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Category Archives: Music @ja

New House Of Tapes: “Warped”

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It took some time, but Nagoya’s House Of Tapes has been starting to push himself into more interesting sonic directions as of late. The project started out as a noisy thing taking conventional dance-music structures and seeing just how heavy he could make his take on floor-filling stuff. This meant a lot of four-on-the-floor beats grinding up against steely synths, all with the volume turned up significantly. Recently, though, House Of Tapes has been moving beyond just pure loudness, and recently uploaded song “Warped” offers the best example of this shift yet. Don’t get it twisted – it’s still LOUD. But there is a lot going on now – noises bounce all over the place, seemingly nothing but a crystaline synth line deep in the mix bolted down to the floor. It is House Of Tapes at his wildest and, at first glance, seems like a total rejection of form altogether. But then he pulls a fast one – “Warped” is his most thought out song to date, as it goes through various sections, from down-low hip-hop beat to barely there interlude. There is plenty of fury along the way, but this is some complex chaos. Listen below.

https://soundcloud.com/house-of-tapes/warped

Bunch Of Artists (Picnic Women, PARKGOLF, Osamu Ansai, Avec Avec) Remix Tofubeat’s Music

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Do you feel that, hanging in the air? As chilly autumn winds start blowing in, so does the specter of year-end lists. Tofubeat’s first full-length album Lost Decade is a lock to land somewhere on Make Believe Melodies’ top albums list, and if you haven’t bought a copy yet, get on that. Maltine Records, who have been upping the Kobe producer for a while now, have assembled a crew of Japanese artists to remix songs from that album, and it is a tight collection all its own.

The reworks here take Tofubeat’s original ideas and take them…in most cases…into radically different directions. Producer Osamu Ansai stretches out the formerly party-ready “All I Wanna Do” into a hazy dream-pop number, turning the TGIF-worthy original into a surprisingly longing affair when surrounded by waves of synths. Though it doesn’t best the original mix (it’s my favorite track from Lost Decade, Okadada’s sped-up take on “Synthesizer” takes it to a more immediate place that will probably make many DJs across the country happy. Same goes for PARKGOLF’s synth-happy interpretation of the already-jittery “I Don’t Care.” Ventla takes the short, squiggly “Touch A” and…extends it into a 12-minute talk show that features, uhhhhhh maybe nothing from the original song, just a guy (Ventla?) talking the whole time. Oh, and Avec Avec flexes his pure-pop muscles on his remix of “No. 1.”

The best moments, though, come from totally off the wall musical reworks. The band OK?NO!!cover the peppy, straight-ahead pop of “So What!” and turn it into a jaunty indie-pop exercise that is a total sonic shift that manages to retain the original’s blissful vibe. Charlot creates a mega-mix of the album, stuffing every song into one ten-minute exercise that is surprisingly coherent for something so gimmicky. And then there is Picnic Women, who teams up with, errr, Justin Bieber for his remix (or just some vocal samples of the dashing Canadian). It sounds less like his usual footwork workouts and more like…jock jams, specifically this. Get the album here.

New Fraqsea: “Sparrow”

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September is offering up a lot of meditative, dreamy music for folks to get blanketed by. The highlight would probably be a resurgent Mazzy Star releasing a new album next week, but fans of hazy music could also turn to artists like Keep Shelly In Athens or Pure Bathing Culture (OK, it came out in August, close enough). Japan has a pair of dreamy albums out this month too – one, Cuushe’s Butterfly Case, will get more attention next week, but for now let’s focus on Fraqsea’s “Sparrow” off her just-released full-length. It’s a cloud, guitar-heavy song clouded by various synths, but no particular sound rising up to demand attention. Fraqsea’s vocals hang just above the whirl of sounds, her words mostly understandeable but at their best when she sings in a higher pitch that makes her sound less clear but more angelic. It’s lovely, albeit simple, shoegazey stuff hiding some nice sonic details. Listen above.

New Taquwami: “Wow” And “Ultra Sad”

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Looks like it isn’t truffle season, but sad season. Whirilng producer Taquwami gets a bit melancholy with his new tracks, packaged together as “Japanese Sad.” All this despite first song “Wow” opening up with a Jay-Z sample. That first new song is actually a bit more upbeat than it leads on, as the vocals pop and even the horn sounds…which are probably the closest thing to being minor key here…pretty sunny. “Ultra Sad” is the better of the numbers, and also more plainly introspective. It is not Taquwami’s usual blast of energy, instead unfolding at a much slower tempo. The vocals are warped, but here they are slowed down and turned into a lament. The horns sounds here, meanwhile, just brush the song. Save for the quickened pace at the end, this is a nice melancholy note from Taquwami. Listen below.

Fancy Idols: Especia And Lyrical School

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We’ve reached the point where idol music – usually an area reserved for AKB48 and Momoiro Clover z – has become really sonically smart. Not always at the top (though sometimes for sure!) but the lower rungs of idol-dom have resulted in some really interesting music. One reason – a lot of young producers are given a shot on major labels producing fledgling idol groups, presumably in an effort to carve out a unique sound for them. Some very talented producers – Fragment, Okadada, more – have been recruited for new idol groups. This week saw two new-ish groups release songs featuring sonic work from really talented producers, and they are some very intriguing J-Pop projects.

First up, Osaka’s Especia. It isn’t totally clear what their schtick is, though a few buzzwords get thrown around – “disco,” “’80s” and (most eye grabbing) “vaperwave” (referring to an Internet-centric genre indebted to ’80s Japanese culture). It’s very trendy labeling, and sorta accurate…the first two fit, while the last one probably could only be applied to the song “XO,” which features a sax just begging to be vapored. The real highlights, though, are the songs bookending their debut EP Midnight Confusion, which are just boogie-worthy bits of city-pop inspired music. The title track is the highlight, a hi-fi dance number that sounds like a more crystal Tokyo Girls’ Style. It is a fantastic pop song with a retrovibe (written by singer SAWA and produced by the talented Schtein&Longer). They even pulled in some great remixers – Tokyo’s Greeen Linez contributes a rework on the album. Listen to the original songs below.

Fellow Osaka unit Lyrical School have been around longer – they used to be known as tengal6, and have been hit or miss, though consistently boasting great producers. They have a new album on the way called Date Course, and the first track from it is a big leap in quality from them. It was produced by Tofubeats, who has been working with them for a while, but here really ups his idol-pop game. Lyrical School are supposed to be a hip-hop-leaning unit, but a lot of their older music has sounded too crowded and cutesy to allow them to stand out. Well, Tofubeats has now crafted an understated beat that is slinky but gives the group plenty of room for the group to do their thing. Listen below.