furry music is many things. to me, furry music is a community of individual artists who share online spaces and benefit from eachothers' social proximity, regardless of physical distance.
not all furry musicians participate in community like this, but to me the biggest benefit of furry music is the interconnected fanbases and desire to celebrate other artists.
for those who don't feel the above is correct, that's cool! my hope in doing all of this is to promote selflessness and bringing down barriers to entry as an artist. even when i was online as a kid with a drawing tablet, that was always my hope in finding community on the internet.
stoopTalk - my furry music podcast
I co-host stoopTalk! Here's part of the description:
Each episode, Will and a rotating guest chat with a furry musician about their projects and other topics revolving around DIY music and the furry scene.
I love getting to hear about the tiny details and the work that went into the music. I'm definitely a more technical host than a personality, but I love being a part of it all the same.
| apple podcasts | link |
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| spotify podcasts | link |
you can also search for "stoopTalk" or "indieAnthro" on any podcatcher-supported service. i personally prefer AntennaPod for android.
furry music writings
| What Is Furry Music? on RateYourMusic | My first foray into writing and trying to share the breadth of music available in the furry sphere. It's outdated now, but I liked it as my entry point in trying to share what I thought was so valuable in furry music conceptually, during a time (2018) when it hadn't really taken off yet. | What Is Furry Music? on RateYourMusic |
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| WhatIsFurryMusic .com | my site to state my ethos on furry music and its many interpretations, as well as to link to my own resources. this page honestly might supercede it but for now it's here! | whatisfurrymusic.com |
| Telegram Channel /whatisfurrymusic | every month i post about what i've been enjoying in the furry music sphere | t.me/whatisfurrymusic |
| EFMC (Ember's Furry Music Compilation) | in 2020 i put together a compilation of other furries' music to make a fun little free compilation. after the first i started asking furries to submit new songs instead of old ones, and the results have always been fun to see. | efmc.bandcamp.com |
| indieAnthro Blog | a blog discussing furry music and sharing new releases in the furry-DIY scene. | indieanthro.com |
| stoopTalk Co-Host | a furry music podcast! will invited me to be one of many rotating cohosts on stoopTalk, a furry music podcast that interviews artists and discusses their releases, as well as just kinda vibe with whatever. | indieanthro.com |
| Rise of Furry Music | a furry convention panel i regularly host! during these panels i highlight the data i've been collecting on the furry music community, i share various perspectives on what furry music means, and showcase work by the amazing artists in the scene. | Full ANE 2024 Panel on YouTube |
my furry music history
as a self-described furry music historian, it's only fitting i have a bob drake-esque longform text entry about my story in relation to furry and music.
so buckle up!
hey, i'm ember.
i was pretty online in 2011. i was trying to be an artist/animator at the time, inspired by my artist friends that i'd made through scratch.
my furry story actually starts with my little pony. it was impossible to ignore ponies in any online space. when my friends switched from drawing personas and gjinkas to ponysonas, i had to find out what was up. i really liked the show and started attending local media conventions in hopes of finding stuff celebrating bronies.
thanks to 2011 youtube recommendations, i got really into sogreatandpowerful just as A Beautiful Heart relased. my debut album Universes Unlike Ours is entirely just me trying to emulate the sounds of 'galaxy'. from there i really fell down the rabbit hole of brony music, and was fascinated at the way musicians could write 100s of verses about the same 22 minute episode. besides sogreatandpowerful and le soldat pony, glaze was always my favourite electronic musician in the fandom. stylistically i just really respected what they were doing, and their songs never got old for me.
one day in 2012, the living tombstone, notable brony musician at the time, posted a remix of the song 'atomizer' by furries in a blender. i really liked this remix and wanted to find the original song. i clicked on the link in the description to the lapfox trax channel, and the latest video (at the time) was the announcement for robot brainstronaut blastoff.
robot brainstronaut blastoff's release introduced me to bandcamp, furry music, and also the promise that music could feel intrinsically exciting and not just what was playing on classic rock radio, or as overt with its stylings as dubstep. it also laid the framework for me to see how i could put out my own music.
i should mention, at the time i had nobody else to point to for furry music (or breakcore/fast-paced exciting electronic music) between the years of 2012. i liked the visual-audio link that the lapfox style provided. even if i found the music between aliases a bit same-y, i still enjoyed trying other styles and seeing what they had to offer.
in 2016 i was introduced to 'teens of denial' by car seat headrest through my friend ashley ninelives. the story i was told is that music outlets were saying great things about teens of denial, but the real meat of the band came from their earlier 2011 release 'twin fantasy'. so i gave it a listen while on vacation in hawaii, during a long, rainy car ride around the big island. that long drive with the album became pretty ingrained in my creative subconscious, i was hooked pretty immediately.
