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New Bruno Uesugi: Deep Space

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Producer Bruno Uesugi recently spent significant time in the hospital for intensive care. Uesugi appears to be doing a bit better, and he just released a two-song set titled Deep Space. The opener kicks things off and reminds of what separated Uesugi from other high-energy producers operating around the greater Tokyo area —- “Galactic Disco Ball” matches rubbery house elements alongside snipped vocal samples and elements of baile funk. It doesn’t get quite as roughneck as older work from the artist, but this is the combo he works so well with. Better still, though, is “Somewhere Far (Deep Space),” which stretches out a bit more. Those baile shouts pop up, but they are set against a zero-gravity backdrop closer to Carpainter gone across the Pacific than anything else. Get it here, or listen below.

New Amps: “Onflow”

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Amps strikes just the right balance between refined and energetic on new track “Onflow.” A lot of the latter just comes from the sounds they opt to construct the song out of — “Onflow” features a light jazzy skip to it, provided by piano jaunts, horn blurts and drum shifts. Yet this never turns into a lounge soundtrack, as Amps peppers the song with handclaps and always keeps the pace of the song zipping ahead. There’s a lot going on, but that never ends up sucking the energy away. Listen above, or get it here.

New Satellite Young: “Singing Dream”

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Lyrical cleverness has always been the element of trio Satellite Young’s music separating them from similarly “retro new-wave” artists. Anyone can pen some overly dramatic lyrics and set it against synthesizer melodies before slapping some Blade Runner imagery over it. But Satellite Young ultimately focus on the now through a throwback lens, or at last think of something more clever than half-baked William Gibson-isms. “Singing Dream’s” main idea is…what if a karaoke machine had heart an autonomy? Boom, ya got my attention. The music, meanwhile, moves in a more shadowy direction than most of the group’s previous works. Compared to the outright bubbly joy of “Modern Romance,” “Singing Dream” uses similar sounds to construct something more cautious, holding a little bit back, especially come the chorus, which avoids full-on release in favor of something a bit more measured. While I’m always going to personally go for the pure pop hooks dotting their debut last year and which is “Modern Romance’s” DNA, this one shows a new side to them, one capable of tension alongside their clever perspective on nostalgia and modern technology. Get it here, or listen above.

New Half Mile Beach Club: “Blue Moon”

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It has been an exceptionally strong week for new Japanese music, and one of our recommendations would be Half Mile Beach Club’s Hasta La Vista, which takes the laid-back funk stylings that I think you could fairly call a contemporary Kanagawa sound (hey, Suchmos get to do NHK’s soccer theme song this year!) and takes it to an alien place, loaded up with Auto-tune dabs and backtracking. It’s a weird and wonderful interpretation of urban chilling, and joins Paellas’ recent body of work in offering a counter to the totally laid back. “Blue Moon” features one of the more outright rock-centric passages on the album, featuring tumbling percussion and electric guitar. But then the strange touches appear, such as the warped vocals or the spoken word bits. Listen above.

New Kosmo Kat: Rose

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Kosmo Kat didn’t vanish, exactly — the Tokyo-based electronic artist collaborated with fellow producer HVNS as iivvyy, resulting in some really fantastic music — but output from their main project certainly slowed over the last year. Rose serves as a fresh start. “Releasing these finally to start a new page,” Kosmo Kat writes, and Rose finds a balance between the bubbly electro-pop of earlier releases and the wonkier techno hinted at via iivvyy. Opener “Pink” and “Jus P Frens” use finely sliced vocal samples to create dizzy tracks that get a cartoon boost from the synths around them, maybe a bit less bouncy than the pop-inspired cuts of past Kosmo Kat EPs, but not far off. Then you have the previously shared “LAE” and the marshy “Lover 420” featuring Yeule, which push Kosmo Kat’s sound into something more dramatic (while still working in loopy twists and turns, along with big-screen ’80s beats). Excited to see where Kosmo Kat goes next, but Rose shows whichever direction will be a blast. Get it here, or listen below.