satellite cult 24.24

~xX_hot_topic_Xx~, web novels, LandScapes™, aol

Apr 21, 2023

welcome to this week’s satellite cult dispatch. i’m so glad you’re here. i hope the artifacts i present you with will soothe you after a long week working the front desk at Utopia Corp., headquartered in the middle Neon Mall City. isn’t the sun nice as it shines down from the other side of the perpetual skylight and catches the ocean blue water of the atrium fountains?

please be aware that the void dive section below contains flashing gifs. if you’re viewing this on the website, forgive the way Substack formats some Bandcamp embeds.

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~xX_hot_topic_Xx~

we all know that Millionaires were the diy MySpace originals before Kesha was even a blip in the collective consciousness. during a period of time when outsiders had trouble differentiating between emo and scene kids, they illustrated the difference perfectly: third wave emo tackled feelings of alienation, depression, and emptiness head-on, while scene buried it all beneath a facade of parties, alcohol, and sex. unlike emo, scene music wasn’t a cohesive genre; it had some crossover with emo and pop punk, but there was also metalcore, crunkcore, synth pop, electro pop, and indie. the word scenecore got thrown around a lot to describe the music associated with the subculture, but it didn’t describe the sound—scene was a vibe, an ethos, built on suburban monotony and Monster Energy.

Tom from Myspace’s ~xX_hot_topic_Xx~ opens with the sludgy, slow echoing of “Millionaires, bitches,” the first lines of the Millionaires’ 2010 single “Party Like a Millionaire.” a vaporwave take on Hot Topic’s golden age, the album incorporates nightcore, noise, and house, all culminating in an experience that made me want to rewatch Invader Zim.

SUPERNOVÆ

drawing from utopian virtual, broken transmission, drum and bass, noise, and hexd, SUPERNOVÆ by dotnds is a soundscape in five parts that produces a mesmerizing flow between glistening ambience and pounding explosion. it’s a sonic evolutionary event.

if you like what you hear, there’s a limited run of 30 CDs available to pick up from net label and artist collective ANGEL EARTH.

renich viasa avage lillith lirach

dark drum and bass with occult vibes, ▯▯333voidGirl’s renich viasa avage lillith lirach is what i wished the inside of my mind looked like. a sharp and droning cybergoth ode to Lilith, it’s both a plea and an altar.

Generation Loss

not to be confused with last week’s generationloss, this synthwave album is brought to us by producer Ganymede. it’s full of chopping and reverberation, teasing out distortions and layers, with some jazzy barber beats-influence for good measure. listening to it serves as a reminder of the transience of experience. who are you without your memories?

LandScapes™

CD’s latest, LandScapes™, is a digital guide through a utopian virtual tourist destination, all from the moment you open your hotel file to excursions through 3D flora and fauna. who needs to leave home? the real world is made of 1s and 0s.

何も帰ってこない II

piano-heavy, lounge friendly barber beats mingle with record scratches and funk on this album by PERMANENT//ZEIMP. it’s trip hop in a red velvet gown, sipping a dirty martini. it sounds not quite dangerous, but certainly thrilling, like something bad could happen at any moment, but the risk is worth the rush.

the northern caves

my friend McKayla at Prettyboy Books suggested i check out this original novel on Ao3—it’s mostly formatted as a early web-style forum for fans of a series of fantasy novels as they tackle reading and discussing its nonsensical final installment.

shhhhhhhhh!!!

i found a classic on archive.org this week, or rather a classic’s sequel: Gameboy Secret Codes 2. unfortunately, it’s not available to download—you need to borrow it. thanks a lot, Harper Collins.

ooopsie

remember when AOL accidentally leaked user search data in 2006? sometimes i think about it—the whole incident spoke to the mundanity, the humor, and sometimes, the horrifying nature of being a person. peruse at your own risk, as some of the search queries are unsettling or triggering, and some reveal personally identifying information about the searchers, though none of the searchers are formally identified by anything other than a number. the leaks are available on the Internet Archive here, but if you don’t want to search them, there are multiple threads on Something Awful dedicated to the leak—i promise i don’t endorse all of the commentary.