Chillstep & Chillhop/LoFi

[Madmick]

This is the most popular streamer on Twitch, now, and when I have watched him, I find myself wondering every time, "Who the hell is that? What song is that?" when he's in between games in the lobby. I find the sound so appealing. I'm not a big fan of vocals. I am drawn most to the electronica instrumental tracks with a jazz infusion to a hip-hop beat. Apparently they call this "Chillstep" or "LoFi".

His subscribers appear to have crowdsourced to compile a list of songs heard on his stream. It's phenomenal:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3SMxYVYfmBFLwghKw23lon



Here is the "Top Result" Chillstep playlist on Spotify, and it mentions other more obscure subgenres that I guess are in the same vein-- Liquid Dubstep, Melodic dubstep, Tropical House. Some of it is okay, but there are too many tracks with bland power-ballad vocals by some chick. It's like Ruelle without the punch. The vocals don't enhance the music. They just distract from and muddy the mood. I don't care for vocals with this style. It sort of defeats the purpose of the sound for me:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6IjDl5eRczFdgZkKYXhuHZ



Anyone into this subgenre? Recommended YouTube/Spotify playlists or bands?

 

[Hyperglide]

It's weird I should like chillstep bit I dont. I find the melodies to sophomoric and the drums to tinny and bland.

I went through my spotify to see if I could find some chillstep but I had a tough time finding artists.

If I wanna chill I put on chillwave. Have you tried that? If I wanna get the blood flowing I will put on some Neurofunk. Liquid you will probably like Mick. You suggested it as a comparable sub genre.

Have you heard Flume? Good entry artist to the genre.

 

[Madmick]

It's weird I should like chillstep bit I dont. I find the melodies to sophomoric and the drums to tinny and bland.

I went through my spotify to see if I could find some chillstep but I had a tough time finding artists.

If I wanna chill I put on chillwave. Have you tried that? If I wanna get the blood flowing I will put on some Neurofunk. Liquid you will probably like Mick. You suggested it as a comparable sub genre.

Have you heard Flume? Good entry artist to the genre.

This is easy listening for me. I suppose it is for me what Kenny G has been for Generation Jones & Baby Boomers. I really love jazz piano, and a lot of his tracks have very safe jazz piano lines that don't challenge the ear. A great example is the 5th song from Tfue's playlist. Has nice touch of the French cafe sound:



That Flume song is alright. That's a bit more uptempo than I'm after, and it also has the chick vocals I don't really fancy. I like Synthwave in the 80's retro vein like you'd hear on Dr. Disrespect's channel, for example, which also tends to be instrumental only.

I couldn't hear a meaningful difference in several of the top songs I found on the Top Result playlist for "Chillwave" from those in Tfue's playlist apart from the fact the melody-forward instrumentation tended to be more synthetic in Chillwave, versus the traditional acoustic piano (or muted trumpet) sound that carry a lot of those Tfue tunes, so I Googled to try to give me a concrete footing. This is what a Quora result had to say:
https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-differences-among-chillstep-chillwave-and-downtempo

1. Chillstep: A musical genre composed of dubstep tracks with chill undertones. Low bass, slow beats, add a female's voice to the hook and you've got some chill step. Examples: Soldier On (Rusko), Sierra Leone (Mt Eden Dubstep), Coffee Break (Zeds Dead), Dutch Flowers (Rusko Remix), Get The Money (PANTyRAiD), Massive Attack (Paradise Circus), I Remember (Caspa Remix)
2. Chillwave: It is characterized by a faded or dreamy retro pop sound, escapist lyrics about the beach or summer, psychedelic or lo-fi aesthetics, mellow vocals, low-to-moderate tempos, effects processing (especially reverb), and vintage synthesizers. The term was originally synonymous with "glo-fi" or "hypnagogic pop". Examples: Talamak (Toro Y Moi ), It All Feels Right (Washed Out), Campagne Coast (Blood Orange), Brokendate(Com Truise), Marijuana(Chrome Sparks)
3. Downtempo: A form of electronic music that is influenced by hip-hop. Characterized by samples, loops, and low tempos. Often referred to as trip-hop although the name "downtempo" or "downbeat" preceded "trip-hop". Examples: Prophetic Sines(Bluetech), Awake(Tycho), Sleep Alone(Moby), Stay Forever(Catching Flies)

