Make Believe Melodies For May 22, 2023
Chiba Has Good Parts Too!
Bonbero, LANA, MFS And Watson — “Makuhari”
I can not emphasize this enough — Makuhari is not a remotely cool place. It’s a giant mall based in Chiba Prefecture, made relevant by the presence of 1) the Chiba Lotte Marines, Roki Sasaki’s team and 2) Makuhari Messe, a convention center hosting various trade shows and, for this newsletter’s purposes, music events. I’ve traveled out there dozens of times since moving to Tokyo, and have seen a lot of great shows…but I’ve never been like “wow, it’s great to be here!”
It’s an absolute credit to all four rappers and two producers, ZOT On The WAVE and dubby bunny, heavily responsible for the current sound of Japanese hip-hop (hold that thought) present in “Makuhari” that they’ve managed to turn a spot where the best establishment is Costco into a source of bravado. This is all in service of Pop Yours, a rap-oriented festival that has become a force in recent years, but despite the need to hype up the event all four MCs will be performing at next weekend, they manage to transform this area into a trophy.
The key is gathering four rappers from very different sonic background together and throwing them over a Brooklyn-drill beat to celebrate the moment, each getting a chance to showcase their own style, from the smoothness of Bonbero to the spitfire gruff of Watson. I think the middle portion is the best stretch though, anchored by MFS’ effortless flexing and LANA’s vocal range, going from pop hook to throatier ad libs. Taken all together, it’s pure revelry at reaching this stage, and a statement for the current era of Japanese rap as it continues to push towards the mainstream (and makes progress, if not strides). That they set this all in sleepy Chiba is just a cherry on top. Listen above.
MEZZ — MEZZ BUNNY
MEZZ deserves a lot of credit for being on the frontier of modern drill sounds in Japanese music1, with last year’s “Gyal Drill” being one of the earliest and best adoptions of that sound in Tokyo. She got an assist from producer dubby bunny, who has helped sculpt her sound. Inevitably, bigger names have taken that sonic palette and run with it — see above, also featuring dubby bunny — but MEZZ remains one of the more interesting artists playing around with it, and MEZZ BUNNY offers her and dubby bunny’s best statement to date, primarily using drill wobble as a backdrop for reflections on the highs and lows of 20-something life in the capital. Though it’s the one deviation that really invigorates this set — “ROYAL MILK TEA” dives into the club for a rollicking (and funny!) party starter featuring Nakamura Minami, while showing just how much potential MEZZ has to play in different sounds. Listen above.
P-boy — PP-MAX 1
RYOKO2000 member continues to show off sonic depth with new two-song jungle and hardcore firecracker. While not approaching the oddball heights of last year’s synthesized sax odyssey FAKESAX, the pair of tracks here work thanks to a tension between the breaks and the waves of synth P-boy lets blanket the song, creating something between herky-jerky and elegance. Listen above, or get it here.
ONJUICY Featuring Submerse — “BUST A MOVE”
Force ONJUICY to move swiftly, and he’ll produce one of the best songs of his career. Submerse makes for an unexpected but perfect creative partner here, drawing him into his best vocal delivery by keeping the track moving. Listen above.
YUC’e — “HAPPY BUNNY”
Pure serotonin boost. Listen above.
mitsume — Drive EP
Some artists do a certain sound so well that it manages to come across as fresh with new releases despite not actually changing that much when you get into the weeds. I can’t think of a better example in Japan than mitsume, a band going strong for nearly 15 years now without deviating far from a locked-in band setup. They introduce new flourishes on Drive — upright bass of all instruments creeps into “Moebius,” a new texture for them but one that is utilized in a way that makes it feel worn-in for the group — but overall continue to find new nooks to the rock sound they’ve long explored. That’s as impressive as constant re-invention, in my book. Listen above.
Miruca — Memorywave EP
The continued passion / panic surrounding “AI Music” means we are about to see Vocaloid dragged into contemporary conversations about music more than ever. That’s not totally off — I was working on a piece for this newsletter about how contemporary AI for music pretty much functions just like the singing synthesizer software, requiring users to actually do something before running it through Drake-aloid, rather than pressing a button that says “sadboy vibes.” I’m not going to get into what stopped me from finishing that…some other time!
