Best Physicals of the Month: May 2021
Updated: Jul 13, 2021
At the end of each month here on Celadon Plaza, we like to highlight our favorite Vaporwave physical releases. Although each month brings many top notch products, we’ll be narrowing it down to the top 3 that we enjoy the most and personally decided to buy.
Month number 3 of Celadon Plaza has come to a close, and it was another great one for fans of Vaporwave. We waited an extra week for this month's top physicals in hopes that a few more were delivered, and alas, this is exactly what ended up happening!
The “Top Physicals of Month” criteria usually incorporates the following:
1. The item was released between the first and last day of the month
2. The item is physically in our hands at the time of posting
However, we are finding it increasingly hard to highlight high quality releases that are released as pre orders. Because of this, Top Physicals of the Month posts can now also feature products that fit this criteria as well:
3. The item was released as a pre order that stated release/shipment was set for the current month. (i.e. A pre order is listed in March and stated to release or ship out in April. This could be feature on an April list)
Hope that doesn't make things too confusing! We were finding that the old criteria was forcing us to miss out on highlighting some very high quality tapes and vinyl due to pre order windows on various products.
With that done, let's check out our picks for May's best physical Vaporwave Releases!
High Society - Luxury Elite
Crash Symbols - Cassette
Luxury Elite tapes are legendary for a reason. Over the years, each label that has had the fortune of releasing one of her always stellar albums on the format has done a phenomenal job bringing the sounds to a piece of physical media that is just as iconic as the music contained on it. Crash Symbols was no different in their release of Lux's newest album, 'High Society.' The tapes are masterfully dubbed onto a gorgeous white shell with red lettering and the J-card was given the same style treatment as the previous Crash Symbols Lux Elite tape, World Class. We'd be anticipating this one for a long while and it certainly lived up to all the hype.
Favorite Track: Continental Airlines
Deep Fantasy - Surfing
Turntable Lab - Vinyl (Repress)
A long sought after repress by fans late to scene, Surfing's 'Deep Fantasy' received not one, but 2 represses in 2021, courtesy of Newbury Comics and Turntable Lab. We had the pleasure of picking up TTL's variant and was pleasantly surprised. The pressing was done on opaque minty green that matches the same hue on the album art with splatters of white and blue. Of the two, we highly preferred this variant, both for looks and for the cheaper price.
Favorite Track: Lifetime
Japanese Disco Edits 1-3 - Yung Bae
Neoncity Records - Cassette (Boxset)
It was a true crime that Yung Bae's complete Japanese Disco Edits series hadn't been made available physically before this year. JDE 1 got a cassette and vinyl release via Neoncity back in 2018, but the other albums were left in limbo. That was, until April of 2021 when a pre order was announced for a complete boxset of Japanese Disco Edits 1, 2, & 3. If you've only seen the mockups then you only know half the story, as they don't do this product justice. Neoncity beautifully constructed each tape on clear tape with glitter and included a holographic front cardstock in addition to a 2 sided J-card for each. The tapes are cut perfectly to fit the short nature of the albums which eliminates needless fast forwarding at the end of each side. All 3 cassettes are housed in a stunning box with gold lettering. The albums may be on the short side and the price might have seemed like a pretty penny due to this, but we assure you that love was put into this release. It's one of the most beautiful sets we have bought over the years, and we couldn't be happier with how fast they shipped from Hong Kong to us here in the US (less than 2 weeks!) If you missed your chance, keep an eye out, as a boxset of JDE vinyl has already been confirmed for the coming months...
Favorite Track: Distant Love
And that will finish our Top Physicals of May! Remember to subscribe to our email list to get Weekly Physical Updates along with any Emergency updates as well, and as always, check out our Release Archive to stay up to date on every Vaporwave Cassette and Vinyl release that's happening.
Until next time, hope to see you around the plaza!