The Rise of Chillwave Music

Entertainment

Synthesized Music Taken To New Heights

Max Joseph - October 26, 2011

Neon Indian and Washed Out rising to success.

Vintage music has been brought back, but with a new modern feel, this sound has expanded the horizons of indie music and subculture, creating the category “chillwave” music. It is also known as Dreampop, Indietronica or Ambient. This category is defined as a type of music that people “chill” to, and has been drawling mainstream attention.

Relaxing synthesized beats brightening your day, chillwave music mainly consists of synthesizers and beat pads all interfaced with each other. This creates a unique sound, that stands out from traditional synthesized music, that is usually referred to as techno or dance music.

Using vintage synthesizers also adds to the effect, but it is really just 80’s music with a modern sound. This type of music has been going off the charts. Chillwave bands seem to be emerging and gaining more attention from the indie charts and especially Pitchfork, an indie music review website.

The best known bands are, Neon Indian and Washed Out. Both bands consist of just one member and the entire time the one member runs around putting together loops on their synthesizers.

Neon Indian was formed in 2008, in Denton, Texas by Alan Palomo. The group mainly consists of just Palomo, though during live shows Palomo has other members play with him.

The group cut their first album on October 13, 2009 titled Psychic Chasms. Slowly over time the album received much praise for its unique sound and people started calling it chillwave music due to its relaxing beats, vocals and synthesized tones. At the end of 2009 the album was ranked 14th out of 25 in Pitchfork Media’s best album of the year poll. Also in 2010, Rolling Stone Magazine called Neon Indian one of the hottest artists of 2010.

The group’s second album was just recently released and has been hyped since early summer when it was confirmed the group was releasing a new album later in the year titled Era Extrana.

Pitchfork Media has already named it one of the best albums of the year and it is receiving much praise. Palomo created his own synthesized sound, meaning he took the sounds from the synthesizer and added effects and different tones to give it a more vintage and relaxing feel.

Now for anyone who knows synthesizers well this is quite hard to do. Chillwave artists seem to have caught on to the trend to create an even more unique sound.

Washed Out was formed in 2009, in Perry Georgia by Ernest Greene. Greene had graduated from the University of South Carolina and could not find a job, so he decided to move back home and get an apartment there.

Greene was influenced by 80's new-wave music and he soon turned his apartment into a studio to create a solo project. Greene did not know his music was categorized as “chillwave” until he released his first EP

In 2011 Washed Out was signed to Sub Pop Records and released his first full-length album Within and Without. The album reached 26th best album on the billboard top 100 albums. Washed Out’s popularity has gained massively since the album was released in July and following a performence at Pitchfork Music Festival. He is now opening for Cut Copy, another electronic band.

Chillwave music seems to be increasing in popularity and more indie record labels are trying to sign chillwave artists. The list of defined chillwave bands, includes Toro Y Moi, Small Black, Memory Tapes, Com Truise, Warm Ghost and Panda Bear.

The comparison to 80’s music seems to be accurate as it brings back old school music with a modern feel. Chillwave music has a uniqueness to it and will come and go just as 80’s electronic and new-wave music did. It has steadily gained mainstream fans and attention.

Hopefully though the genre becomes more mainstream and generally more acceptable and more chillwave artists get signed and receive more recognition.