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In the early 2010s, a sense of yearning for the recent past captured the attention of Internet users worldwide. The retro revival set its sights and sounds on the 1980s and ’90s, rebooting the decades’ aesthetics for an online generation.
Soundtracking this revival was a new style of lo-fi electronic music seemingly made in — and for — the moment. Known among the cognoscenti as “vaporwave,” the nostalgia-based subgenre emerged with a one-two punch of audio and art primed for virtual virality. The scene was a familiar one, even if you’d only seen it on Tumblr: Greek sculptures on grids going nowhere, a neon sunset foreshadowing the warm pop waiting inside.
Something about that nameless nostalgia appealed to George Clanton, a Virginia-based artist whose penchant for the past manifested in a solo pop project called Mirror Kisses. Named after an Echo and the Bunnymen lyric, the project was intended to be “a spoof on ’80s music” for Clanton to share with his friends.
“The first Mirror Kisses album — that I’ve since erased from the Internet — was me making what I thought was a Human League record,” Clanton says. But when “everyone pretty much agreed [it] was way better than everything else [he] had done,” Clanton began taking the project more seriously. “Instead of making jokey style music like I did in the beginning,” he says, “I started getting interested in integrating more of my personal life and artistic best.”
After releasing a pair of Mirror Kisses albums — Bad Dreams (2012) and Heartbeats (2013) — Clanton participated anonymously in the vaporwave scene under the moniker ESPRIT 空想 (Chinese for “fantasy”). Much to his surprise, the effort was “a huge success, at least in the vaporwave sphere,” that paved the way for future trips into the past.
While simultaneously working on the next Mirror Kisses album, Clanton realized the project’s name no longer fit: “The music had become so serious and personal,” he says, “and I got sick of telling people the name of my band was Mirror Kisses.” So he went back to the basics. “I felt like this was my big opportunity to change my band name to George Clanton. I knew I wouldn’t get sick of it.”
The change did him good. In 2015, Clanton released 100% Electronica — the first album under his own name — on his own independent record label, 100% Electronica (co-founded by Clanton and then-girlfriend/now-wife Neggy Gemmy, née Lindsey French). Initially formed to release Clanton and French’s music, the label broke new musical ground by releasing the first-ever vaporwave vinyl record, ESPRIT 空想’s Girls Only 7-inch EP.
Hot on the heels of the albums’ success, Clanton took the wax wave worldwide. “There were a lot of artists I really loved that did not have vinyl,” he says of his desire to start the label. One of those artists was the Australian duo S U R F I N G, whose vaporwave classic Deep Fantasy was the first 100% Electronica album not released by Clanton or French.
Whether he’s running the label, working on his own projects, or coordinating an upcoming tour, Clanton says, “It’s always been driven by music, all of my passions in life.” And when it comes to music, he always turns it up to 11: “To me, the music just doesn’t sound right unless it’s super loud.”
Perhaps a relic of his younger punk days, Clanton’s love for loudness often shocks fans expecting his live show to be a calming experience. “A lot of people — and they’re not wrong for this — listen to my music to chill out to,” he says, adding that “isn’t [his] intention, generally speaking.” For Clanton, the louder the music, the better. “Whichever is the loudest show on stage ends up being my favorite for the tour,” he says. “It can never be loud enough.”
Clanton visits Orlando for the first time on 4/20, topping a stacked Abbey lineup featuring L.A. electro punx Sextile, St. Louis siblings Frost Children, and Dade County darlings Donzii. Warning: The volume — among other things — will be high.
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Tyler Barney
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