ARCADE KID (11)
By:
December 12, 2023
We are pleased to present ARCADE KID, a ’90s “drivethru” written, illustrated, and soundtracked by HILOBROW friend Nikhil Singh. Our readers are urged to check out Nikhil’s dystopian psychedelic-noir novel Club Ded (Luna Press, 2020).
Y2K Looms. Where were the killer robots? Alien abduction on the rise. MIT’s famous conference on the subject. Chinese astrology foretold a period of darkness. A metaphysical prison term, which apparently initiated at some point in the latter half of the 90’s and continued for several years. There was indeed a sense of palpable bleakness in much of the popular culture of the time. A chthonic, useless emptiness, which lurked and festered. The corporate swell mirrored this innate nihilism. Vast, blank buildings began to manifest in viral multiplications. Visions of a future Karnak. Faceless, lawn-moated edifices, riddled with pencil-pushers and a hundred thousand fluorescent banks. People disappeared into the vacuum of these structures in droves. Their personalities began to alter, in accordance to the principles of the hive. You could observe them through panoramic windows. Their hair so desperately styled, effecting the dimension of walk-on sitcom characters, constantly on the lookout for unseen superiors. Their barely lived-in bedrooms gradually became encrusted, with a vicarious coral reef of over-watched films and unread books. Shrines to all the time they wished they still had. The new world hoarder. A certain narcotic allure — a limp-wristed revival of decadence. The ever-present end of the world, which by now was taking and longer and longer to manifest. I recall reading an interview with Thomas Ligotti; that prodigious writer of existential horror, working almost exclusively in short stories. He was asked why he had chosen to set his only novel, to date, in the echelons of a corporate structure. His reply, couched from years of service within such a work environment, was that the corporate world was the closest modern paradigm we had to the infernal realm. It was a baroque viewpoint, but this lent it a certain resonance. It reminded me of people who have an urge to go to war — a need to bring the inevitable closer, through direct action. The decadent temptation to succumb to an orgy of annihilation, in the face of inconceivable. Mutant culture going corporate. I want to factory farm you like an animal. Grimy dives died as the drugs changed. Ecstasy demanded comfort. Roller disco for the soul. Charles Burns’s Black Hole. By 1996, commercial house music. Just the sort of mindless groove the new world hoarder demanded. The dark, psychedelic days were dying. In a septic tank of their own vary-coloured excrement. By 1997, heroin chic. Smack was everywhere. Even floss couldn’t remove it. Fashion lost its rebel edge. Mannequin faces, drifting toward the end of the Millenium. Glossy, sleepy sex dolls on fragrance campaigns. Tom Ford and Gucci. Utilitarian crocodiles. Overkill eye-liner. ICQ and chat worlds becoming something ‘other’. Tentative beginnings of avatar couture. The boring pseudointellectual universe of Radiohead. Gamer rise of Nu-metal. Mall-sounds of a new generation. Spikey bleach-blonde skaters. Baggy jeans and black nail-polish. Muffy, the camp-fire player. Girl bands. Boy bands. Boiled down to Britney. Xtina in a bottle. Post-Eurovision Barbie anthems, E-rotic and jumping castles on drugs. Mr Blobby vs the Teletubbies. Ugly echoes of fallen idols. The Blair Witch. The flared stitch. Handy-cam diaries. Post-Dogme. Mena Suvari in corn-rows. Vomiting in close-up.
More NIKHIL SINGH at HILOBROW: DREAMING MEDIA (Q&A) | JOURNEY TO IXTLAN | HASHTAG FASHION POLICE PROBLEMS | ILLUMINATE OR DISSIPATE? | HATE ISLAND. ALSO: HADRON AGE SF (2004–2023) | ORIGINAL FICTION at HILOBROW.