TOYOMU got all the attention for his imagined take on Kanye, but the young producer also co-runs a party / label out of his hometown of Kyoto called Qauntizer Kyoto, giving space for similarly cosmic-tripping producers in the Kansai region. Quantizer Sampler 2 is, fittingly, a great gateway to a collective taking the Brainfeeder-inspired deep-space…
Memories on memories, really: bedroom producer / suburban nostalgia dealer i-fls’ latest release takes songs from two 2013 releases (Wished Nightmare and Decade In A Day, both now deleted) and finds the reclusive producer reworking them and adding a few new elements into them. ” I had distrust to degree of perfection for this two…
Remember when the “city pop revival” was the premier wave of nostalgia running through Japanese music? For those who are a little exhausted by what came next — an intense rash of “oh man, the ’90s!” speared by SMAP, Hikaru Utada and the crushing march of time — we have a new three-song set from…
The march towards Yoshino Yoshikawa’s new album continues with the second single from Event Horizon “Opt-Out.” It highlights some of the themes running throughout the album, primarily one of trepidation about sweeping technological changes (“I don’t want to be part of the big data” being a highlight). As much as the words wrestle with one…
Always open to more squiggly electro-pop units entering the Japanese indie music fray, and thankfully the Tokyo duo Kamisama Club bring their best with the bouncy “Onegai Temple.” The pair craft a fidgety backdrop — one that opens quite serenely, with chimes and a few electronic warbles, but soon bursts into a synth-charged skip featuring…