of the musical style:

Last night she said
Oh baby I feel so down
Oh it turn me off
When I feel left out
So I, I turned around
Oh maybe I don’t care no more
I know this for sure
I’m walking out that door