Acoustic drum EP by i-fls My life has become much more mundane since i-fls released his last collection, December 2014’s Inverted Waves. “Mundane” sounds bad, but really it has been a net boom for me — life is less chaotic, I get to stay home more and I get to enjoy the small details of…
Let’s just lay this one out in text first — combining Avex artists FAKY, Yup’in and FEMM into one special unit should result in something totally average given the pedigree of the individual acts involved. FAKY and Yup’in have had their moments, but overall neither artist is the sort you get worked up about in…
Simplicity wins for Nagoya’s The Vegetablets. That’s how it tends to go with indie-pop of all stripes, Japan-based or otherwise, but with this duo the lets-make-some-music! vibes just come across more clearly, as their songs are both simplistic but deeply charming. 3 follows an album from last year that got The Vegetablets some international glances,…
This bubbly beat comes courtesy of Tokyo’s Yuichi Nagao, and it is a nice bleep-blooper full of bouncy details (the way those synths intersect with one another! how hopeful this sounds!) and just a fun little groover. Listen below.
Zushi outfit Half Mile Beach Club has always let a certain darkness creep into their music — distorted vocals turned a tropical breezer like “Yankee” into something alien, while numbers like the still-spell-binding “Twilight” sounded lonely thanks to a late-fall-at-a-resort feel. “Bee Line” finds them getting a bit more direct with their grittiness. It opens…
Moscow Club posted a new EP onto their website tonight, and you can download it for free right now. 909 State features the instrumental “Pacific 724” and the lovely little ditty “Ghost Dance.” Check it out now! [bandcamp album=1203472100 bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=venti] UPDATE: And they also have a new video for “Pacific 724” that is…
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.
Lots and lots to love today…so lets dive into all of it. Way better than chocolate, yeah? The biggest news of the day comes courtesy of Flau, who’ve released the follow up to mysterious outfit Neon Cloud’s stunning debut Knit. Scar finds the group…and it is becoming more and more clear Cuushe is involved somehow…
Geez, man, I don’t even know, ya know? I tweeted out something about Dempagumi.inc being the most based idol-pop group in Japan right now…a group whose background (or gimmick) is that the members all are former/still sorta are otaku, one of the more loathed sub cultures in Japan today. One of them, Moga, used to…
Cloudy Busey “Who Says They Love You” Osaka’s Cloudy Busey started the year with the long, lonely walk home anthem “Up To You (If You Love Me)” and later released “Have U Ever,” which he said would be perfect for Justin Bieber. Between those two, the Ice Cream Shout frontman who also records under the…
Osaka’s Hideo Nakasako has let some time pass since last year’s great Time Passes album, but he’s posted a three-song EP to SoundCloud that makes all the months that came before it worth it. The highlight is the opening track “Groove Me,” which opens with sea-sick synths reminiscent of what Tokyo’s mus.hiba deals with on…
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…
