Making Synthwave: How an Online Music Community Invented a Genre (1)

Synopsis

Making Synthwave: How an Online Music Community Invented a Genre documents the journey of an online community in their formation of the synthwave genre.Taking an emic perspective that delivers a behind-the-scenes, access-all-areas telling of synthwave’s story from the very beginning to the mid 2020s, this ethnographic account offers a full history and development of the online synthwave community. Through an insightful longitudinal virtual ethnography by a composer, producer and performer, the book observes how artists, audiences, musicians, producers and performers have come together to negotiate the musical and cultural boundaries of 1980s ‘throwback’ style synthwave. The book makes visible tacit knowledge of the synthwave creative process, as well as providing rich and experiential subcultural detail that situates synthwave as an active community of practice which formulated its roots as a music genre exclusively online in the mid to late 2000s.This book is essential reading for music makers in a variety of genres and scholars of popular music, cultural theory and music production, as well as those interested in the nuances of music-making on the internet, creative processes with synthesizers and the mechanics of genre theory and community music in the digital age.

Copyright:

2026

Book Details

Book Quality:

Publisher Quality

Book Size:

294 Pages

ISBN-13:

9781040747940

Related ISBNs:

9781032732039, 9781040511442, 9781032732046, 9781003448075

Publisher:

Taylor & Francis

Date of Addition:

11/13/25

Copyrighted By:

Jess Blaise Ward, The right of Jess Blaise Ward to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections

Adult content:

No

Language:

English

Has Image Descriptions:

No

Categories:

Nonfiction, Music

Submitted By:

Bookshare Staff

Usage Restrictions:

This is a copyrighted book.