Here is something a bit more slow-burning from Nagoya outfit Pop-Office. They’ve taken their time before, but “Objects” feels especially reflective, featuring guitar melodies that bring to mind…gulp…a ballad. Yet Pop-Office don’t get too sugary, with the vocals still drifting off in the back, obscured by the feedback-dappled guitar. Dramatic, but still featuring the smudges around the corners. Listen above.
The Expo ’70 Commemoration Park in Osaka is probably one of my favorite places in the world to visit. It’s peaceful and pretty and all around a place that puts me in a good mood every time I have had a chance to stop by while in Kansai. Yunovation’s “Roki Store” takes its title from…
Call this coffee house music, except it tries to break your focus from your MacBook Pro. Osaka’s Maokoto Murakami makes an extremely minimal type of dance music, the sort of thing not blasting out of any club I’ve ever walked by in the city. This stuff probably plays better on Sunday morning anyway, Murakami making…
Digital noises shouldn’t sound this alive. Tokyo group Candles resides in the same space occupied by fellow Japanese artists like EeL, Nuxx and √thumm – electronic-swamped outfits not quite as sugary as Perfume, but more than just dancefloor fodder too. They are groups that see both dance music and pop as forms of emotional release,…
東京のプロデューサーTaquwamiは様々な挑戦をしてきました。激しい曲や繊細な曲、サンプル重視の曲や貝殻を耳に当てているような幻想的な曲、Occult Youの活動を除いても、彼の手がけた楽曲は大変バラエティーに富んでいます。新曲”All My Life”ではそんなTaquwamiの得意なサンプリングやエレクトロ・サウンドが輝きつつも、新たな挑戦も随所にちりばめられています。今年リリースされたBlurrywonder EPはR&BをTaquwami流のシンセの渦に巻き込んだようなサウンドだったのですが、今回の”All My Life”はより正統派なR&Bに。曲の前半を埋め尽くしているミニマルなビートはまるでUsherの”Climax”のよう。空気感に影響されてなのか、ボーカルサンプルはいつもよりもつぶやきがちで暗い印象に聴こえてきます。後半ではいつものスタイルが展開されていくのですが、”All My Life”はTaquwamiの新たな一面を確かに確認できる曲になっています。試聴はこちらから。
Electronic artist De De Mouse wowed this year by crossing bright cartoony sounds with drum and bass. Wood Solid Dance Jam apply a similar strategy, but instead of electronic music they drizzle breakbeats over jazzy compositions. If Music Is Rotted one Note instantly came to mind, you know how this goes – WSDJ take a…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oETuy1KsJMM&hl=en_US&fs=1&] It takes some set of balls to name your band after Buddy Holly’s backing group, so The Crickets score points for daring from the get-go. The five-piece sounds very little like Mr. Holly’s bros though. SparkPlugged and Neaux (side tangent: that pairings the J-music blog equivalent of Nash-To-Stoudemire, totally dope) correctly pegged the sound…