タイムマシーンに乗って２００９年の秋に戻りましょう。私は日本に来てまだ数ヶ月。大阪の郊外に住み、たまに好奇心から、誰が演奏してるのかもわからずライブを観に行っています…退屈なバンドも色々観てきましたが、そんな経験からCubismo Grafico FiveやLove And Hates(後にHNCとMiila And The Geeksを知るきっかけになりました！)等、素晴らしいアーティストを体験する事ができました。そんな中でもWednesdayはかなり早い段階で観る機会に恵まれたのですが、そのギター中心な楽曲と、時折レトロなロックに完全に夢中に。次の年にリリースされたアルバムは凄く堪能していたのですが…それからWednesdayは何処へ？
Let’s step into the way-back machine and travel back to the autumn of 2009. I’ve been living in Japan for only a few months, out in the countryside outside of Osaka. Sometimes, for kicks, I’d just go to shows in the city randomly without knowing anything about the group’s playing. Although this resulted in seeing a fair share of bad outfits, it also resulted in me stumbling across the like of Cubismo Grafico Five, Love And Hates (which led to HNC and Miila And The Geeks) and many more. Wednesday were at one of the first shows I ever saw in person in Osaka, and I was won over by their guitar-centric, sometimes retro-leaning brand of rock. They released an album the next year and I really enjoyed it…and then they sort of just went away.
Turns out they released a new EP at the very end of last year, and the above song is the single from it. “Mr. Free” finds the band exploring the same jaunty territory they were traversing back in 2009, although this one starts slow and then barrels ahead as things progress. Structurally, it’s far more patient than most of their older stuff, which found a catchy idea and ran with it. What’s surprising about Wednesday in 2013 is how they sound like a group who could, conceivably, be lumped into Japan’s indie-pop boom – only their relatively crisp sound quality really makes me think twice. Regardless, nice to see these guys still kicking around. Listen above.
Sorta surprising that Tokyo producer mus.hiba ended up being one of the dudes from this metropolis to score a surprising amount of international collabs. It isn’t that his music is all that weird, just that it makes use of a technology you more or less never see pop up in Western songs – Vocaloid, specifically…
A lot of good stuff came out over the past few days – let’s do a quick round-up of the finest new tracks from across Japan. – Kyoto’s Eadonmm just keeps on creeping on. His latest song is called “If You Melted,” and it gets more sinister from there. It is a rumbling, skeletal song…
Flau Records has released a new, surreal video for dream-pop artist Cuushe’s “I Love You,” which you can watch above. It is a nearly four-and-a-half-minute jumble of lips, diamonds, spaghetti and much more. It is also a great opportunity to listen to the song once again, off of Cuushe’s Butterfly Case album (which I reviewed…
SHoegaze often gets saddled with negative connotations – “my god, it’s full of stars,” one music critic mocked on Twitter when My Bloody Valentine’s MBV dropped earlier this year, with plenty of others calling the group (who stand in for shoegaze) nerd music or weed music, neither of which were meant in a positive context….
So much stuff came out while we were on vacation, we’ve decided to just do a quick catch-up post highlighting some of the best stuff that appeared. Away we go! Jesse Ruins’ side-project Cold Name dropped two new cuts late last week, and they continue fleshing out Cold Name’s unsettling sound. “Intent To Kill” and…
Here’s pop reduced to some very, very basic elements. Osaka’s OBUTSUDAN-SUMINO constructs something that’s both aching and catchy using a lot of space – the bulk of “Kaerou” is just him singing over a barely-there beat and some chilly synth splashes. At times the song whirrs and whoozes, but the bulk here is about space….