In 2024 the tag barber beats appears on 488 releases in the Frekvenci archive and plain synthwave on 382. It is the first year the slower, sample-based vaporwave offshoot passes the genre this site is named for. The archive lists 1,718 releases dated 2024, 2% fewer than 2023, so the total barely moved while the mix did. College's Secret Diary, which came out in November 2008 and which College's own account places near the start of the scene, is sixteen years behind it.[1]
The tag swap
Barber beats rose from 381 to 488, synthwave fell from 442 to 382, and signalwave held near the top at 203. Vaporwave as a plain tag is at 115, synth-pop 96, darkwave 82 and slushwave 75. Signalwave is named after the "broken transmission" branch in Bandcamp Daily's vaporwave family tree.[3] The What is barber beats? The vaporwave micro-genre named after one prolific artist describes the tag; the A short history of synthwave, from French blogs to the charts page explains the older one.
| Family | 2023 | 2024 |
|---|---|---|
| Vaporwave | 933 | 1,001 |
| Synthwave | 472 | 419 |
| Popwave | 167 | 142 |
| Darksynth | 97 | 98 |
| Dreamwave | 74 | 58 |
The vaporwave family (1,001) is now well over twice the synthwave family (419). That describes what the archive lists, and it does not mean synthwave stopped: 419 synthwave-family releases is nearly as many as the whole archive held for 2013 (429).
SHOW THE NUMBERS
| Family | Releases |
|---|---|
| Vaporwave | 1,001 |
| Synthwave | 419 |
| Popwave | 142 |
| Darksynth | 98 |
| Dreamwave | 58 |
Narrower and denser
Artists fell from 1,000 to 914 and labels from 407 to 339, but each artist and label released more on average. 427 artists are new to the archive, 47% of the year. 326 are self-released. By format: 889 LPs, 364 singles, 275 EPs and 24 mixes.
Country is known for 62% of the year. The United States has 410 releases, then the United Kingdom (63), Canada (58), Serbia (58), France (56) and Germany (48). Serbia's 58 matches the 58 releases of a single artist, undersaken, who has 145 listed releases overall. That is why we present country counts only as a rough guide.
Labels on top
DMT Tapes FL is first again with 92 releases, up from 61 in 2023. Then come Dreamcorp. Records Inc. with 37 of 63, RetroSynth Records with 32 of 200, Miami Palm with 21 of 24, No Problema Tapes with 21, WORLD END COLLAPSE with 17 of 37 and, tied at 16, Genom Records (of 47), Mom and Dad's Computer and Hitachi Home Video.
RetroSynth Records, a name from the first boom, is third, and with 200 listed releases it has the second-largest catalogue of the top four. Miami Palm has put out 21 of its 24 listed releases in 2024, a young label's profile. The RetroSynth Records: label profile and where to start page has the longer view.
Who made the most
Undersaken from Serbia has 58 releases (53 self-released). After that Makeup and Vanity Set has 18, then haircuts for men, CityOfFeelings and "I Wish I Could Stay Here Forever" (from Australia) have 16 each, and GUILD MERCHANT from Norway, memorykeeper7 from Sweden, PERCUSSION OF A SOUND MIND and Remittere Momentum from Belgium have 13 each, alongside Mom and Dad's Computer.
One thread back to 2018
We could not find an outside event that we can date and tie to 2024, so we will not invent one. The archive does show a thread through the decade. Kat Von D, who sang on Gunship's 2018 album Dark All Day,[2] appears in the 2024 list with her own album My Side of the Mountain, released on Kartel Music Group. A guest slot on a synthwave album became a solo synth-pop LP six years later, one example of how the scene's edges blur into pop. If Gunship's sound is your starting point, If you like GUNSHIP: artists to try next follows it.
Ten albums to try
- Dark Fantasy Studio · 2024 · Dark Fantasy Studio · LPA synthwave-tagged LP released under the studio's own name.
- LAU · 2024 · Aztec Records · LPA synth-pop LP on Aztec Records, from the artist whose debut appears on the 2021 page.
- Kat Von D · 2024 · Kartel Music Group · LPThe solo LP described above, on Kartel Music Group.
- Accident Sentimental · 2024 · Objet Trouvé · LPA synth-pop LP on Objet Trouvé, new to the archive.
- E Z R A ゴーバー · 2024 · B O G U S // COLLECTIVE · LPA slushwave LP on B O G U S // COLLECTIVE.
- Forest Kids Collective · 2024 · Forest Kids Collective · LPA vaporwave LP released under the collective's own name.
Sources
- Valerie Stories: 10 Years of College's Essential LP 'Secret Diary' · Vehlinggo, 26 Nov 2018
- Gunship new album out 5 October 2018 (press release) · Prescription PR, 13 Jul 2018
- Genre As Method: The Vaporwave Family Tree, From Eccojams to Hardvapour · Bandcamp Daily, 21 Nov 2016