Being the big time hipcat that I am, I often feel the need to probe the vast interweb in search of new music. I also have a to stay up to date on current music related news trends. Probably just in case I am down at Reckless and I hear someone talk about WAVVES I can say…”Did you guys hear about dudes meltdown in Barcelona? Dudes crazy!… Do you have that record on laser disc? Those are all I listen to these days, CDs are so played out.”
(The real reason is actually closer to satisfying my need to scoff at people who I feel like crappier music than me, which in my humble opinion is everyone.)
Anyways, recently I caught wind of a new movement that seemed like it had already happened. Came and went totally under my radar. I would usually be cool with somthing like this seeing as in about 10 years I could “get back into” whatever music I missed and be totally raddder for “bringing it back”. The movement I speak of is “Glo-Fi”, Maybe you have heard of it.or… “Probably not, its pretty underground”
This is what I have started calling a “Frakengenre”. Somthing that melds so many subgenres together it is no longer worth labeling within a genre. Things like Rock, Jazz, Classical, Folk, Blues, Electronica in my mind are all very broad encompasing umbrellas for many things to hide under. Most of the time classifying anything past these is too much for me. After a certain point it just seems like pondification. In some cases the label almost means more than the music.
If you were to label the death out of Glo Fi what would it be?…part Electronica, part Shoegazey Pop, half Super Nintendo Core, and 2 parts Lo-Fi. It is quite a specific sound. I first found out about this new subgenre in a very mysterious way. It was a type of discovery I am not used to. It started whilst surfing through songs on my roomates ipod a month or two ago. I came accross two songs by an artist called Neon Indian. I threw it on out of boredom and curiosity. My reaction wasn’t immediatley positive, but it sure was’nt passive, which is unique for people in my generation when hearing new music. I listened to those two tracks 3 or 4 times each while cleaning the house trying to figure out if I hated them or liked them. Knowing nothing about Neon Indian or Glo-Fi at the time it was hard for me to disect and digest this music. I needed more info. How was this music made? Were there alot of people making music like this? Was it new or old? I needed to know. I eventually decided that I couldn’t react in a negative way to this music so itwas alright in my book.
My second expierience with this genre was similarly mysterious. A week or two later while surfing a music news site I cold clicked on a link labeled “best new music” and listened to a few tracks. The first one I clicked on being “Feel it all Around” by Washed Out. Instantly I was captured. The thumpy cassette deck quality of the synths threw me into a nostalgic tizzy. All these farmilliar sounds melted into somthing so pretty and so heavy. The sound of a snare drum on a recording is one of the most important things to me. The backbeat is the heart of any song for me. The snare drum on this song is like a really slow punch in the head, as if you were underwater. The vocals were 20 layers deep singing melodies slower than dial up internet. I was stuck in the song. Stuck in slow motion. As I read the blurb beneath the title I saw “Glo-Fi”. I immediatly laughed at such a silly term. I didnt know what it meant, but I knew that if it sounded like this I liked it.
Since then, I have checked out a few other acts in the genre and have been surprisingly undwewhelmed. There are listenable tracks here and there but nothing similar to these two artists. Would I say I am a fan of “Glo-Fi?” If it means liking Neon Indian and Washed Out;then I am guilty as charged, trendy as the next acid wash jean wearing Pilsen dweller.
I am wondering though: Is there room in a genre so specific to progress? I am willing to bet no, but I guess time will tell. I will hopefully be surprised with Neon Indian or Washed Out’s next release. Maybe someone new will come along and do somthing equally as compelling and fun. Fun being very important here. I am hard pressed to think of many other styles that pull on so many things I like. If “Glo-Fi” were a musical color it would be the brownish grey one; A little bit of every other color to varying amount.
Anyways here are a couple of tracks worth checking out…
