[chillwave forever] Feeling nostalgic for the 2009 blog pop golden age, as Toro y Moi releases glo-fi’s first “archival, retrospective box set”

As the most hyper-nostalgic generation of music listeners in the history of recorded sound, its about time we all start actively acknowledging our sentimental feelings about 2009: a year when chillwave artists around the world were starting to find each other on Tumblr, amidst the larger-ranging Gen Y International Blog-Pop Underground that was reaching its height. Chillwave itself is a hyper-nostalgic genre, so it makes sense that only three years after the its inception, the genre's most prevalent characters would start releasing box sets and best-of’s. This one is sort of like The Roots of Chillwave.

Stream the first single, "Dead Pontoon," below. If it is any indication, this will be essential for any glo-fi enthusiast's 7-inch collection.

For those who are feeling super nostalgic (which is probably everyone drawn to this post), here's something similarly fun that I found on the Interweb last week: a tour CD-R released by Washed Out in early 2010, full of random home-recordings and demos that never made it onto proper releases. Track 5 (they're all untitled) is my favorite; it's surfy and feedback-y and doesn't sound much like the Washed Out we now know and love.

Though the aforementioned Great 2009 Blog-Pop Underground lo-fi community produced mostly punky garage pop and shoegaze artists, like Dum Dum Girls and Spectrals, a listen to these early chillwave recordings connects a lot of the dots: these unearthed recordings are janglier, punkier and still have vague rock structures to them, tied in with the hazy dance beats that would come to define this strain of bedroom pop.

The first-ever chillwave box set is out April 24 on 7'' vinyl, CD, and digital via Carpark.