FLAPS
Editor’s Letter W
elcome to Flaps, the newest addition into the world of zines. Why the name Flaps? It’s a Spaced reference - great show, it’s got Simon Pegg in it. Check it out if you haven’t already. Main features in issue one include looking at the future of Vaporwave. Don’t know what Vaporwave is? Hit up page 7. Another main feature is an exploration into having Obssessive Compulsive Disorder, focusing on patterns that anti-depressants are taken in by people very close to me - that’s on page 11. Flaps is a personal journey, there’s a lot going on and it’s a constant work in progress, but then again, nearly everything is a constant work in progress. If you think Flaps all over the place, you are right.
Larry Gliddon
A special thank you to... @waxmilson He’s a distinctive
illustrator who currently resides in Bristol. Words cannot describe how talented he is and his kindness will leave me forever grateful.
@lorienxwilliams Without her
graphics, Flaps wouldn’t be as funky as it is. Everybody who contributed to Flaps. I couldn’t have done this without you.
Contents 6.....................Vaporwave 11....................Anti-Ds 15...................Legal Highs 21...................Feminism 26..................Bong Water 33..................Chocolate
VAPORWAVE: MUSIC ANAESTHETICS
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verything is possible on the internet. You can buy anything, you can become anyone you want to be, you can buy whatever you want, and you can create anything you want. The internet allows your mind to wander.
In 2011, Vaporwave was born through internet forums like 4Chan and Reddit, and went on to become one of the very few music genres to live entirely - and successfully on the internet. If you haven’t heard of vapourware before, you obviously haven’t been on the internet as much as anyone else - or you’re six years old, maybe younger. So Vaporwave is basically synthy dance music from the 80’s and 90’s,
usually slowed down but sometimes it’s sped up - there’s no in between with it in terms of BPM. As it began online, it immediately qualified as a meme, supposedly parodying capitalist culture through the medium of 90’s nostalgia, supposedly acquiring the name from Vaporware, which means something that’s being advertised to buy but isn’t actually available due to being just a concept.
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Imagine taking an elevator to the tenth floor of a building made of Hubba Bubba, Zap lollies and Rice Krispies, and you were in there with Macauly Culkin and the entire cast of the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. Imagine the Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme song slowed down with synths, playing in the elevator. This is an example of Vaporwave. But it isn’t just about music, it comes with an aesthetic. Just like HipHop is associated with guns, dance music with pills, and classical music with psychopaths, vapourwave is associated with retro iconography like VHS and Windows XP. Album covers, for example, have a pastel colour scheme and Japanese lettering that tends to be s p a c e d o u t.
Prominent artists within the Vaporwave scene include Macintosh Plus, user 2 8 1 4 and Blank Banshee, who enforce the aesthetic with their album covers. Simpsonswave formed its own sub genre when Vaporwave was at its peak. It consists of Simpsons clips edited with retro iconography as well as filters which adhere to the aesthetic, paired with notable Vaporwave tracks. Lucien Hughes was one of the most prominent memers to make Simpsonswave a thing. He actually got the inspiration from Simpsons Shitposting, which is a Simpsons meme page on Facebook, making Simpsonswave a meme within a meme. “I think Vaporwave is a really important cultural movement. It’s had a lot of mainstream impact despite starting out as a niche,” says Lucien. Vaporwave is an experimental genre, causing the ambiguity of it to inspire sub-genres.
“Just like Hip-Hop is associated with guns, dance music with pills, and classical music with psychopaths, vapourwave is associated with retro iconography like VHS and Windows XP”.
When I asked Lucien about the current state of Vaporwave and the future of the culture, he said that “People say it’s dead but it’s just sort of diversified into lots of other genres. A lot of the people who used to make traditional Vaporwave have moved into genres like Vaportrap, seapunk and so on… The nostalgic, chilled out 80s-90s inspired core is still there.” Seapunk started on the online blog platform Tumblr, and possesses the same sort of themes of Vaporwave. Unicorn Kid is an artist closely associated with Seapunk, and
Witch House is also another sub-genre which is a dark twist on Vaporwave, with bands like Crystal Castles and You Love Her Cos She’s Dead who posses themes of Witch House. Vaporwave was a meme that brought people together through music, and even after five years, it lives on through many sub-genres which are still around today. Listening to Blank Banshee in 2017 will be a nostalgic experience taking you back to the time you were listening to it to be ironically nostalgic. Memeception.
Written by Larry Gliddon Pics by Max, Lorien and Lucien. The subtitled pic is a screenshot from the internet.
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Mental Health:
It’s not what you think, it’s what you know. How do patterns make you feel? A) Happy B) Angry C) Sad Z) Nervous?
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W
hat if you had a headache from stressing about the milk not arranging right in the fridge? Or if you think it’s okay to shout at friends for wearing mismatched socks? It may seem really funny watching someone getting angry at trivial things, but there is an underlying tone of seriousness to these situations. Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is a condition that affects the way you think and act due to obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviour. It can happen to anyone, and sometimes it will interfere with your life, whether you notice it or not. Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) are thought to work by increasing serotonin levels in the brain for people who have anxiety and depression, or other mental health conditions that are a result in a chemical imbalance in the brain, including OCD.
Having OCD can happen to everyone, and to be honest, pretty much everyone is a bit OCD - it’s just those affected act upon it. It’s usually prominent after a significant life event, like bereavement. What triggers you? Will a bunch of boxes that won’t arrange properly set you off? Or what about living in fear that one day you’re not going to be able to stop yourself from hurting someone? Picture the scene. All of a sudden you’ve gone all cold and you can’t stop shaking and your mind has turned into white noise and so much is happening right now and you can’t fucking think for one second. What you need to do now is slow your breathing down. Breathe in. Hold for five seconds. Breath out. Repeat until you’ve calmed down and get over whatever just happened there.
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“I think that Citalopram is bollocks. I don’t have time for a slow and gradual recovery. I would rather take Diazepam because it’s got an instant effect.” - My mum
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“Living life on the edge is the only way to live.” - Dr Seuss
Panic attacks are fucking terrifying and they are quite literally mind-numbing. They’ll creep up on you. Like a freaky bailiff for your soul. Now, everybody takes medication for a number of different reasons. I’m on Sertraline (which is an SSRI) to treat my OCD and my Panic Disorder. I got talking to a friend who has depression and he showed me his antidepressants. What stood out to me is the pattern he took his anti-depressants in. Medication affects every single person differently, but it made me think about the pattern in which medication is taken might actually be a reflection of the personality of the individual taking it and might show the effect that the medication is having on that person. I think maybe finding patterns so intriguing is down to my own
OCD. Patterns that don’t match up can often give me intense headaches. Some things I get angry about are amusing to people because they don’t understand my condition. And some of my mates who know about it will find it amusing too. Mental illness is not taken as seriously as it should be, and never has been. When I told a mate I was back on medication, he went “Oh great, another sedated friend I have to look after then.” Like, fuck you! I told you in the confidence that you would understand better. But mental health does have this stigma about it which makes it hard for people to talk about it. You can’t really tell anyone because you know they’re going to think you’re constantly suicidal if you’re depressed, or you cover yourself and all of your belongings in tin foil if you suffer from anxiety. Just because you can’t see it, does
not mean isn’t there. Recovery is a gradual process, no matter what illness you have. And recovery is about trust - you have to trust the medication you’re taking is going to help you get better. But what’s more important than that is trusting yourself. This probably sounds like a loads of bollocks but you can’t get better unless you believe you’ll get better.
Written by Larry Gliddon. Pics by Larry, Arthur, Matt and Mum.
aLL OVER THE PLACE
FLAPS