Cayenne and Rui Ho are two self-made electronic musicians who have evolved the Soundcloud sound into the mainstream — bringing together new emblems for the nostalgia-obsessed generation with gritty, iconoclast renditions of the pop genre.
Pictured Above: Cayenne by Christopher Sim
In a YouTube video from late October 2020, a 23-year-old musician known now by her alias as Cayenne glitches from a living room to a park as a pixelated pop track plays in the background. She continues the motif of warping into different objects while luminous yet vile and heavily synthesised kick drums interrupt her interpretation of a heartbreak song. At just two and a half minutes long, the fashion is an amalgamation of multiple electronic genres — glitch pop, gabber, and trance-pop — made popular from the late 1990s to the early 2000s.
The result is a sound that instantly propels one into complete disarray, yet spurs the mind into complete ecstasy at the same time.
__
Cayenne (@cayenne_forever) is the solo musical project from Singaporean Celine, most notably as the lead vocalist in the indie dream-pop band, Sobs. Her debut track “Drivin’ Away” has cleaved opened an irresistible niche in the local electronic scene. “It was the song that brought Cayenne to life”, explains Celine. “I was going through a rut last year and spent most of the quarantine unproductive and depressed. But towards the end, I was actively working on music every day, taking time to mess around on Ableton even if I didn’t come up with anything in the end. All that messing around led to “Drivin’ Away”. At that moment, everything just clicked. I felt like I had finally found my identity with Cayenne.”
__
View this post on Instagram
She is one of the many new instances of the bedroom-made, electronic-pop rise in Singapore and this culture of mutating the glitzy foundations of pop has, too, blossomed elsewhere. The term “hyperpop” has been coined to loosely describe such sounds. PC Music — an upstart music label in London — has been deeply associated with popularising the playful spirit of the genre. The notoriety began when A.G. Cook — PC Music’s lead project — worked with British pop artist Charli XCX on her last albums.
From there, hyperpop sounds have now been made accessible and are easily found on platforms such as TikTok — far from its beginnings just seven years back on Soundcloud. It blurs the lines between music made in the bedroom and professional studio production.
__
According to Celine, “[Hyperpop] is as an umbrella term more than anything now, and everyone has their interpretation of what hyperpop is. Not all hyperpop artistes identify themselves with the label but what they have in common is that they’re not afraid to keep pushing the envelope with constant experimentation of their sound and redefining the sounds of pop.”
It comes as no surprise that the genre has a deep association with the queer community as well, where a majority of hyperpop projects are led by LGBTQ+ members. Most importantly, it highlights new accessibility to take any sound one enjoys and make it new again.
__
Photography & Styling: Dre Romero
Berlin-based Chinese producer, Rui Ho (@rui_hooo), has played a hand in maturing the electronic pop sound over the last five years. Just one listen from her most played track on Spotify — “The Heat” — would attract avid listeners of ambient sounds that is further mixed with modern, enthusiastic productions. In the case of Rui, to label her solely as hyperpop might pull the attention on the artiste’s inclination to abstract sounds away from her repertoire.
__
“I get so many different influences”, she elaborates when asked what genre defines her music. “Right now I am musically close to artistes like SOPHIE and Arca — especially since both of them are trans-women. It deeply inspires me. But my biggest inspiration would be Utada Hikaru from Japan, as she is the producer and singer/songwriter for almost all her work. It influences me by doing everything on my own as well.”
__
View this post on Instagram
Is hyperpop, or is the new distorted sounds of pop the future of music? “I think everyone’s interested in the future but everyone has a different vision of it”, exclaims Rui. “Like I would’ve never predicted the revival of disco-pop/synth-pop as the biggest trend of 2020. So in the future, a bunch of different genres would be existing at the same time and more artistes will crossover genres. I used to think sounding more like a machine would be the absolute trend of the future, but now I am seeing that it could go in so many more directions, but probably still more and more electronic.”
Photography & Styling: Dre Romero
“I think it’s the most interesting and experimental form of pop music at the moment”, Rui proclaims.
__
Hyperpop is now taken seriously, despite its innate nature of perhaps ridiculing or humouring the state of contemporary pop. It reflects a desire to propagate the pop-making machine as a commodity much less than that as an engine for creativity. However, behind this rise is the birth of a new, young global community of artistes who have found likeness within themselves in creating exciting music.
Therefore despite its criticism, artistes such as Cayenne and Rui Ho who continually push the boundaries of electronic music ensure the dysfunctional pop sounds are here to stay. As Rui profoundly reaffirms, “there are endless possibilities in electronic music.”
This story about two self-made musicians on the evolution of the Soundcloud sound first appeared in the May 2021 issue of Men’s Folio Singapore.
RELATED ARTICLES
Life, In A Slow Dive
