The Pretend Future of the Past

My son was listening to vapor wave and trying to explain the genre to my wife.

He said it’s like a nostalgia for a version of the past that never quite was built around a future that never came to be.

It’s interesting how compelling the future of the past aesthetic is these days. We can’t seem to get enough of an amalgamation of previous eras – mostly ’80s and ’90s technophile niches – versions of the future.

Is it because it’s quaint and funny? Is it because it’s cool and fun? A combo of nerdy outsider and hip cutting edge insider? Or is it because we’re unhappy with the present, and lament that it didn’t turn out they way we imagine we imagined back then?

Combining all the fun parts of the future-oriented past into a new version and living in it today is a weird contradiction. Or irony. Or something. I’m not quite sure.

When the trend runs out of steam, I wonder whether it will be followed by a rise in popularity of an even more removed past, or a new vision of the future.