What has long separated Cicada from other slinky outfits creating smooth city-bound music in the 2010s is the little sense of unease they bring to their numbers. Suchmos or Nulbarich are a mix of cool and goofy earnest, but never unnerving, while Lucky Tapes or Never Young Beach tend to just be chill. Cicada, on songs such as newest creation “Furete Hoshii,” have weaved in little details that throw the laid-back vibe off. Here, it’s those pitch-shifted voices and the way the melody slightly skips over itself. Or how everything crawls to a syrupy stroll late. Experimental explosions this ain’t — Cicada probably still wants in on this boom while it lasts, and this has plenty of bounce too it (plus, those sticky vocals) — but I think their origins in Japan’s electronic (or at least netlabel-adjacent) community color songs like this, and make it far more intriguing than most. Listen above.