not long after, i was thinking about the uniquely 'online furry' perspective that twin fantasy provided. coming out to friends over skype, trying not to be weird about hyperfixations like favourite animals or an animal that represents you. being socially isolated and experiencing long distance. it made me wonder if there were other artists making similarly-toned music with lyrics as deep-cutting as car seat headrest's.
as an inevitability of being really into car seat headrest, i joined a lot of fan forums and servers, and found way more car seat headrest-inspired music projects. some of them were furry even! it was at this time i was getting to know artists like numbers of floral tattoo, or arps of bit depth, prior to them releasing the projects they're currently known for. i did this for a few years.
in 2018 i wrote a document called the 'furry music manifesto'. i didn't publish it. someday i will, but i should probably make a new one first. maybe this whole website is it, idk lol. but it was entirely speculative, wondering what a theoretical 'furry music ideal' would look like. also, i attended my first furry con with ashley ninelives this year. it showed me a side of furry that i was afraid of (i hadn't gotten over my mascot fear at that time).
in 2019 i noticed an uptick in furry musicians arriving on the scene. i saw more videos of performers surfacing from cons. i saw more artists try to compete for the same audience as lapfox during its hayday. i started to find way more explicit 'this is furry music inspired by car seat headrest' and i was really enjoying the thought of seeing that 'furry music ideal' realized. i started to notice more of a community being built around furry music.
around here is when i started my HUGE list of furry musicians. i was getting more online with twitter and wondered if people would benefit from having a list of every furry musician i know of. people said yes, so, i made it! it's my favourite thing to maintain (in spite of my adhd which makes it hard to maintain things).
with 2020 on the horizon, ashley suggested i come visit boston for ANE. and wow. ANE 2020 has got to be one of my favourite experiences i've ever had with furry. i met so many amazing people like duster (not the band), para raccoon, will and andrew from 1 trait danger, russelbuck, vomen, and scurrow, but then i got to connect with some of my oldest online friends who just so happened to be in town during the last night of the con?? (genuinely, huge thanks to ben, reaper. love y'all.)
honestly, everything in furry music from 2020 onwards has just felt like a series of funny small world moments. meeting people i'd known online for years in person was a crazy experience for me. only dampened by the fact that it kept happening every hour and the nuance started to wear off once i started to meet musicians i thought were entirely unreachable or untouchable in their popularity.
the pandemic hit, and i kinda blacked out for a few months trying to be really productive. one of these projects i did manage to pull off before my months of burnout was Ember's Furry Music Compilation. it was definitely worth it, just one of many ideas I wanted to finally get out there in hopes of building some sense of community with furry music. i know i'm far from the first to make a compilation, but i really wanted to see more interconnectedness in my own community.
during 2021-2022 i took a break from music to focus on school and game development. if you're curious i made a furry game about a certain space fox and space bird that you can go find on my games page.
i'm struggling to think what to even say about 2023. i went to fureh? i finished talk to me burnaby as listed on my music page, which was a pretty big milestone. i think this is when i was more wiling to be forwardly furry since i was putting so much damn effort into it. i stopped masquerading my furry convention trips as 'anime con trips'. i think the real kicker was that my brother started watching anime and i had basically nothing to talk about, i realized i kinda needed to shore up to this otherwise private side of myself and be less ashamed about what i like or what i do.
2024 has been my most eventful year yet. i went to ANE, i met some amazing people. genuinely, a friend group i could only dream of. i felt very thankful to meet will (scuttlefuzz) in particular, having somebody else just as interested in furry music to wax with. we literally spent an evening just sitting on their bed browsing spotify and sharing links with eachother. definitely didn't imagine that my niche interest for the past 6 years would be shared by someone i'd be talking to in real life! so, yeah! thanks will! 🐑
after i'd headed home, will asked about having me on as a writer for indieAnthro, where we'd review albums and potentially run a podcast. although i don't feel like i've spent that much time dedicated to indieanthro, i'm very happy with where the whole website has gone and the following its' gained.
right now i'm really happy with how furry music is starting to be taken more seriously! not just more music outlets finding furry music and writing about it, but slowly creeping into the subconscious too. no longer is it ride or die; "furry music is either twin fantasy or lapfox", it's becoming a much more vibrant and diverse space of styles.
i mean hey, hope anthony fantano already listened to floral tattoo and this is the glasshouse on his livestreams, it's only a matter of time until some big reviewer really helps put a new furry musician on the map.
