The 15 Best Vaporwave Releases of 2025

From plundered barber beats and neo-slushwave to original gaming soundtrack jungle

When I tell people that I’m still really into vaporwave, I often get nothing but strange, bewildered looks as an answer. “Vaporwave”, they often repeat with a bemused accentuation, “but hasn’t that been over for a decade?”

Scottish vaporwave producer US Golf 95 has a different take. “Vaporwave is in a really interesting place right now,” he was quoted in an interview last year. “The hype has definitely died down. I see this as a good thing in a way. It’s allowing the envelope to be pushed in many different directions.”

While I agree with that statement, it’s interesting to note that the vaporwave charts on Bandcamp in 2025 were – again – dominated by barber beats releases. We did see a substantial slushwave revival triggered by Telepath’s comeback and a bunch of classic mallsoft and future funk releases popping up every now and then, usually when re-released on some vintage format like cassette or minidisc. But slowed and reverb-drenched trip-hop remained by far the most popular strain of vaporwave, irrespective of any physical format.

Within barber beats, the last two years saw a rising trend inspired by ambient jungle and liquid funk of the variant that was prominently featured in video games back in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Some producers even started plundering old sample CDs and video game soundtracks from the era to create original music in this style. A popular example would be Harvey Jones alias Pizza Hotline, whose album Dream Select topped Bandcamp’s vaporwave charts for weeks when it was released in October. His discography would receive a massive uplift as well.

Both plunderphonics and original production were central to vaporwave from its very beginnings. An outsider might see no obvious similarities between, say, Vektroid’s style-defining mixtape Floral Shoppe and 2814’s ambient masterpiece Birth Of A New Day. The same goes for barber beats now – just compare any early Macroblank release with MICROMECHA’s newer work. The former is slowed down 1990s trip-hop, the latter is original drum’n’bass in a Y2K retro style. Yet despite their obvious sonic differences, they’re still part of the same genre lineage.

What does that lineage actually mean today? US Golf 95 has the perfect non-explanation: “Vaporwave is now a general feeling. The nostalgia, artwork and sum total of inspirations (…) keep it under the vaporwave umbrella. I’m really interested in seeing where vaporwave goes in the next five to ten years – It could potentially be unrecognisable to the core albums that established the genre.”

Below you’ll find my favourite 15 vaporwave releases of 2025, from barber beats to slushwave and gaming jungle. Be aware that vaporwave is an anarchic underground scene; with a few exceptions, the music is plundered, meaning it consists of samples of copyrighted material. The releases are mostly free or name-your-price on Bandcamp and unavailable on commercial streaming services.

desert sand feels warm at night – Vjaġġ tal-Qalb

Slushwave started as a subgenre based on slowed-down J-pop songs with ghostly vocals and loads of flanger and phaser effects. This UK producer remains a dedicated purveyor of the style; the project is a showcase of his innovative compositional approach, mixing manipulated samples and original elements to a degree where it’s impossible to distinguish between the two. This expansive ambient journey (just the transcendent opener “Bluebells” is over 40 minutes long) reminds me of early 1980s Steve Roach or Robert Rich records, but with a hauntological approach to textures and atmosphere.

Pizza Hotline – Dream Select

An imaginary soundtrack to a non-existing video game, Dream Select features original drum’n’bass tracks drawing from “obscure and dated 90s sample CDs, as well as hunting through ROMplers and digital synths of the era to find crystalline, artificial, and precise sounds”, as the Bandcamp blurb states. For someone who grew up on the Good Looking and Moving Shadow catalogues, this is not a mere exercise in nostalgia through – hearing this music through the ears of contemporary producers like Harvey Jones alias Pizza Hotline provides a feeling of connectedness and continuity, similar to the retro ‘94 jungle tekno sounds of Tim Reaper and the likes.

undersaken & slowerpace 音楽 – Blood & Sacrifice

If someone asked me for my favorite barber beats curator of 2025, the first name that came to mind would be Slowerpace. Like many of his peers in this field, he doesn’t produce original music but is just a self-described “vaporwave enthusiast who likes playing with software”. In other words, he’s not an actual producer but more of a DJ that makes their own edits and remixes for mixtapes and compilations. I could recommend any of his releases this year, but this duet with the similarly prolific Undersaken was a true grower; I found myself steadily returning to this collection of cinematic, mystical trip-hop with a dark, psychedelic undertone.

Macroblank – サムライ

Probably the most popular barber beats curator of them all, the mighty Macroblank blessed us with a constant stream of collections this year – one per month, to be exact. I’ve listened to them all, and in all seriousness, there wasn’t a single one I didn’t enjoy. This one is my favorite out the bunch, and it’s themed around the acclaimed Samurai Jack cartoon TV series. I have no idea if the music is actually sampled from the soundtrack, or if it’s just generally inspired by it, but it’s this highly enjoyable playlist of laid-back acid jazz, bossa breaks and jazz-funk beats, which takes me back to a 1993 record digging trip to Shibuya that never happened.

