Make Believe Mailer Vol. 38: Tik Tok Around The Clock
Koda Kumi's last decade hasn't been all that memorable. The J-pop performer hasn't totally flopped in the years after she said women over the age of 35 had "rotten" fluid in their wombs, with most of her albums hitting the top spot of Oricon and her 2012 single "Go To The Top" doing just that on the singles side (the first EDM pop song to do so in Japan). But those chart-topping albums moved slivers compared to her Aughts work, and her singles since have been duds. She made a cheesy video that looked like DA PUMP's "U.S.A." half a year before them, but she couldn't even get the "cool dasai" treatment.
Yet over the last couple of weeks, she's seen her name surge back into digital and YouTube charts. But it isn't a new number giving her a new look, but rather a cover of a song done by some blackface doofs in the '80s. It came out in 2010, but i has found new life — and new media attention — thanks to a generation of Japanese teens glued to their smartphone screens doing dances to a nightcored-version of the tune.
Few platforms carry as much sway in Japanese music circa 2018 as Tik Tok. It's a video network similar to Vine or MixChannel, but with more of a focus on music (or, at least, audio). Most people in the Western world might know it for being where the Chinese "Karma Is A Bitch" meme originated earlier this year. The China-born app also happens to be the most downloaded offering in the App Store so far this year, having made massive inroads across Asia. It's really taken hold in Japan since late last year, but the recent boost it has given Koda Kumi really shows its potential in the music market.
This proposition isn't new in a global context — Vine broke songs or at least served as a testing ground during its initial days, while Japan's own MixChannel played a pivotal role in helping artists like TWICE become mainstays in J-pop. But both of those platforms offered plenty beyond audio content, with Vine fostering all sorts of comedy (and, unfortunately, personalties) while MixChannel thrives on couples just as much as synchronized dancing. Tik Tok, though, leans totally on sound, whether samples dialogue from movies or Japanese comedians...or from songs (which...given how skittish Japanese music labels can get around the internet, it's funny that they embraced things like Tik Tok, allowing 10-second-long snippets of music for use because...well, that's as short version as you can get, I suppose).
I've stressed in this newsletter the total fragmentation of Japanese mainstream music in 2018, and Tik Tok offers a fantastic snapshot of this. It's more about background noise and meme-ry than anything else, which feels fitting for the last five years...but also feels like a millenial (errr, Generation Z? Both?) update on 2000-era ringtones, which were basically 10-second-long expressions of individuality (minus the hand movements...I assume). Technology, it is always marching on and changing everything in its path.
What makes Tik Tok most interesting to me is the pure unpredictability of what Japanese teens end up gravitating to. Some of it is expected -- K-pop absolutely shines on Tik Tok, which should be expected since that is the sound of junior and senior high schools across the country. But then you go through compilations like this and just...what are these Wave Racer demo files and Country Bear wink numbers? A lets-all-hold-hands-now playroom sleeper from 2013 performed by a child is now inescapable across the continent. And then comes a mostly forgotten Koda Kumi cover from almost a decade ago — now one of 2018's most surprising stories.
News And Views
Put a bunch of names in a box, and if Sekai No Owari and Epik High came out together, I would have shook my head a lot. But here we are, with a collab song!
That Hey! Say! JUMP guy is, indeed, going to New York to study.
Oricon Trail For The Week Of June 18, 2018 To June 24, 2018
Mag!c Prince is a reminder that 1.) Johnny's & Associates does not have a chokehold on the male idol market in Japan, and that plenty of agencies can put together popular groups of dudes delivering forgettable pop and 2.) exclamation points can go wherever they damn well please.
Perfume's GAME (33 1/3)
My entry in the 33 1/3 Japan series is out now! Get a copy at Bloomsbury or Amazon. Or at Kinokuniya bookstores in the US. Perfume announced a new album titled Future Pop for later this year, and I'll save thoughts on that for...well, when it properly comes out. But gotta say, the name of the album is kind of a roll of the dice, especially since they really did predict the future of pop music back in 2008 (have you heard any of Charli XCX's songs in the last two years?).
Look At Me!
Talked to Kenmochi Hidefumi, the sound side of Suiyoubi No Campanella, for The Japan Times. The group's new EP Galapagos is about a 70 percent departure from what they've done in the last couple of years -- some people criticize them for sounding the same, which is a misguided critique! -- and, like UMA before it, feels more like a preview of a sound still mutating.
In less than positive news -- my time at SBS PopAsia ended this past Friday, due to restructuring at the site that has resulted in all contributors being released. I really enjoyed having a near-daily place to write about J-pop news and bigger-picture topics, and am thankful for the chance they gave me over the last year-plus. Anyway, if you know of any publications looking for someone who can blog about the daily happenings of J-pop, direct them my way, because I'm looking!
Blog Highlights: Lady's Only, Orange Milk, Annie The Clumsy
Written by Patrick St. Michel (patrickstmichel@gmail.com)
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