Make Believe Melodies For December 20, 2021
The "Why I Don't Rush Lists Out In December" Edition
Shigge — Silver Smoker
This newsletter comes to you after two days spent in Kyushu, Japan’s west coast. While I won’t fake learning too much about the region — it was less than 48 hours total, with most of them spent with a toddler intent on lying down on the sidewalk, to emphasize “I’d rather waste my time blocking foot traffic than let you hold me” — this brief escape to Nagasaki Prefecture offered tunnels of pure relaxation, the kind of laid-back vibes that just feel impossible in Kanto. Sometimes, you look out an airport bus’ windows to see a sun-speckled bay and you think…yeah, even this is making my soul feel a little better.
Maybe that’s a vibe shaped by Yesterday Once More, a label founded by Fukuoka-based producer Shigge. The music they released always feels a touch looser, a little bit sunnier, than what emerges from Tokyo or Osaka. Naturally, the operation’s possible best offering yet comes from the head honcho to close out a particularly cloudy year. Shigge’s Silver Smoker is a delirious rush of dance music, letting warped vocal samples and familiar party-starting sounds bleed together into simple but fulfilling sound. “Daisy Cutter,” “If You” and “Woo Ahh” are just some of the stickiest dashes, blunting sonic elements to create out-of-mind cuts ideal for a temporary brain slip. What makes it work on a greater level is the moments of haze Shigge messes around with to make the album as a whole hit harder, like the tipsy plinking of “Muted Your Feed” giving way to the joy of “M.U.D.”
While it’s rich of me to pretend this is, like, built for sunny Mondays — if I’m being totally honest, the rush I feel the most from Silver Smoker is that of wanting to spend one post-last-train night in a dank club listening to music like this — I still can’t shake the looseness informing Shigge’s latest, especially after feeling so chill visiting their home region. Think of it as a little dash of warmth — or weirdness — for wherever you are. Get it here, or listen above.
Yung Sticky Wom Featuring Only U And Manon — “Heart Emoji (Remix)”
Completely here for Manon’s finest verse on record — wherein she drops any cutesy, Asobisystem-approved kawaii veneer in favor of saying “bitch” like it’s the first word she’s ever learned. She tries on different deliveries, and enjoys each of them en route to stealing this song. Listen above.
Kalen Anzai — “Genjitsu Camera”
There’s a much deeper dive into the career of Kalen Anzai awaiting — long Avex’s next huge thing, she’s largely tread water, probably most famous for being outclassed in a drama by an eye-patched wildcard. All analysis would boil down to the same point though — she hasn’t had the music to back up her image and song titles (how could you waste “Fake News Revolution” on this!?), failing to push J-pop forward but also not being enough of a nostalgia act either. “Genjitsu Camera” dares to ask, what if she actually released great music to go with all her hype? It helps that this fizzy number features credits from PC Music’s Danny L Harle and a big ol’ writing one courtesy of Charli XCX. Those additions come through clearly too — the sing-song-y pre-chorus serving as a highlight — and result in Anzai’s best overall release to date. Avex, up the budget! Listen above.
Seiho — “Mother”
A great showcase in how to make tension work courtesy of one of the best doing it anywhere, still. Great reminder to revisit the once Amazon-only Camp EP, one of the year’s more charming offerings out of Japan. Listen above.
SAPPY — Crisis…Good Luck E.P.
I’m always up for artists investigating their own work rather than just churning out singles for an uncaring subscription-streaming-based universe. Rock band SAPPY offer a dissection of their own sounds via their latest release, featuring a showcase shoegaze number…and two songs breaking it down further, finding new angles on the number and revealing interesting sonic ideas (specifically, something built for new-age zoning out with “Re: Good Luck”). Listen above.
Chameleon Lime Whoopiepie — “Crush Style”
While it’s almost certainly been derailed by the Olympic Opening Ceremony (remember that!?!) controversy, I keep expecting Shibuya-kei…or at least the sonic vapor trails of it…to enjoy a reclamation period like city pop any day now. One of 2021’s better young artists out of Japan, Chameleon Lime Whoopiepie, imagines just what a modern spin on that sound could be. Everything about new single “Crush Style” nods to retro sounds and juxtaposed styles — turntable-based sampling meets video games meet icy vocal manipulation, all run through a rap filter! — to create a goofy-fun pop number with an extra layer of retromania worth exploring. Maybe this is how the ‘90s wave comes crashing in? Listen above.