This explains why the Top Result Chillstep list I found on Spotify was littered with female vocals. Still, the songs on the Tfue list aren't really characterized by a "faded or dreamy retro pop sound", either, and without vocals, obviously rarely contain "escapist lyrics".
I know Trip-Hop. It is easily distinguished from these other styles. So I went to Wiki for more clarification:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chillwave

Chillwave is a music microgenre that emerged in the late 2000s. It is characterized by a faded or dreamy retro pop sound, escapist lyrics about the beach or summer, psychedelic or lo-fi aesthetics, mellow vocals, low-to-moderate tempos, effects processing (especially reverb), and vintage synthesizers. The term was originally synonymous with "glo-fi" or "hypnagogic pop".[4]

Chillwave loosely emulates 1980s electropop and engages with notions of memory and nostalgia. It was one of the first music genres to develop primarily through the Internet. The term was coined in 2009 by the satirical blog Hipster Runoff to describe indie acts whose sounds resembled incidental music from 1980s VHS tapes. Its most prominent artists were the acts Neon Indian, Washed Out, and Toro y Moi, who gained attention during 2009's "Summer of Chillwave". Washed Out's 2009 track "Feel It All Around" remains the best-known chillwave song...

The 2009 "Summer of Chillwave" was marked by an inundation of artists with names and song titles referencing summertime, the beach, or surfing.[37] Songs were generally of low-to-moderate tempo[38] and incorporated vintage, analog instrumentation that evoked the popular music of the late 1970s and early 1980s.[39] Initially, the "chillwave" tag was subsumed under the "glo-fi" and "hypnagogic pop" labels.[4] Journalist David Keenan coined "hypnagogic pop" a few weeks after "chillwave" was invented to describe a trend of 2000s lo-fi and post-noise music in which varied artists began to engage with elements of cultural nostalgia, childhood memory, and outdated recording technology.[40] While chillwave and hypnagogic pop both evoke 1980s–90s imagery, chillwave has a more commercial sound that emphasizes "cheesy" hooks and reverb effects.[41]

Neon Indian (Alan Palomo), Washed Out (Ernest Greene), and Toro y Moi (Chaz Bundick) were considered to be the vanguard of the chillwave movement.[36][12][46] All three were one-man acts from the Southern U.S, while Greene and Bundick were acquaintances and collaborators.[47] Greene's "Feel It All Around" (July 2009) became the best known song of the genre, later to be employed as a backdrop for the opening sequence of the television series Portlandia (2011–2018).[17] Neon Indian's debut Psychic Chasms (October 2009) was another early album that typified the genre,[30] particularly the tracks "Deadbeat Summer", "Terminally Chill", and "Should've Taken Acid With You".[48] Bundick's debut Causers of This (January 2010) drew similar attention for its style of old-fashioned, lo-fi pop.[49] The album was acclaimed by critics and given an early endorsement by Kanye West, which lent the work significantly more popularity. Rolling Stone additionally dubbed Bundick the "godfather of chillwave".[50]

Meanwhile, Chillstep doesn't even have an English Wiki page, and it seems that it is really just the above style applied to Dubstep tracks:


In the example I gave above, I guess the shift in the song @1:40 might reflect "the drop" from Dubstep-- Chillstep style. I don't hear anything invoking the 70's or 80's synthpop sounds in the Tfue playlist (i.e. "the analog instrumentation that evoked the popular music of the late 1970's and early 1980's"). That sound has its fingerprints all over Synthwave.

It is going to take my ear a while before I think I'll be able to pick a Chillstep tune from a Chillwave tune (if there is enough of a difference to really feel it out on ear alone at all).

 

[KAZSoliloquy]

i typically think of lo-fi as guided by voices, gary war, early ariel pink. i feel like an old man with all these terms changing.

check out the majestic casual youtube channel if you’re into this shit. they’ve got heaps of that chilled out music.



(love the how to dress well sample in this track)

 

[Couch Ninja]

Lo-Fi just means Low Fidelity, which refers to the quality of the recordings which is usually poor or not concerned with having a polished sound - however you want to put it. But musically it could be any genre or style. Ty Segall does Lo-fi Rock n Roll, The Sound Defects do Lo-Fi Jazz-Rock/Hip Hop, and Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats do Lo-Fi Doom Metal (and are the best band going today imo). I've never heard of 'chillstep' before this thread, but I'll check it out!

