album premiere: George Clanton – 100% Electronica
Of all the wonderful new music that Skylar Spence introduced us to during his site takeover on Friday (there was a lot), George Clanton and his brilliant new record 100% Electronica stood out as our absolute favorite. Clanton (fka Mirror Kisses, and also the man responsible for the most meta vaporwave track of all time as ESPRIT 空想; he says this album finds his two previous projects "transmuted into their final form") seems to have a similar uncanny knack as artists like John Maus and Ariel Pink for creating soaring, unabashedly dramatic classic pop, and it's clear after one listen to legit anthems like "Bleed" and "It Makes the Babies Want To Cry" that '80s MTV heroes like Tears For Fears and New Order are obvious reference points. But this is pop music refracted and warped through Clanton's singular and unmistakably modern lens, as he manages to turn vaporwave, chillwave, and other assorted internet-genre-waves on their collective ear, ultimately transcending all of it in the name of undeniable, timeless jams that could only exist in 2015, songs that can be at once subversive, funny, dark, poignant, and deeply affecting. Listen to the album in its entirety below, and download the whole thing + pre-order it on limited vinyl here.