Let’s table the whole “chillwave” debate—whether or not the term actually describes a multitude of wildly varying artists, whether or not it’s indicative of a modern media obsession with branding and labeling everything within earshot, whether it sux or rox or whatever—and take a look at a couple promising chillwave glo-fi hypnagogic pop bands on the rise.

Girls in the Eighties is a pretty clever name. It conjures a whole kaleidoscope of bleary, Jonn-Hughes-on-VHS hallucinations, though the music put out by these Nashville musicians wisely sidesteps blatant nostalgia or lo-fi swampiness. Sure, some elements are muddy, some vocals are gain-soaked, but everything is refreshingly sonically active and the lo-fi elements sound deliberately so. And isn’t “deliberate-ness” the perfect measuring stick for many lo-fi bands? If the shitty fidelity doesn’t actually add anything to the music, then what’s the point?

Girls in the Eighties actually remind me most of The Depreciation Guild or Astrobrite or any other analogous post-millennial nü-gaze acts. There’s a palpable affinity for MBV, The Jesus & Mary Chain, and their many sound-scaping imitators on display, but the songs on GITE’s Teenage Royalty also deal in the well-plied short-and-sweet pop gem/punk banger formula (only one track exceeds five minutes, all but two are under four). Apparently, GITE has seen many failed incarnations but this latest, with its cottony jams sprinkled with laptop beats and chip-tune squawks, sounds like a winner.

The low-down on another emerging chillwave band, Del Rol Le', after the jump.

Del Rol Le’ craft tunes that more ably satisfy (what I assume is) most peoples’ perception of chillwave: everything’s pleasantly washed out, with surf guitar, alfresco samples, and saccharine vocal harmonies gaily coexisting. Some of their songs are more ambient than others (“November”), and others sound like dreamy beach radio broadcasts—the ghosts of forgotten Spector-era pop ditties given new analog flesh. Their “Summer Flocking” features the most glorious use of chimes since “What Would I Want? Sky,” but it’s their unimaginatively-titled “Beach Cassette Jam” that really has me mesmerized. Is that a vocal sample or something they created on their own? Doesn’t really matter, anyway.

Girls in the Eighties have made their Teenage Royalty album available for free online (you can grab it here). You can hear more from De Rol Le’ on their myspace, and download a dope split they’re released with Foxes in Fiction here.