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Category Archives: Music

New Kosmo Kat: “L.A.E.”

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We didn’t put together a favorite songs list this year, but if we had, you better believe that iivvyy would have gotten on there. The combo of HVNS and Kosmo Kat made some of the more mind-bending electronic tracks to come out of Japan in 2017. Part of the project’s charm comes from how it finds the right balance between each producer’s style, while also revealing a wonkier dimension from the merger. Kosmo Kat’s latest solo track carries elements of iivvyy in it. “L.A.E.” is a dizzying house number, featuring hiccuping vocal details and an occasional surprise detail (note the strings that just glide through, a weird moment of levity in an otherwise dizzy number) to keep things unpredictable. It lacks the sharpness that HVNS brings, though that works for the song’s advantage, as this still comes off as more Kosmo Kat than iivvyy. Get it here, or listen below.

Make Believe Melodies’ Favorite Japanese Albums 2017: #10 – #01

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#10 Ame To Kanmuri Nou

Welcome to the top ten, where a common thread emerges in the releases Make Believe Melodies loved the most. This year was defined by artists who have been around for a while now hitting the sweet spot of their respective sounds, along with performers who crafted their own little fully-realized worlds to sneak into. Ame To Kanmuri, appropriately, did both. This project revolves around Molm’o’mol, a member of hip-hop-gone-whatever-they-want idol group Koutei Camera Girl, heading into the night to rap over dimly lit beats constructed by a team of producers that includes Osaka trackmakers AVV (And Vice Versa) and Paperkraft. Nou isn’t just a startling introduction to Ame To Kanmuri, it’s one of the most mysterious sounding full-lengths of the year, a snapshot of Tokyo in the loneliest hours of the night narrated by a confident MC. She’s the guide through these sounds, ranging from the acid glow of “hungry” to the lonely “i know,” a song that sounds like one wandering the streets with the echo of a club in their head. While the general sound of Nou sounds novel within the context of 2017 — it’s the fading glory of lo-fi house, with rapping! Though when this inevitably happens in Western pop, I doubt it will work so well. — it’s really the pinnacle of production from Paperkraft and, especially, AVV, who has been exploring this chipped dance style since the INNIT days. And it all comes together perfectly on year-end highlights like “lie night,” as towering in swagger as any other Japanese rap song, but with an added layer of mist surrounding it.

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Make Believe Melodies’ Favorite Japanese Albums 2017: #20 – #11

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#20 Suntra Oblivion Summer Coast

There were plenty of chances to escape to the sea if you followed Japanese music in 2017. Suchmos broke big with their Shonan-inspired smoothness, while slightly more ragged bands such as never young beach and Yogee New Waves laid out what to expect from their names even before hearing their beach-rock-inspired jams. You had to dig a little deeper, though, to find a collection sounding apt for the coastline, but still touching on the resort-inspired breeze of city pop and featuring a very specific kind of summer melancholic. Producer Suntra nailed all of that with Oblivion Summer Coast. It features plenty of laid back moments, from the plinky-plonky stroll of “Palm Avenue” to the strut of “Tokiwa Resort.” And Suntra could just let loose too — the nearly ten-minute-long “Six Nights” is just massive. But sweeping through all of Oblivion Summer were complicated feelings conveyed via simple but affecting melodies, through aching keyboard notes on “Starry Night” down to the skip of “Maboroshi Bayside.” Get it here, or listen below.

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Make Believe Melodies’ Favorite 2017 Japanese Albums: #30 – #21

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#30 She Talks Silence Sorry, I Am Not

She Talks Silence started as a solo project plucking away in the shadows, before becoming a duo moving ever-so-slightly forward, before this year returning once again as just Minami Yamaguchi, somehow taking a bigger step forward but also becoming harder to hear. Sorry, I Am Not is only available digitally, which in theory would make her reflective rock more readily available, but which is still a single lane. Yet this new digital solitude works well with her sound on Sorry, an album where she both refines and mucks up her hushed sound. The title track rushes out on a skittery beat, but her singing remains closer to a whisper. Yamaguchi continues to put her darker spin on indie-pop on bouncy cuts such as “Walk Away” and “Holy Hands, Holy Voices,” yet she’s also crafted an unsettling lullaby of a song on “More Anti-Yourself” and added ample scuzzy feedback to “There’s No.” As long as their is a way in, She Talks Silence’s world will always draw us in.

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Make Believe Melodies’ Favorite 2017 Japanese Albums: #40 – #31

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#40 Parkgolf Reo

Reo found Sapporro-born producer Parkgolf stepping into new territory. Mainly, he tried to bring other voices into his Technicolor world. These new additions revealed previously unseen perspectives on his style — rapper GOODMOODGOKU gets him to craft one of his breeziest beats to date on “All Eyes On You,” while working with Emi Okamoto on “Dance No Aiz” revealed a populist approach for the producer, showing he can lay down something that doesn’t sound too wonky for car radio. Yet he knows to feed the base too, and Reo locks on thanks to power surges like “Silk Curtain” and “Crush On,” his most focused rave-offs yet.

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