Look, I’m watching the second half of this Japan-Colombia World Cup game and it is stupid stressful, here is a new song from Osaka’s Soleil Soleil, it’s good. Back to sitting all scrunched up like seeing if Japan can score two goals….
Covering an electronic dance track as a rock band? Risky on a whole bunch of levels. Covering THE electronic dance track of the Oughts as a rock band? Yikes. Yet somehow, Throwcurve have managed to take Daft Punk’s triumphant “One More Time” and give a very inspired take on it. A large chunk of the…
London-based electronic artist bo en is no stranger to working with Japanese artists. On previous releases, he’s teamed up with Avec Avec and mus.hiba, while he’s produced numbers for J-Pop acts such as Yun*Chi. Now he’s teamed up with Akio, the primary vocalist in Sugar’s Campaign, for a short but extremely cheery set of pop….
This past summer, I watched Sakanaction play to a packed baseball stadium just outside of Tokyo, going on before Radiohead at one of Japan’s biggest music festivals. It’s not like I needed confirmation that Sakanaction are a big rock outfit in their home country — I’d already heard their songs countless times on TV, or…
The sweltering heart of summer has arrived in Japan, unless you live up in Hokkaido, where the temperatures are far more manageable and the next two months probably feel wonderful. Sapporo producer Buddhahouse’s new release via Sabacan Records, Summer Breeze, captures the more relaxed feeling of the season on the northern-most island. The title track…
Do you like Alicia Keys? Do you like Alicia Keys pushed to the extreme edges? She’s made a handful of really great music all her own too, but there have also been some fantastic remixes of her songs. Now, here comes up-and-coming Osaka-based producer Metome taking Keys’ “If I Ain’t Got You” and turned it…
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVWSbW7xz7s”] Being an alternative-rock band probably isn’t an easy life. They usually don’t receive the big budgets most mainstream J-Pop acts get, but they often still have enough commercial ties where they can’t run into the wilderness and really cut loose. Standing out in a very crowded field, then, becomes difficult, and a lot of…