One of the weirder things to happen…or, more appropriately, not happen…in the realm of Japanese music is the near lack of music relating to the 3/11 earthquake and tsunami or the Fukushima nuclear incident following it (and still going as strong as ever). I’m not talking about outright political songs addressing the government or TEPCO or whoever the hell…those exist, and like most protest songs, they feel of a hyperspecific moment that might have been compelling at the time but just doesn’t resonate the same in 2013. I’m also not talking about the whole “No Nukes’ music festival thing…that’s activism using bands as a way to spread a message mostly independent from the music itself (with exceptions…which then circles back to protest songs). Nope, I’m talking about how life has felt post-3/11, and how everything that has happened in the aftermath of those events has dramatically changed the shape of Japan (beyond the obvious…think also the jacking of post-disaster national unity into an unsettling nationalism, a shift to the right coupled with further apathy from young Japanese that has allowed the likes of Shinzo Abe to get power…again). A few acts have stumbled into the disorienting vibe of post-disaster Japan…Miila And The Geeks, Neon Cloud…but a scant amount try to tackle it directly.
I get that mainstream artists signed to big labels aren’t going to do that…but what about the under-the-radar scene? Do they not have opinions on anything going on? Have they not been impacted by any of it? What do they have to lose?
One of the most prominent…and best…albums shaped by 3/11 was last years New Epoch by dance music producer Goth-Trad. That collection of old-school dubstep was made in the aftermath of Fukushima, and a paranoia runs through that album that mirrored the anxiety of getting daily updates about the nuclear power plant and not knowing what the fuck was going on. Far less seen were a series of albums by juke/footwork producer CRZKNY. Some were hyper-direct commentaries on the nuclear situation in Japan, while the rest pulled off the same uneasy tension Goth-Trad had. Now, the Hiroshima native (and that’s some REALLY important context) has a new collection…his best collection yet, in fact…called Nuclear/Atomic, that once again doesn’t shy away from the weirdness of life after 3/11.
Again, it’s important to stress this isn’t protest music, the only direct messages possibly within the warped voices peering behind the corners of the music. Yet I have no idea what any of those vocals are trying to say, and that seems intentional – they are the most obvious signifier of sonic disruption, these scary sounding voices breaking through electronic dance songs. The entirety of Nuclear/Atomic is marked by moments like this, of one sound clashing with another, of the discombobulated beat of “Electric Weapon” suddenly crashing into angelic synths that could have come from a Metal Gear game. There is a lot of light vs. dark going on here…see “Swagger,” “Digital Nation Sound,” “Hunter” for good examples…and it’s also CRZKNY’s tightest album yet, the energetic sloppiness of early releases patched up, making for something that sounds great while still seeming like it could fall apart in a second. Get it here, or listen below.