The excitement surrounding the new album by the genre-hopping metal outfit Boris focuses on the new wrinkles the sludgy trio add to their sound. Titled Attention Please, this full-length marks the first time the group’s guitarist Wata will sing lead vocals. Early song “Hope” showcased a very different vibe, one I described as “the closest…
Identity — or, more accurately, confirming identity — has always been a bit of tripping point when it comes to Japanese music. This became an especially tough with the arrival of vaporwave, a micro-genre where artists borrowed heavily from Japan for their aesthetics. This eventually lead to some project boasting a name written entirely in…
The team of Noah and Kidkanevil return as Nemui PJ for a special Halloween treat. “Many Times We Hoped” came out today to celebrate the spookiest day of the year and it sounds…well, not like something you’d associate with Oct. 31 specifically. Rather, it is just a new Nemui PJ song, built around soft chimes…
The title track already had us geeked up, but now the full Make Me Feel EP from Lolica Tonica has arrived, and its even more of a rush than expected. This set — featuring four original songs, and four remixes from the likes of Carpainter and Zekk — is pure energy, a self-contained argument that…
It wasn’t long ago that Boyish were making only feedback-glazed indie-pop, the sort of brittle numbers that proudly wore their bedroom-feel on their sleeves. “Asagao No Hana” sees the project trying out something a touch more refined. This crept into a song released last month too, but it’s on this newest number where they really…
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRhqTO2GODU”] One of the standout blasts of indie-pop from Hideki Kaji And Riddim Saunter’s 2010 team-up…liked around these parts…gets a video. Watch the dudes play around above.
Tokyo’s Ningen OK are a group that demand to be seen live. I lucked my way into seeing them this past weekend, knowing nothing about them, but leaving thinking this duo put on one of the better live sets I’ve seen recently. They play surrounded by what appear to be homemade white pyramids. Guitarist Takurou Yamashita stands in front of a board littered with effects pedals, while Ken-ichi Sakaguchi looms over a drum kit which he soon hammers away at. They play very precise, wordless rock that always seems an inch away from tumbling into chaos, but always manages to hold together. Between songs, Sakaguchi leans towards a Vocoder and creates trippy segues featuring his robo-tized voice. Then they launch off again. It’s captivating stuff.
Their music manages to still sound good away from a live house – “Taion No Yukue” highlights Ningen OK’s precision-centric nature while also introducing elements of chaos (listen to that radio feedback). Listen to that below. It comes off their recently released first album of the same name, which is also probably full of good moments. Still, Ningen OK seem like a live band first, one that you should certainly make time for. Bookmark this page.
The first three songs on For Tracy Hyde’s All About Ivy are lovely indie-pop numbers. They continue the sound the group has been mostly working with over the past year, guitar-pop topped off by vocals sung in Japanese. There are individual elements in each song that jump out as especially impressive – the drumming in…
This one announces itself really well…after a few seconds of pulsating electronics courtesy of Kobe’s Cosmosman, a woman’s voice cheerfully says “Welcome to the future!” And then “Radio Menthol,” the first song off of Ananga Ranga turns into a bouncy cartoon number that seems like it should be soundtracking videos of dancing fire hydrants or…
Man, these four sure have grown in over a year. Back in 2012, they were just another indie-pop band in a very crowded field. Now, they are one of the few to break through and land on a decently known indie label (Second Royal) and their music has gotten tighter and better. They have a…
“Pppppppp-picnicwomen-women-women-women”という強烈なタグの曲。Picnicwomenがジュークにチャレンジし、今年のお気に入りの一つになりました。このプロジェクトの最新EP、Stylusには、 “Ripstick Girl”という曲意外に、同じKool Switch Worksのアーティスト、Ahmad Jackson Jr.の曲も含まれています。”Ripstick Girl”はゆったりとしたギターで始まり、攻撃的なマシンガンのようなビートに、ググっても探すのが不可能に近いマニアックなサンプルが乗っています。その後、曲はテンポが速まり、他の要素が入ってきたりして、複雑になっていきます。Ahmad Jackson Jr.の”Done For You”も面白く、ホーンがや、泡がはじけるような音がふんだんに使われ、ミックスの奥には、J. Dillaがやっていた事で有名なサイレン・サウンドが聴こえます。購入はこちらから。 stylus ep by KOOL SWITCH WORKS
Wow, has it really been two years since this? That was the moment Merpeoples – an up-to-that point good band who had a few solid tracks but seemed like a perpetual “pretty good” outfit – jumped to a new level, showing they were capable of not only turning a lame-as-hell ‘80s cut into something wonderful,…
Tofubeats already has one great album and a handful of well-produced singles for other artists under his belt this year…and, welp, he has another gem now with “Don’t Stop The Music.” Here, the Kobe producer embraces a more laid back structure compared to the often manic tracks on this year’s Lost Decade, letting the music…
