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Do-It-Yourself Anthem: Pelican’s Furomu Japan Pt. 1

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EDM gets tagged as this big decadent, corporate thing, but it can be assembled relatively easily, which was part of the charm early on in that industry’s rise. Pelican reminds of how something most likely made in a bedroom can still carry the same energy. “Furomu Japan” (“From Japan”) is pure energy, starting with some rap-sing declarations (“it’s ok, we are all human baby!”) before building up to a drop. Simple, but effective, and bringing a lot of force through. They round it out with a rework in a style kind of like Dimitri From Paris. Get it here, or listen below.

New CRZKNY: Spit The Album

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The newest album from Hiroshima artist CRZKNY will see all of its proceeds go towards emergency disaster support in the wake of the severe storms, flooding and landslides that have been happening in Western Japan over the last week. Beyond being for a good cause, Spit The Album also stands as a highlight from CRZKNY this year. Flashes of his earlier attempt at gabber shine through — see the late synth stabs on “Burn,” or even the acid touches on “Luxuary” — the bulk of this release focuses on his bread and butter juke. “Into Piece” skitters forwards, made unsettling by some wispy vocal samples and electronic spikes, while “Memories” plays around with a start-stop format to create a trippy little track. Get it here, or listen below.

Beef Fantasy Remixes Pasocom Music Club’s “Inner Blue”

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First, because this blog doesn’t really do album reviews — especially of releases that require either a physical purchase or access to streaming (a whole different pitfall regarding coverage, but I digress) — let’s set the stage by showering Pasocom Music Club with more praise. Their debut full-length Dream Walk came out at the end of June, and it’s a stunner. Building on last year’s nostalgia-with-a-distance releases, Dream Walk finds a middle ground between sleek Jusco dance-pop and fuzzy city pop memory, with the group pointing their sound towards legit mainstream attention. “Virtual TV” is a bop spit out by a Windows 95 operating system, while “OLDNEWTOWN” nods to the 2000s era of netlabel music while also constructing a groove that stands on its own in 2018 (and has, somehow, crashed the Spotify Japan Viral 50). They bring delirious iMac rave offs (“Waterfront”) and sentimental pop that should get them J-pop writing gigs if anyone has any sense (“Inner Blue”). Almost certainly a top-five lock, personally.

One of the few artists who could rework a song on Dream Walk and make it their own is Beef Fantasy. Maybe it’s returning the favor for their remix of his “Virtua Beach,” or maybe interviewing them charmed him enough to remix “Inner Blue.” Whatever the case, Beef Fantasy’s take on the song injects some funk into the one moment on Dream Walk where Pasocom show some human restraint. Just listen to those big, gloopy bass notes and how the beat gets shifted around to turn this into a song that struts rather than strolls. The human center remains, but now it moves a little looser. Listen above.

New Snail’s House: L’été

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Music has been pushed to the background more than ever in 2018. It isn’t a new development exactly, but generally speaking songs often get treated like wallpaper. See mood-centered playlists on streaming services, or how contemporary soundtracks to YouTube influencer videos sound, or the seamlessness between commercials and original works. Changing times, but as it continually feels like music is nudged further into the back, the more I’ve come to appreciate the growth Snail’s House (or Ujico, another project by the same person) has shown over the last couple of years. Initial releases from the project were firmly in the “kawaii” camp, and could feel a few bass whirrs removed from slotting nicely into a looped livestream that you could potentially do homework to. Yet something evident in their work is a desire to build up and explore new territory with their sound, rather than settle for something that has proven quite lucrative on Bandcamp (and lord, just poke your head into various niche-genre communities online…a lot of people are coasting!).

L’été features nearly no words but overflows with so much attention to detail that simply playing it as background music seems like it would be tough. Snail’s House has built on the piano-based foundation of previous releases and swirled in new touches — “[vivid green]” plays around with the idea of samples interrupting the melody, but rather than crash like in future bass they add charming detail via railroad crossing chimes and breath-long pauses. No sample goes to waste in “Himitsukichi,” every one playing a role in the song itself, while “[sunflower]” uses small shifts in sound and violin surges to create an endearing song in an intimate package. Snail’s House even weaves in something like “Platonique,” a rumbling number closer to toe than other anime-favoring producers in his realm. L’été shows how much is possible in a sonic palette often used as a backdrop, and is another step forward for Snail’s House. Get it here, or listen below.

New Elen Never Sleeps: Flowers For Hesse

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There comes a painful moment where you realize you are only getting older, and all the things that you love lost to time are not necessarily going to carry over to future listeners. For me, that has mostly centered around this period in Japanese indie music — let’s say 2011 to like 2013, maybe 2014 — that produced a community that appeared ready to morph into something even greater. CUZ ME PAIN, Hotel Mexico, Moscow Club — it wasn’t centered in any one place, but found a sweet spot between Shibuya after dark and SoundCloud. But it has faded away, like all moments do, and feels destined to slip away. It was great when it was happening, and I love to revisit…but you can’t expect others outside of it to come to it the same way.

Elen Never Sleeps belonged to this community, and created dreamy indie-pop wit an intimate breath-on-neck quality to it. Just listen to the Silver EP, clouded by melancholy and uncertainty (“I tried to find a job” being a particularly stinging line). That project went into hibernation, but in one of those welcome surprises has returned in 2018 with Flowers For Hesse, a full-length album that easily could have slid in to that golden period. A lot like Moscow Club’s triumphant Outfit Of The Day, it tickles all that longing for this music community in a listener like me. And like that album, it isn’t a pure nostalgia trip, but testament to what made the project so good in the first place.

Elen Never Sleeps lets the emotion come through pretty clearly across this album, with the title track setting the stage with plenty of space for melancholy vocals delivered unabashedly…when he wants to sell the emotion, those words get stretched out. Songs across Hesse unfold at mid-tempo, with plenty of space for the words to shoot high, all while maintaining an air of closeness (see the head-down-walk of “Anna from Heaven,” or the more aggressive posture of “A Faded Beauty,” which goes from a stomp to vulnerability quickly). “Haunted Darling” picks up the pace for the most throwback sound here, while Elen Never Sleeps flexes some new tricks that show this isn’t simple dipping into the past, such as the slow-stroll pace of “Violet Jazz” and highlight “Paradise Lost,” featuring pleasant flute-style notes and good use of sampled voices. At one point on the album, Elen Never Sleeps sings “nothing ever lasts forever,” and he’s right. But Hesse reminds that it doesn’t have to just go away, either. Get it here, or listen below.