Vincent Van Gogh died with the assumption that his life’s work was worthless and that he had amounted to nothing as a painter. Unfortunately for him, it would be a mere 30 years until he was revered as one of the greatest artists of his time. The arts are a fickle field, as anyone who has engaged with them for long enough could tell you. While it is human nature to create, our sheer creative output means only a fraction of content is discovered, leading to greatness often being overlooked. Be it the circumstance of the times or the whims of fate, the ultimate end to most musicians careers is the inevitable fall to obscurity. However, every so often, an artist bounces back from the pits of relegation. This veritable death saving throw of an event has led to a few of the greats in music today, and I wanted to expound on these artists’ acceptance of nihility, their eventual call to the limelight, and what that means for artists today.

Nowadays, it’s hard to escape the prevalence of Slowdive in the shoegaze genre. With how widely accepted the genre has become in the modern day, it feels weird to consider the band’s reception while their music was being released in the ‘90s. Once so promising to many, a fierce backlash towards the band sparked as they began to establish themselves in the mainstream. Their now widely loved album Souvlaki was dragged through the mud for being outdated and bland, causing the band to be dropped by their label after the release of their subsequent album Pygmalion. From this point, the band went off on their own endeavors, still working in music but not expecting to go back to the moniker they all once fell under. 

As we will see with Slowdive and the other groups I have picked out, the catalyst for the bands reintroduction to the mainstream came in no small part due to the nostalgia-tinted glasses that the general public has been wearing for the last 10 years. This desire to revisit eras like grunge in the ‘90s or the early 2000s have sparked interest in once written-off media, past opinions notwithstanding. Slowdive’s Souvlaki now stands as one the most revered albums of all time, with the band themselves reforming and dropping two new albums to positive reception. The main takeaway here is the following: bands that have come back into the spotlight were often too ahead of their time. It is inevitable that doing something new alienates many when comfort is so sought after.

Being the least well known of the artists I will be talking about today, you would be hard pressed to know who Gigi Masin is if you are not acquainted with the ambient music scene. However, I would liken his impact on the world of music to being like the wind. He is an artist who has spread so far and influenced not only music but the industry itself. As a forerunner in the Italian radio DJ scene during his youth, Masin Would introduce his niche music taste to the late night segments he played for. Eventually, he would release his first project, aptly titled Wind, to only a handful of people in 1987. He would continue making music over the next few years until leaving the music world after being employed by the Italian postal service. And that’s how he remained for 20 years, never being recognized for his craft. It wouldn’t be until the 2010s, over 30 years since Wind originally released, that his ancient catalog began gaining recognition. Upon a wider re-release of the album, many began to see the meticulously crafted soundscapes and melancholy atmosphere that he had created as being well ahead of their time. Now, the album is heralded as one of the finest works in the ambient world, and Masin has resumed making music.

While I don’t think Masin ever intended to try and make it big (if your name isn’t Brain Eno or Aphex Twin, I think that’s a given in the realm of ambient music) it is sad to see how close such a masterpiece of an album was to being lost to the annals of time. Any number of factors could have caused his music to go undiscovered, but the fact that it was speaks to the power of good art. If a piece is truly great, it will be found.

In the realm of discovery, the story of Panchiko should be heralded as one among the most unlikely revivals of a band. After producing the EP D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L and distributing a handful of copies in the year 2000 the band disbanded after being unable to sign to a label. The members went their separate ways, pursuing careers anywhere from the army to a tree surgeon. However, over 15 years after the EP’s release, it was discovered on 4chan in a small music shop. The band members were sought out and contacted. Faced with their newfound popularity, the band reformed. Their style of melancholic indie rock spoke to the crowds of today, with their latest album Ginkgo coming out earlier this year.

With how unlikely of a situation it would be for such an event to take place, I think the last factor for any artist arising from the dead is luck. As with becoming a large artist in the first place, coming back as an artist functions in the same way. If that 4chan user hadn’t been in that specific music store and found one of the only remaining copies of their album, none of their (albeit belated) success story could have happened. 

Reflecting on these artists’ revitalizations, it is sad to think about how many of their caliber go unnoticed year over year. Seeing how it took all of these artists decades to come back into the public eye, it makes me both sad and hopeful for what has been overlooked in music in recent times. The public’s attention proves fickle, and with the constant bombardment of information people are exposed to today there are a limited amount of creatives that can occupy our collective consciousness. Perhaps then the ultimate message is to rely on time. As people evolve and trends change, the new is allowed to creep in. In addition to the new, this cycle brings back what may have been missed in the past, reevaluated for the present. While your future favorites may be releasing music now without your knowledge, give it time: eventually they will be discovered.