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Pep In Your Step: Hirihiri’s “Hirahira”

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A big theme we return to around these parts is how welcome energy can be in music — even if an artist isn’t really imprinting anything new onto a style, sometimes a really fast tempo is all that is needed to get us perked up and enjoying it. Producer Hirihiri’s first album Hirahira isn’t quite that. They add in a lot of great personal touches to these “future bass” songs that elevates it beyond simpler sugared-up imitation. Check the guitar lines and Speak N Spell voice serving as a main vocal on the playful “You Know How To Spell,” which imagines what SoundCloud Shibuya-kei could sound like. Or the softer passages of “Va11halla,” which quickly give way to squeaky stretches of noise upping the drama up. Or check the funky bounce of the closer “Long Gone,” even if the Birdman sample should have been ditched (though, still! An example of personality). Plenty of character here, but even the numbers that sound like well-worn territory deliver the right blast of energy to get you going. Get it here, or listen below.

New Taquwaim: “Bye”

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Last year’s month of new Taquwami everyday felt like a challenge at the time, but one that had the faithful (me, for sure) ready to commit to hear unreleased material from one of the decade’s very best. The recent effort to wrangle all those tracks together — aptly titled 31 — not only makes for a good argument in favor of albums as a way of self-containing an artist’s output, but reveals the depth of each track by giving listeners the chance to actually compare them right away (well, more conveniently at least). It also results in two bonus cuts getting added on, which is always a good thing. “Bye” is great bait to get folks snapping up this physical offering. It’s a short number that works well as a coda to 31 as a whole, finding Taquwami building tension before letting skittery percussion and playful keyboard notes scamper over it. After some bursts in the middle, it closes out with piano and what sounds like clinked glass. A wide range of textures and feelings in just over two minutes. Listen above.

Ryuichi Sakamoto Teams Up With U-zhaan, TamakiRoy And Chinza Dopeness For “Energy Flo”

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I mean…why shouldn’t this exist? Why not!?

So Ryuichi Sakamoto has teamed up with two rappers and a guy who mostly plays Indian instruments to create a new song. Given the current clout Sakamoto has in all musical circles, this is kind of a surprising choice. But then again…it is Sakamoto, so it also feels kind of fitting that he’s collabing with this motley crew. For whatever reason, it also results in an interesting number, one willing to let the edges blur in the pursuit of something wonky. Compare “Energy Flo” to the number the trio minus Sakamoto put out earlier this year. That one is a bit more straightforward, and way more referential to what it is doing and trying to crack jokes about it at the same time (rappers over something that sounds vaguely Indian…bad news guys, Madlib already did this!). Maybe because a Yellow Magic Orchestra guy is hovering over this, the trio get a lot more adventerous on “Energy Flo,” letting words hover and piano notes just kind of zone out. I feel like Sakamoto gave them permission to get weird, and they showed what was possible once given the green light. Listen above.

Brain Drain: Koji Seto’s “Since Wave”

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In general, YouTubers venturing into music has been a disaster. Nothing worse than an influencer treating art as another way to build their brand, but here we are in 2019! But that doesn’t mean a YouTuber can’t hit when they do release a song. Koji Seto mostly makes videos like this, or this, or uhhhhhh this. But he’s also dabbled in a lot of music creation on the channel, and in a recent upload Seto goes in to how he made his own synthwave song. And “Since Wave” actually holds up as a snackable bit of synth-pop. Simple for sure, but the gentle bounce and synth melody would fit in nicely among the dreamy reflections of Local Visions or the more playful Juscotech defined by artists like Boogie Idol. And it’s far better than a lot of the Liam-Wong-core retro stuff coming from people who watched Blade Runner once and fired up Garageband. This has bounce. Listen above.

New (Kinda) Blackbass With Ryuei Kotoge: “Unfair”

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The surest way to give your project a musical boost is get a great under-the-radar producer helping out with the music. Blackbass call on Kansai producer and INNIT-adjacent creator Ryuei Kotoge to help construct the sparse “Unfair.” This one came out on an EP released earlier this year, but now gets a video, and it is worth digging in a bit deeper. Like that FNCY song from yesterday, the chilly music helps to have the actual vocals of Blackbass — digitally manipulated as they are — to come through a bit more clearly. But this one also offers more tension, the stiffer beat colliding with the ice-like keyboard notes just right to create something with a very lonely vibe. Listen above.