I can't exactly pinpoint when but Synthwave music has been one of my favourites for a long time now. Blade Runner (1982),Drive (2011) - and to some extent - The Social Network (2010) certainly pop to mind as the prime earliest examples where I loved it before older teen and childhood memories come into play in a messy labyrinth where I usually struggle to pin-point specific memories. Pop-culture wise, the most popular usage of it in the last half-decade, from what I can gather, is Stranger Things, and one of the main reasons I loved it initially was because the series used this type of music through and through. Somewhere along the line, I came upon The Rise of the Synths, added it to my watchlist, and only now finally got around to watching it. Don't have a lot to say about it since, despite my love for the genre, I'm not well versed in it from an artist/band perspective but I'm gonna be penning (or rather keying) down my thoughts anyway.

This documentary is a great rundown of the modern scene; their drive, their inspirations, their history. It also takes you back in time in decade sized chunks to give an overview of the eras and where it all began. All of it is stitched together and produced in a competent manner with two components standing out above the rest: the music, which was one of the primary reasons I gave this a try as I'd knew there will be some titillating Synthwave in the documentary for the genre; and the narration by the legendary John Carpenter who went over his early life and had some inspiring words for aspiring artists and general motivation for anyone who feels out of place, which I welcomed greatly.

Synthwave always had that 80s nostalgia vibe and for reasons unbeknownst to me - I was born in the 90s - pulled me in strongly while, at the same time, gives a longing for the future and oftentimes a particular form of future that one can relate to something like cyberpunk; this two-sided pull is what I love about it most. As is evident from the artists in the documentary and from the fans in general on Youtube or any other place on the net, it is what attracts all of them too and I find that interesting and beautiful.

I do wish that it was longer and had greater detail when it comes to synthesizing the music as it comes off as an overview rather than an in-depth look but, as a crowd-funded project, this is still a great achievement and props to the team and the backers. If you're a fan of this type of music, I'd highly recommend giving this a try. It's short and sweet. And if I were to rate it, I'd give it a Kavinski/Vangelis.

Just watched this, pretty cool, quite a lot of commentary from John Carpenter in between musician interviews. Anyone who can remember the '80s, or anyone into any kind of soundtrack or electronic music should dig it too, but like i've said before, I think the music can be apreciated by anyone including rock / metal fans, and a significant proportion of the artists come from a rock background, which they mention here. I like Synthwave for this fact, and the nostalgia factor (i'm a kid of the '80s) and the film soundtrack feels, but also because lots of it is just plain good what ever music you like!

Not one to be missed if you also hanker for the neon lights of the 1980s.