Guides

Ordered by what each one made possible next. Two of them predate the name.

1. 01 Chuck Person's Eccojams Vol. 1 Daniel Lopatin · 2010 Establishes the method: one loop, slowed, drowned. →
2. 02 Far Side Virtual James Ferraro · 2011 Establishes the subject: the sound of consumer technology. →
3. 03 Floral Shoppe Vektroid · 2011 Establishes the look, and makes the genre legible to everyone else. →
4. 04 Blank Banshee 0 Blank Banshee · 2012 Adds drums, and with them a room. →
5. 05 SAILORWAVE Macross 82-99 · 2013 Adds the dance floor, from Mexico City. →
6. 06 Hit Vibes Saint Pepsi · 2013 Proves the dance floor has an audience. →
7. 07 Hiraeth 猫 シ Corp. · 2014 Turns the interior into the subject. →
8. 08 Palm Mall 猫 シ Corp. · 2014 Perfects it, and names the branch by example. →
9. 09 World Class Luxury Elite · 2015 Slows television itself into a genre. →
10. 10 新しい日の誕生 / Birth of a New Day 2814 · 2015 Proves none of it needs samples at all. →

The canon list above is chronological and argumentative. This one is just easy to listen to.

1. 01 Floral Shoppe Vektroid · 2011 Start with the famous one and get it out of the way. →
2. 02 Hit Vibes Saint Pepsi · 2013 Immediately fun, no acclimatisation required. →
3. 03 World Class Luxury Elite · 2015 Background music that rewards attention if you give it any. →
4. 04 Palm Mall 猫 シ Corp. · 2014 The concept lands in about ninety seconds. →
5. 05 新しい日の誕生 / Birth of a New Day 2814 · 2015 Long, slow, and the one most likely to convert you. →

Short list, because the branch has one canonical record and a lot of imitators.

1. 01 Palm Mall 猫 シ Corp. · 2014 The definitive statement. →
2. 02 Hiraeth 猫 シ Corp. · 2014 The record that set it up, months earlier. →
3. 03 슈퍼마켓 Yes! We're Open 식료품groceries The supermarket-concept landmark, named beside Palm Mall in every account. Not yet written up here. Not held
4. 04 News at 11 — Named in the canon; we have not confirmed the attribution, so it has no page. Not held

The branch that most rewards listening on headphones at unreasonable length.

1. 01 新しい日の誕生 / Birth of a New Day 2814 · 2015 The reference point for dreampunk, and largely sample-free. →
2. 02 Rain Temple 2814 · 2016 The 2016 follow-up, and the second pillar — deliberately not a sequel. →
3. 03 Dawn Arrives t e l e p a t h テレパシー能力者 The 2025 revival of the alias, and the first classic-style slushwave record in a decade. Not held

Nothing here is a mistake to enjoy. The point is that the categories are doing less work than people assume.

1. 01 “Resonance” HOME The track behind the 2015–16 simpsonwave edits, and how most people first meet the aesthetic. It is original synth composition rather than a degraded sample — usually filed as synthwave-adjacent. Not held
2. 02 Future funk generally Macross 82-99, Yung Bae, Saint Pepsi Argued over constantly: a vaporwave branch, or an adjacent genre with vaporwave roots. This archive treats it as a branch and marks the argument. Not held
3. 03 Synthwave generally — A neighbour, not an offshoot. Original composition, faster, harder contrast, almost no sampling. Not held
4. 04 Replica Oneohtrix Point Never Same author as Eccojams, one year later, and routinely swept in. It belongs to Lopatin's own catalogue rather than to the genre. Not held