Beef Fantasy — “Fukuramu No Theme”
The sound of billionaires in space…or at least the best possible theme song for such a scenario you could imagine, courtesy of the ever-clever Beef Fantasy. Listen above.
Oricon Trail For The Week Of December 6, 2021 To December 12, 2021
Back in the day, the Oricon Music Charts were the go-to path to music stardom in Japan. Acts of all sorts traversed these lands, trying to sell as many CDs as possible in order to land a good ranking on a chart choosing to only count physical sales, even as the Internet came to be and the number of versions offered for sale got ridiculous. Today, with the country finally in on the digital, these roads are more barren and only looked at by the most fanatic of supporters needing something to celebrate. Yet every week, a new song sells enough plastic to take the top spot. So let’s take a trip down…the Oricon Trail.
SEVENTEEN — “Ainochi Kara” (155,766 Copies Sold)
Who says J-pop doesn’t have any international impact? All these popular K-pop boy groups have to come to Japan and record stocking-stuffer ballads for the local market, regardless of how boring they get.
News And Views
Actress and singer Sayaka Kanda died this past Saturday, according to her office. She was the daughter of Seiko Matsuda and Masaki Kanda, and an accomplished entertainer who dabbled in many areas during her life, from being a voice actor in anime and the Japanese dub of Frozen, to in recent years covering Vocaloid songs on YouTube. The news has, as you’d expect, become the biggest entertainment story of the week, and a shocking one at that.
To totally shift emotional gears…here’s a sign of the continued epoch shift in how the J-pop industry approaches the world in 2021. Johnny & Associates, once so terrified of the internet that it wouldn’t let Amazon share cover art of new albums or singles from their acts, is launching “Johnny’s Gaming Room,” wherein their talent indulge their gamer side. From the preview alone, a lot of screaming which, to these Millenial ears, sounds perfect for the Zoomer crowd!
K-pop idols doing J-pop-born TikTok challenges…borders, where we are we don’t need those.
Extremely niche news, but “hyper hop crew” Dr.Anon…one of this newsletter’s faves from 2021!…features in an online campaign for WEGO.
If you’re looking for a place bullish on a post-COVID music boom, head south from Tokyo to Yokohama. I recently had the chance to see a show in the newly built PIA Arena MM near Minato Mirai (ahhh, that’s what those “Ms” are about) station, a nice spot smack dab in downtown debuted in…Spring 2020, but hanging on as the country’s live music industry starts sprouting up again. Now comes news that a new venue, K-Arena Yokohama, is set to open in the bay-side city come 2023. The music town of tomorrow has been decided.
Here’s a controversy that no notable media outlets or websites in Japan are actually talking about, but since BTS is involved, media outlets jump on it and megaphone nothing into…a slightly noisier nothing. The real blame falls on The Korea Times, which has a history of both chest-puffed-out soft power stories and pieces like this where they chum the bottom of the internet to find quotes that…they can’t even link to! At least slap an html source to whatever Mariana Trench-deep bulletin board you scraped to get this.
Billboard Japan talked to singer/songwriter Yuuri, responsible for some of the year’s biggest hits, about…doing that.
Hooray hooray, it’s year-end season, and lots of great lists are emerging! This Side Of Japan shared their top 100 Japanese songs of 2021, while The Glow spotlighted 26 singles from the past year. Metropolis offered something similar, while even members of Kero Kero Bonito shouted out some Japanese highlights from this year as part of a Brooklyn Vegan feature (Perfect Young Lady…deserved shine, which will be reflected in my list when it comes out in Spring 2023).
NTsKI…now in augmented hologram form
【NEWS】アプリ「AURA」をDLすると、渋谷でNTsKiのホログラムを出現させることが可能です。未発表音源も一緒に視聴できますので、NTsKiを探してみてください。 You can find NTsKi HOLOGRAM with her sound in Shibuya if you download app @kalkul_aura until MAY 2022🚨 kalkul.com
Written by Patrick St. Michel (patrickstmichel@gmail.com)
Twitter — @mbmelodies