 

[GSP4tw]

This is the most popular streamer on Twitch, now, and when I have watched him, I find myself wondering every time, "Who the hell is that? What song is that?" when he's in between games in the lobby. I find the sound so appealing. I'm not a big fan of vocals. I am drawn most to the electronica instrumental tracks with a jazz infusion to a hip-hop beat. Apparently they call this "Chillstep" or "LoFi".

His subscribers appear to have crowdsourced to compile a list of songs heard on his stream. It's phenomenal:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3SMxYVYfmBFLwghKw23lon



Here is the "Top Result" Chillstep playlist on Spotify, and it mentions other more obscure subgenres that I guess are in the same vein-- Liquid Dubstep, Melodic dubstep, Tropical House. Some of it is okay, but there are too many tracks with bland power-ballad vocals by some chick. It's like Ruelle without the punch. The vocals don't enhance the music. They just distract from and muddy the mood. I don't care for vocals with this style. It sort of defeats the purpose of the sound for me:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6IjDl5eRczFdgZkKYXhuHZ



Anyone into this subgenre? Recommended YouTube/Spotify playlists or bands?

I listen to this when I game or am just relaxing. Check out Chilledcow on YouTube for some playlists on there. If I was at my pc I would link my favorite one(s).

 

[Madmick]

Lo-Fi just means Low Fidelity, which refers to the quality of the recordings which is usually poor or not concerned with having a polished sound - however you want to put it. But musically it could be any genre or style. Ty Segall does Lo-fi Rock n Roll, The Sound Defects do Lo-Fi Jazz-Rock/Hip Hop, and Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats do Lo-Fi Doom Metal (and are the best band going today imo). I've never heard of 'chillstep' before this thread, but I'll check it out!

That's the literal meaning that has existed for decades, in contrast to Hi-Fi, yes, but the term appears to have been acutely appropriated by a specific subset of genres including those discussed in this thread. This contempory evolution can be observed via Google:

Or Wiki which notes that it is becoming more strongly associated as a term with these subgenres:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lo-fi_music#2000s–2010s:_Hypnagogic_pop_and_chillwave

2000s–2010s: Hypnagogic pop and chillwave
Main articles: Hypnagogic pop and Chillwave
See also: Chill-out music


Ariel Pink performing in 2010

The rise of modern digital audio workstations dissolved a theoretical technological division between professional and non-professional artists.[61] Many of the prominent lo-fi acts of the 1990s adapted their sound to more professional standards[59] and "bedroom" musicians began looking toward vintage equipment as a way to achieve an authentic lo-fi aesthetic,[62] mirroring a similar trend in the 1990s concerning the revival of 1960s space age pop and analog synthesizers.[60] R. Stevie Moore was increasingly cited by emerging lo-fi acts as a primary influence.[41] His most vocal advocate, Ariel Pink, had read Unknown Legends, and later recorded a cover version of one of the tracks included in a CD that came with the book ("Bright Lit Blue Skies").[39] At the time of his label debut, Pink was viewed as a novelty act, as they were virtually no other contemporary indie artists with a similar retro lo-fi sound.[7]

Previous lo-fi artists generally rejected the influence of 1980s pop radio that informed most of Pink's sound.[63] Afterward, a type of music dubbed "hypnagogic pop" emerged among lo-fi and post-noise musicians who engaged with elements of cultural nostalgia, childhood memory, and outdated recording technology. The label was invented by journalist David Keenan in an August 2009 piece for The Wire, which included Pink among his examples.[64] Pink was frequently referred to as the "godfather" of hypnagogic, chillwave or glo-fi as new acts that were associated with him (aesthetically, personally, geographically, or professionally) attracted notice from critics.[65] According to Pitchfork's Marc Hogan, each of those tags described what was essentially psychedelic music.[66] Adam Harper reflected in 2013 that there was a growing tendency among critics such as Simon Reynolds to overstate Pink's influence by failing to acknowledge predecessors such as R. Stevie Moore and the Cleaners from Venus' Martin Newell.[39]

