Entry 025 - Zuwe - SH40

 

 

I made a conscious decision two years ago to venture out of my comfort zone and into new music genres. One of those genres ended up being vaporwave. While I didn't find much that I liked within the vapor genre itself, there was the offshoot called dreampunk that really resonated with me.

Dreampunk mixes dreamy atmospheres with a futuristic sci-fi vibe. The visual component is as important as the audio, both taking heavy influence from the 1982 film Blade Runner.

Zuwe isn't exactly a dreampunk artist but SH40 arguably falls within the confines of the genre. This is an all instrumental album of slowly evolving ambient melodies dotted with samples of cities, people, and nature.

True to the genre's form, the artwork is a strong accompaniment to the audio. There is this dichotomy of man and nature rather than man vs. nature. The harmonization of the synths with the sounds of nature and people scattered throughout makes this album seem like a natural utopia in the distant future that we are catching glimpses of through clouded - dare I say dreamy - vision.

The music has a drawn out misty feel to it - like witnessing a semi lucid dream. There is just enough clarity to make out some of the details, but not enough to make out all of them. That is one of my favorite things about this album: it give just enough clarity to let your mind hang on to, yet not so much detail that there is nothing left to the imagination.