GORE – 異端者

GORE is another highly prolific barber beats curator whose brand guarantees quality releases at this point. This collection from early in the year feels like one of their strongest so far. The mood skews dark and dubby, often pivoting to trancey and psychedelic sounds – think massive electric basslines, moody guitar lines, wailing violins and sitar, shimmering synths and strangely twisted vocal samples. Mysterious, ritualistic music from across the electronica spectrum, united under the barber groove.

t e l e p a t h テレパシー能力者 – Another Day Has Passed in a World Without You

My favorite of the four comeback albums that slushwave legend Luke Laurila released in 2025 as telepath, signaling his return to the original sound he once helped shape. While the other albums featured a mix of old school slush and his more recent, synth-heavy ambient/new age leanings, this one’s just one big throwback to those 2014/15 days when some of his most beloved work came out. Clocking in at 10 to 20 minutes, these snail-paced tracks stretch out slowed blissful melody loops, fed through Laurila’s distinctive chain of effects. Nostalgia, ultra.

Timeshare’94 – Habitat 67

This UK-based duo is known for their highly original take on barber beats: For their seminal release Groot in België, they plundered obscure Belgo-pop and New Beat tracks from the late 1980s for example. Their newest album Habitat 67 is more of a classic-leaning collection with a relaxed downtempo vibe and a slightly Balearic edge. The perfect capitalist productivity music for updating spreadsheets, designing LLM prompts and building Canva presentations at the local WiFi café.

MICROMECHA – Virtual Frontiers

An Italian producer who started out with dnb-inspired barber beats, but pivoted to creating original jungle tracks this year. Like Pizza Hotline’s Dream Select, the album was created as a soundtrack to a fictional video game and harks back to that Y2K era of atmospheric techstep and liquid drum’n’bass. Many of the sounds were taken from old sample CDs and original PlayStation soundtracks. These tracks feel like quick demos, uncluttered and effective, all floating pads and old skool breaks. In true vapor fashion, the mix sounds as if recorded through a console plugged into an old school TV set. What’s not to love?

snowpoint lounge – 思い出の森

A Pokémon-themed barber beats collection of manipulated trip-hop and nujazz tracks. The first half reminds me of peak Nujabes, which is never a bad thing to begin with. Towards the end, it gets a little more experimental with jazzy deep house and Latin drum’n’bass tunes. I’m a few years too old to have ever truly caught the Pokémon bug, but this is a highly enjoyable, organic release with massive replay value.

Magnum Innominandum – The Malygris Suite

One of the more ambitious projects from the barber beats universe – an epic 40-minute suite divided into seven movements, all created from samples meticulously layered with drum breaks and live instrumentation. The project was inspired by the fantasy, horror and science fiction writer Clark Ashton Smith (Malygris is a dark sorcerer from one of his Lovecraft-inspired story cycles). Behind the music is Jim Miles of St. Louis, Missouri, keyboardist of prog rock band Harpo Jarvi. Reminds me distantly of some of DJ Shadow’s and James Lavelle’s late-1990s work.

Oblique Occasions – overlove

A veteran of the barber beats scene with a number of classic tapes under his belt, Oblique Occasions remains among the more active curators in this area, releasing five projects in 2025 alone. I’m singling out their latest plunderphonic collection from November, because overlove has an abundance of these moody 1990s trip-hop breaks that drew me into barber beats in the first place – that combination of jazzy keys, synth basslines, studio effects and intricate percussion work always gets to me. When done right, this style of live manipulation resembles that of a great dub session, similar to what Kruder & Dorfmeister did on their iconic mix CDs.

GODSPEED 音 – Y2K アイコン

I was sold on this right from the start, because the opener slows down and manipulates “Venasque” from Ian Pooley’s 2000 album Since Then, one of my favorite Balearic house records of all time. Godspeed is another prolific barber beats curator that continues to deliver quality compilations. On this anime-themed tape, he’s focusing on upbeat tracks with a vague French touch/future funk energy. A welcome change of pace in contrast to all those deep chill-out/downtempo grooves.

Dusqk – Sanctuary OS

Another ambient jungle-themed release about “a console idling on its menu without a disc inserted”; Dusqk’s mission statement was “to create something calm and relaxing for the community; something that felt like an ethereal save point where you can just rest and rejuvenate”. The formula here is atmospheric pads over two-step riddims; it sounds softer, dreamier, way more ambient than previous Dusqk material, less focused on manipulated vocals and hard-hitting breaks. I fully approve of this new direction, though I enjoyed some of the earlier albums too.

modest by default – Ꚛrtodoxia I (اقتراب)

This is a barber beats curator from Buenos Aires, Argentina, who released a brilliant trilogy of collections between October and December. His curation for this series focuses on laid-back trip-hop beats with sparse, rolling drums and analogue-sounding, jazz-fusion-type instrumentation. Exactly the type of stuff you’d find on any ‘chill’ or ‘lounge’ compilation back in the early 2000s, which usually sounds slightly dated and bland from today’s standpoint, until you hit it with that magic slowed + reverb treatment. All three tapes are great, but the first one’s an absolute belter.

DΛRKNΣSS – her memory tapes

Actually, why are so many great barber beats curators coming from Latin America? DΛRKNΣSS is a veteran of this style allegedly based in Tecate, Mexico, a border city in Baja California. An extremely versatile and eclectic collection, her memory tapes came after a longer release break. Synth-leaning trip-hop, outrun-style electronic tunes, all rather slow and moody – feels like a post-break-up soundtrack, oscillating between deep despair and a vague hope for the future.