In the late 2010s, a form of downtempo music tagged as "lo-fi hip hop" or "chillhop" became popular among YouTube music streamers. Several of these channels attracted millions of followers.[67]

In addition to the abstruse distinctions between Chillwave and Chillstep I'm also seeing "Chillhop" used in quite a few of the tracks I like. The most concrete difference that makes sense to me of all I've seen described is that the Chillstep (as on Tfue's channel) tends to be laid over a syncopated beat while the Chillwave songs I've checked out have always sounded like a straightforward 4/4 or 3/4. This Dubstep forum post I Googled really opened the clouds up and shed some light:
https://www.dubstepforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=121905

Q: I'm confused between "2-step" rhythms and "half step" rhythms. I thought 2-step is to do with the snares hitting the 2nd and 4th beat, like in 2-step garage and half-step is when the snare hits the 3rd beat of the bar (which most dubstep tracks do) but on sites it is saying dubstep is 2-step, what is that about?

Can somebody explain

A: if you take a 4/4 tempo at 140 beats per minute the classic dubstep cliche is that the snare will hit down on the third beat (only once) making the groove feel slower.

2 step rhythm will classically have a snare on both the second and fourth hit. (or slightly swung in garages case)

This is the same as a 4/4 house beat though, so a 2-step groove is recognised by the placement of the kick drums (on the first beat and halfway in between beats 3 and 4.)

I make 2step btw

 

[GSP4tw]

@Madmick Finally at my pc, but this mix(and the ones that follow it) are some of the ones I like to listen to for this sort of music.

edit: realized this isn't the lofi one, but fuck it I'll leave it as I love these mixes.

 

[Wolfbrigade]

I am drawn most to the electronica instrumental tracks with a jazz infusion to a hip-hop beat.

 

[Madmick]

@Madmick Finally at my pc, but this mix(and the ones that follow it) are some of the ones I like to listen to for this sort of music.

edit: realized this isn't the lofi one, but fuck it I'll leave it as I love these mixes.

Both of these spectacular, and exactly what I'm after. My hats off to you gentlemen...

 

[Monte Moku]

The jazzy beats are kind of a niche genre in the electronic music community that is simply called Lo-fi Hip Hop.

A few good places to start finding it are labels and collectives like Always Proper, radio.wavs, Rootnote Collective and con comfort. Some of my favorite Lo-fi Hip Hop producers are ojmacoj, mndbd, ntourage, Nujabes, emune, smuv and [ocean jams].
Here is also a 24/7 stream of this type of music, so you can just throw it on and do whatever:

 

[Madmick]

@Madmick Finally at my pc, but this mix(and the ones that follow it) are some of the ones I like to listen to for this sort of music.

edit: realized this isn't the lofi one, but fuck it I'll leave it as I love these mixes.

WTF? This playlist disappeared!

GSP, help! Can you remember your favorite artists and songs from this? I hadn't yet added all the artists to my Spotify that I could find.

 

[POWER2]

Lo-Fi is the business. It's the stepchild of rap, jazz and neo-soul.

 

[GSP4tw]

WTF? This playlist disappeared!

GSP, help! Can you remember your favorite artists and songs from this? I hadn't yet added all the artists to my Spotify that I could find.

Four of the five playlists are gone. Fuck. I don't remember any of the songs. FeelsFuckingBadMan. The other mixes by Chilledcow are good too, but those were so good especially the first one.

Chilledcow has a spotify playlist you might be able to find out from there.

 

[yousuf]

I like middle eastern - here's something similar in vibe to the chillhop playlists

 

[Madmick]

Also noticed this older thread when I searched for this one:
Chill jazz hop?

 

[Hyperglide]

@Madmick i created a playlist on Spotify that is always being updated.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3O3cdZDiJh57wpKS6zJC8J?si=A7VgBQuNQ3yJUq4b_xHhOw

 

[Zer]

I haven't gotten balls deep into it but here's a youtube channel I hit up from time to time full of stuff

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCY2mgHbe4QiYjLHrtF5FMYQ

 

[GSP4tw]

The ChilledCow, Chillhop, Bootleg Boy, etc. all have pretty good mixes on their youtube channels with links to their Spotify playlists too.

They also have their 'radio' versions that just play through songs continuously.

 

[GSP4tw]