Where I do think AI music and Vocaloid split off radically is in the community surrounding it. I just don’t see an actual set of artists using AI to make…not even “good” or “interesting” music, but like remotely serious work, in the way Vocaloid cultivated an actual counter-culture to the J-pop mainstream of the late Aughts. Like, you have panic points like Ghostwriter which still feels like some commentary on Drake rather than celebration of technology (“look how easy it is to make this!”) but the bulk of AI music right now boils down to “what if my favorite VTuber sang a song” or “what if Homer Simpson had the N-word pass?2” It’s all memes, not actual artistic connections…which Vocaloid definitely was and is.
To that point…lots of people still doing interesting things with Vocaloid, demonstrated by producer Miruca playing around with the voicebank of Kizuna Akari to create a rollicking set of songs centered around synthesized vocals. When someone uses the AI-generated voice of Taylor Swift for something original instead of what amounts to doujin music3, I’ll be worried. Until then, I’ll stick with the people interested in exploring the limits of new tech. Get it here, or listen above.
Oricon Trail For The Week Of May 8, 2023 To May 14, 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.
Kanjani8 — “Mikansei” (206,752 Copies Sold)
I guess it’s cool they hired members of an actual pop-punk band to write this? Uhhh, hope they got paid well?
News And Views
The Johnny Kitagawa story continues to be central to Japanese entertainment news. Former Johnny’s Juniors members who shared alleged sexual assault at the hands of the agency founder spoke in front of the Japanese Diet, arguing for the creation of an independent third party to make it easier for people to report similar incidents (which, clearly, is something the whole industry would benefit from). Long-running agency member Noriyuki Higashiyama commented on the scandal over the weekend, becoming one of the first current talents to address it. More people also coming forward with claims against Kitagawa.
Though there’s actually significant non-Kitagawa Johnny’s news this week too. Current era engine Snow Man released a new album this week, and it surpassed a million copies sold in just four days.
Meanwhile, three members of King & Prince officially are out of the group following one final performance.
Yoshiki announces a new X JAPAN single — the first in eight years — in late July.
YOASOBI’s “Idol” continues to chug along, amassing over 100 million views on YouTube and showing no signs of stopping. And here come the covers!
Mentioned this in the tofubeats’ post last week, but Jude Noel with a great look at some under-the-radar netlabels over at Bandcamp Daily.
Kyary Pamyu Pamyu’s heyday in Japan is long over, but she’s doing well in the States, including drawing a long ol’ line at Anime Central in Chicago (errr, Rosemont, but c’mon).
MASS OF THE FERMENTING DREGS touring North America soon, go see them if you can!
I went to Sapporo last week, primarily to watch the “Kitsune Dance” be performed inside the city’s new state-of-the-art ballpark (fantastic place, already planning future visits). While there, I also had lunch with the lovely Dog Noise, founder of Obake Mask, who told me details about KING∞XMHU, the “theme park club” found in the northern city that I’d heard about but was unaware of how…wild it was. The DJ booth was like a totem pole? Here’s a tour.
Literally a day later…the club announced it’s closing! The big news is this is a blow to the clubbing ecosystem of one of Japan’s biggest (and, views, best) cities, but really it just makes me think I have to scrounge up the Peach Air ticket fare to see it before it closes at the end of the month.Speaking of baseball, Yama performed as part of the Yokohama DeNa Baystars GIRLS☆FESTIVAL.
4s4ki releasing new album “inspired” by the anime Code Geass. Fun fact — when I interviewed her for Pitchfork last year, she came to the interview wearing a Code Geass sweater. Clues abounded!
SAI from Ms. Machine wants to tour Scandinavia! Help make that happen!
Tamagotchi teamed up with a hell of a roster of artists for this collaboration series. At long last, Zo Zhit from Dos Monos working with the toy I played with while I was in the second grade!
Written by Patrick St. Michel (patrickstmichel@gmail.com)
Twitter — @mbmelodies
Follow the Best of 2023 Spotify Playlist Here!
Nod to Double Clapperz, though, for being on top of the British manifestation of this sound much earlier and helping to pave the road for where the country is at now.
though I mean…people do this with Miku too. I sleep easy at night knowing most people just want to use technology to generate lolz.
My one hot take here is that I think the AI program here actually does a good job translating Swift’s tone into Japanese…lots of good gags possible now!