I love discovering subcultures when I’m out and about. I think the day when I become closed minded and start complaining about a subculture is the the day when I buy my cane and increase my use of the word “whippersnappers” when referring to young folk.

NintendoCore

Image: Yourscenesucks.com

Some subcultures are funny to me as an outsider (i.e. those people who can’t let go of happy hardcore rave and still dress like cartoon characters with pacifiers) but other than making me giggle innocently I don’t pass judgment on the people in those scenes. I’m sure they see something that others do not and are probably ridiculing all the “squares” within their circles themselves, so I don’t think anyone has the right to judge either way. In some cases the scene is a phase while in others it’s a way of life that lasts well into adulthood. Whenever I need a cheat sheet, I go to Your Scene Sucks and read up on the hilarious generalizations of each type of scenester and their music playlists.   The thing that each scene forms itself around is always some kind of music. If you think about it, each scene is pretty much defined by a certain type of music or a repertoire of genres that those within that scene prefer. Modern day hipsters are all about indie bands you’ve never heard of, while a punker will listen to…well…punk. It’s no different today than it was 50 or so years ago with greaser rockabillies and poodle skirts. For all the aversion to conformity expressed through dress styles and music tastes the irony is in the uniformity of the clothing and the limited range of tastes characterized by each scene. Conversely, what’s beautiful about all of this is that the music itself is never uniform. Musicians strive so hard to be different from the rest that they are willing to experiment with new sounds at any level and can sometimes even create a new “genre” altogether, even if by accident.

Since watching Scott Pilgrim Vs the World I’ve kind of gotten into chiptunes. Chiptunes are musical compositions that use the same sound palette as an 8-bit computer system. The band that got me into chiptunes was Anamanaguchi, who also did much of the music for Scott Pilgrim and its eponymous side scrolling video game, which I downloaded from the Playstation Network. The first song got me hooked and I was ravenously looking for more after that. Take a listen to the tune here at the right and you will have had your first taste of chiptunes.

So back to the scene angle. As you can see by our friend in picture at the top of this post, scenes tend to beget related fashion choices and while the picture of the “Nintendocore” dude has an embellishment here and there to show the extent of the fashion mode it’s pretty much spot on. And so what? Since the world went digital the line has been blurred between what a nerd is and what a cool kid is. In fact nerds are in style and will continue to be as long as they create awesome things…like Facebook and WordPress and Etsy. Oh yeah, and chiptunes.

The scene is still somewhat underground but there are some really talented and eccentric artists in it who vary in their approach. Anamanaguchi uses pieces they’ve worked on before hand and beef up the sound with live guitars and drums while many other chiptuners approach the style like a DJ would at a club as they pore over all kinds of buttons, hacked Guitar Hero controllers and of course the physical chip board from an old game cartridge or NES. Last week during CMW I stopped by my friend Alice Quinn’s re-launch party for her website TdotComics.ca and got to see a few chiptuners at work. One guy was particularly entertaining (and frightening) to watch so I filmed him with my smart phone. You can see him in action in the video to the left.

Whatever scene you’re in, try not to make too much fun of the other scenesters because chances are you look just as unique (or ridiculous) as they do and are just looking at the world through a different lens.

If you wanna get geeky with me, come to the Wizard World Comic con this weekend and let’s nerd out!