Dariacore is the first studio album by American artist Jane Remover under the pseudonym Leroy. It was self-released on May 14, 2021. Described as a mashup album, Remover was inspired by Vektroid and SoundClown music. Dariacore created a genre of same name and was considered one of the best albums of 2021 by The Fader. It received two sequels.
Background and composition
Dariacore was a result of Remover "messing around" in the digital audio workstation FL Studio after being inspired by the livestreams of electronic artist Vektroid. She was also inspired by Vektroid's "glitchy" track "Sick & Panic" and SoundClown music. Remover began uploading untitled songs under the pseudonym Leroy, using cover arts taken from the television show Daria. Remover referred to the subgenre's name as "a joke that's been going on for too long."
Dariacore is a mashup album. Jordan Darville of The Fader wrote, "Thanks to its liberal use of frenzied breakbeats, Dariacore could be described as a grandson of drum and bass, with a heart that pumps Frosted Flakes milk." In a Sputnikmusic review, staff member Kirk Bowman said the album "draws from all sorts of sources, like hyperpop, drum and bass, various memes, and so much pop music". The album was self-released on May 14, 2021.
Reception and legacy
In a 4.3/5 review for Sputnikmusic, Kirk Bowman said that "Leroy [...] has proven [her] worth several times this year alone, but for my money, this is [her] high point". He said that "this is the sound of someone who adores music [...] and has enormous talent pairing that with a sense of humor, a short attention span, and, above all, brilliant musicality". Bowman was positive of the album's flow and, even though it contained "crazy ideas", "to one extent or another, all these ideas somehow work. this is the epitome of taking risks and having it pay off." He declared that "Go White Enby Go" could be his favorite song of the year. Dariacore was listed as the 40th best album of 2021 by The Fader staff. Jordan Darville wrote that "perhaps every generation needs a musical Frankenstein, and if that's the case, I'm glad Gen Z has Leroy".
Remover is credited with creating the dariacore microgenre — named after the album itself — which inspired a wave of SoundCloud artists. In a review of her album Frailty released under Jane Remover, Mano Sundaresan wrote to Pitchfork that "[Remover's] defining moment of the year may be inventing a glorious microgenre of shitposty Jersey club mashups called dariacore". With the popularity of the album, she stated: "I guess people just caught on and wanted to join me and that's how it came to be. I like how much fun everyone's having with it. I want to keep it separate from [Jane Remover], but I also don't really have a direction that I want to take Leroy in. I just do whatever I want on there and all the songs just happened to sound the same." Remover released two sequels: Dariacore 2: Enter Here, Hell to the Left (2021) and Dariacore 3... At Least I Think That's What It's Called? (2022).
Track listing
All songs produced by Jane Remover and stylized in all lowercase.