Make Believe Melodies For March 27, 2023
Digital Heart
SNJO — care
I’m a simple person — capture the emotional groove of humanity primarily through digital tools, and you’ve got a fan. Local Visions has long excelled at housing artists interested in this intersection. The creators they attract play around with the nostalgic sounds of their own youth and the faux-memories of modern internet aesthetics, but rather than seek lost times they use modern techniques to discover new life in them.
Producer SNJO — formerly of Kyoto duo TOXXIES, beatmaking for a while now — loves to see what machines can do, and how voices can stretch with the assistance of software. New album care delights in dissecting familiar grooves, whether it be talkbox-draped robo funk of “Eyes” or shimmering dance-pop on the fritz found on “Wander.” Beats, synths and vocals mutate throughout the nervous (like, you have clock ticks rushing you along) dash of “Silence,” one of several songs here also featuring more pensive lyrics about concerns about the future and mortality, making all the sonic tics a touch more uneasy. The world and sound found on care feels familiar, but, as most in the Local Visions’ universe delight in doing, SNJO pokes at it to find the modern spirit within. Get it here, or listen above.
Aiobahn Featuring KOTOKO — “INTERNET YAMERO”
The Creepypasta sequel to last year’s para-para panic “INTERNET OVERDOSE.” The Eurobeat bliss still finds a place, but now it’s interrupted by pounding hardcore, spooky strings and shrieking. All the dramatics of, like, Dempagumi.inc ten years ago and a found-footage VHS horror movie, slammed together in under five minutes. Listen above.
Aiobahn Featuring Yuka Nagase — “Chu De Oyasumi”
Gotta respect an artist with range. Producer Aiobahn can do happy hardcore horror, and he can craft effervescent tracks for Virtual singer/YouTubers to express heart-skittering longing over. A great example of Aiobahn’s use of space, and just a generally sweet bit of melancholy for the modern age. Listen above.
CRCK/LCKS — “Teiku”
At long last, CRCK/LCKS realizes how their music best sounds — broken apart. The group has been hovering around the “city pop revival” / jazz rock resurgence over the last few years like a half-inflated balloon, doing their job but not really in an exciting way. Oh but bless them on “Teiku,” for throwing all the city-life-ain’t-it-great energy away in favor of scattered percussion, electronic scritches and space…so much wonderful space…to let the vocalist do her work. Funny enough, this one has a lot in common with the SNJO record up top, except much more of a left turn for the artist in question. Listen above.
Litsuka Aisawa — “white lie”
Heart-on-sleeve hyperpop benefiting from the intimacy recording from home brings. Listen above.
kiki vivi lilly — “39 Minutes”
After a pretty rank week of rain, the sun has returned to the Kanto region, just in time for some easy-breezy indie-pop begging for warmer forecasts. The latest from kiki vivi lily finds her digging her heels into the twee side of her sound , with “39 Minutes” finding some optimism after a long one (“we can make a better day”). It comes from a new EP out in early May…just in time for a snatch of sunny times before rainy season roars back. Listen above.
upusen — tea is too hot
Another Local Visions’ favorite returning with a new set of synthwave swelter for your work-at-home experience. This sort of knowingly retro electronic music is often more about vibes than anything else — let me direct you to this looped footage of The Simpsons set to a staple of the genre to explain — which might lack tension, but can still hit the spot. Producer upusen knows how to conjure up a mood, while also dotting tea is too hot with more left-field touches for this style, such as the off-kilter rhythm of “Too Hot Tea” which turns into the squiggliest groove on the set. Get it here, or listen above.
Akiko Wada — “Kanpai Funk”
Hilarious to imagine the Japanese government seeing the youth not downing alcohol at a high enough rate, and them deciding “quick, we need Akiko Wada to make a song about how cool drinking all night is!”
In much less fun reality, this collaboration with rising producer meiyo is a continuation of “Yona Yona Dance” and my Discovery Zone theory of Japanese music. “Kanpai Funk” actually addresses the feeling of older Japanese music being unstuck from time, wondering if all these modern raves are real before celebrating this mish-mash of decades as something new everyone can enjoy (though I imagine Wada’s team is hoping this gets her swept up in it!). There’s also lines about TikTok, AI and one that implies Tindr, for a little extra contemporary sheen. Listen above.
