宅録ミュージシャンのトクマルシューゴが、2010年の作品”Port Entropy”に続くシングル、”Decorate”をリリースしました。今までの楽しいおもちゃ箱のような曲以上を望んでいる人にとっては期待はずれかもしれませんね。今回も、遊び心に満ちた曲に仕上がっています。ベル、木管楽器とアコースティックギターが曲の多くを占め、目覚まし時計のような茶目っ気のある音も面白いです。彼のスタイルは全く損なわれていないです。視聴は上から。シングルを購入すれば、トクマルシューゴによる、かつてMTVで大ヒットしたバグルスの、”ラジオ・スターの悲劇”のカバーも聴けます。シングルカットがどうなっているかは知りませんが、ライブバージョンは以下から視聴できます。
I spent two years living in Mie Prefecture, a stretch of land nestled between Osaka and Nagoya that was part mountainous and part coastal. Caught in the middle of those topographies, sits Matsusaka. It is as suburban-rural as it gets in a place where both those terms are flexed to the maximum – it’s a…
We got to get Bandcamp to have a wider selection of tags, because Fukuoka producer Shigge tagged his new album as “hip hop,” “instrumental” and “beats.” Those aren’t inherently bad things…most of the time, they are amazing!…it’s just that the Japanese music scene has become so over-saturated by these beat albums that I’ve gotten into…
This is, as the project’s name implies, a pop song. It just happens to be captured through a very damaged prism, all the catchiness of “I Die In Tomorrow” turned sinister and unsettling, a bad dream rendered into a just-under-two-and-a-half-minute track. The beat is jagged and the vocals are blurred out, the actual words nearly…
At their best, The Paellas…especially the lead singer…sound like they are in the same room as you as their music unfolds. The bulk of their material up to this point has sounded like the work of a doomed lounge band, the group’s words muffled by fuzzy recording. Everything is a little more clear on new…
Memories are imperfect things. That’s something home-recording artist i-fls understands so well, especially on his latest collection Diary Of Spectre. We like to treat nostalgia as something warm, something that gets stirred up in us and reminds us of simpler times. Yet that’s just the stuff of movies – nostalgia, once treated as a disease,…
Kindan No Tasuketsu has a new album out this month, and although our interest was peaked from the announcement alone, it is now even higher thanks to “Tonight, Tonight.” Nothing at all like The Smashing Pumpkins’ song, this is a throbbing bit of electro-pop, unreletning save for a very very brief break late in the…
Bedroom-whizz Shugo Tokumaru has released his first glimpse of the follow-up to 2010’s Port Entropy in the form of new single “Decorate.” For those expecting his whimsical, toy-instrument heavy music to morph into something new by now, prepare to be let down because “Decorate” is another solid example of his playroom pop. Tokumaru’s usual assortment of bells, woodwinds and acoustic guitar dominates this song, and at one point he even works in the sound of an alarm clock ringing off. Also intact – the same sense of wonder the majority of Tokumaru’s tracks possess. Listen above. You can buy the single in stores now, and if you do, you also will get the chance to hear Tokumaru’s take on The Buggles’ MTV-launching “Video Killed The Radio Star.” I don’t know what the single version sounds like, but watch Shugo deliver a cutesy live cover below.
It’s year-end season, and I think one of the major trends that is going to get glossed over in lists and thinkpieces is how nostalgic everything felt this year. It’s unavoidable in Japan, where the biggest artist of the year was Namie Amuro and the biggest song resurrected Eurobeat. But it’s also playing out elsewhere…
I’m always ready for something really heavy when Trekkie Trax come along with a new release, but this split between Amunoa and In The Blue Shirt isn’t quite as bone rattling as expected. And, given my current state (exhausted), it is very welcome. Amunoa’s half, “Lil’ Lady Luck,” is slightly more surprising, since I’m used…
This is as jaunty as DYGL have ever sounded, to an almost unsettling degree, though peel it back a little and a bit more roughness comes through. DYGL move ahead on a hoppy melody, highlighted by some nifty turn-of-the-2000s guitar work and a beat built for a get down. And those handclaps, so jolly! It’s…
The little I’ve read about OMODAKA seems to emphasize how great the artist’s videos are. Very true, but I hope the music isn’t getting shortchanged by this praise for the visual side. What I’ve heard from OMODAKA (mostly from this MySpace page) offers an interesting take on pop music. Though bathing a pop song in…
Long-running electro-pop artist SAWA is back, having just released a new mini-album and now sharing the song “Oboroge Dancing” from it. It’s an up-tempo track featuring shimmering details and an EDM-era breakdown, one that slides in nicely with the song as a whole (considering how much festival-ready stuff is influenced by electro-pop, it makes sense)….
I’ve never really pictured the music Elen Never Sleeps records as being “sad,” the stuff meant to be looped in the background as someone cries into a pillow in their room. His use of space and reverb certainly sound downtrodden, but the Tokyo artist’s voice always seemed much more than simple sad sackery. In terms…