Oricon Trail For The Week Of March 13, 2023 To March 19, 2023
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 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.
Snow Man — “Tapestry / W” (902,652 Copies Sold)
Snow Man are pretty clearly the most popular J-pop group going, and it isn’t close. This dual single not crossing the million first-week sales threshold feels sorta disappointing, but only because Snow Man is quite possibly the lone outfit capable of selling that many physical units in a single week anymore (they’ve done it before!). The majority of groups would be thrilled with any combination of numbers with two random digits lopped off.
After the last few weeks of Johnny’s dreck topping Oricon, it’s generally refreshing to get two songs from that pop universe with a pulse. “W” stands as the better of the pair, Snow Man engaging in pop dramatics against a guitar riff crying out for a DAZN commercial to soundtrack, but which the addition of violins and constantly tweaked tempos makes work, even if the lyrics try to sink it. “Tapestry” isn’t quite as lively, but even it moves at a skip.
It’s been just…an absolutely Johnny’s-filled month, between the BBC documentary on one end and this release plus King & Prince’s recent single standing as 2023’s first juggernaut sales forces. Yet this is the 21st century, and it’s important to take in the entire landscape. When, one does, reveals another song proving to have immense staying power…
Like, this one hasn’t hung around as long as it has because people just love silent that much, right? This one’s only just been nudged out of the Billboard Hot 100 Japan top spot after making history in that space, and has held a lock on Spotify’s Top 50 Japan1 and Apple Music’s Japan Top 100 playlists for months. While a 2022 release, "Subtitle" has to be in the discussion about 2023, too.
News And Views
BiSH member AiNA THE END suffered a head injury during a filming, requiring medical treatment. Numerous BiSH shows and TV appearances have been postponed or cancelled, while word on AiNA THE END’s condition at the moment have yet to be announced.
Hiroshi Narasaki, who played bass on various Les Rallizes Dénudés’m songs in the 1970s, has died.
Hideaki Takizawa walked away from Johnny & Associates late last year, in a move that stunned most J-pop followers. Why would you do that? Well, the answer is..TOBE. Takizawa introduced his new company TOBE Entertainment which…right now I’m not sure what it aims to do, but features a website boasting about a “new generation” and a “concept movie” raising more questions than answers.
God, please don’t be the Metaverse
Whatever that means, I do hope this leads to more competition in the J-pop space, and more options for performers. One of the most thrilling developments during 2020 was watching more artists choose independence over agency life, though in the years after that felt like it slowed down a bit. New entrants in the industry like this seem like a happy medium for the time being, and…hopefully…can help reshape the pop music landscape further.Travis Scott joined AWICH on stage at a recent Jordan brand event in Tokyo.
New set of performers announced for KCON Japan, most notably XG, who I think will be doing their first show ever in their home country.
Travis Japan performed at the Washington D.C. Cherry Blossom Festival this week — an event once also hosting AKB48, as documented in a classic Washington Post piece — and swung by some local morning shows along the way.
Japan and Korean-centric online songs marketplace Surf is expanding.
For Tracy Hyde called it a day after a final show this past weekend, which was livestreamed globally (you can watch it here). One of the best indie-pop/shoegaze/just rock acts of the last decade, very happy to have talked with Azusa Suga weeks after he started the project back in 2012 (time flies!) and with the whole group in 2021. It’s a cliche, but…hey, at least we have the memories and the music.
Written by Patrick St. Michel (patrickstmichel@gmail.com)
Twitter — @mbmelodies
Follow the Best of 2023 Spotify Playlist Here!
This chart is getting wacky by the way — maybe I’m dumb since the general meh-ness of their music turned me off from the start, but Yangskinny now somehow have a top three hit on streaming? Indigo La End is in the top 20? LANA might be a superstar in waiting, with a song already breaking through into the top 50?
Wild to see Yuka working with Aiobahn. Always been loving her music, but this song with Aiobahn & the recent one produced by Mekakushe are especially great.