Make Believe Melodies For October 11, 2021
Slightly Abbreviated Version Because *Waves Hands Around* (Also Nothing Happened Last Week)
DADA — “High School Dropout”
It felt like Japanese rap was in a vice grip following the disastrous NAMIMONOGATARI 2021 event in Aichi Prefecture this August. The poorly organized, COVID-19 Petri dish provided the media with the “music festivals will be the death of us (literally!)” fodder they had been searching for with Fuji Rock, and also allowed a new manifestation of the “kids these days” divide in the country to emerge, focused on hip-hop. Thankfully, the kids remain untouched by broadcast and print outlets, and rather than shun the style they’ve embraced it. “High School Dropout” by Fukuoka rapper DADA has zoomed up Spotify’s Japan Viral 50 chart (#4 right now) thanks in large part to TikTok…but not just that platform.
“High School Dropout” connects a bunch of stray lines running throughout Japanese music, ranging from the continued search for a local take on the American-born style (the video feeling very Chief Keef indebted) to yet another example of the “young people rejecting societal norms” appearing in pop…this has way more in common with Ado than, like, JP The Wavy, at least thematically. Yet it’s also surprisingly reflective rather than angsty, pairing it’s flexy moments with reflective looks back on how far DADA has come after ditching public education. I’ve sorta given up on trying to pinpoint “Japanese hip-hop’s breakthrough moment,” because maybe it’s best seen as something connecting with a very specific audience, and happy to let everyone else scratch their heads over it. Listen above.
ORESAMA — “Parallel Motion”
Electro-pop is back baby! After several years away, duo ORESAMA return with a funked-on pop number reveling in a time existing before “the city pop revival,” when everything just sounded a little more elastic. Listen above.
PICNIC YOU — Life Without Buildings
Not going to lie…completely reeled in by the album name. While sounding nothing like that Life Without Buildings, PICNIC YOU tease something fitting for the current HyperPop moment while actually leaning closer to the tag-team experimentation of a group_inou (or even a Dos Monos). Listen above.
Half Mile Beach Club Featuring Maika Loubte — “Full Moon”
Half Mile Beach Club has been one of my favorite artists in Japan over the last few years, owing to their ability to warp the beach-ready sounds you would associate with their native Zushi into something alien and ecstatic. Their latest, with versatile artist in her own right Maika Loubte, once again locates revelry in familiar shapes…with extra flute notes. Listen above.
DJ Badboi — “ROT (Edit)”
Nothing clever to say about this, just an incredible edit of a classic that makes every second count. Get it here.
trash angels — “ourfallenangels”
One thread that the internet-damaged kids of today might not even necessarily connect to their music is how ahead of the curve tofubeats was in his approach to pop music. The latest song from Japanese SoundCloud high school darlings trash angels features a lot of rapping run through electronic filters, and not to suggest he’s the first to do it ever…but few Japanese acts were as prescient as tofubeats about this, and listening to “ourfallenangels” feels a lot like downloading a Maltine Record .zip file in 2011, albeit with a little more melancholy bleeding through. Listen above.
Lil’ Yukichi Featuring antihoney — “May I…”
Closer to Electronic Dream (where were the 10-year nostalgia-fests on that one? Better than half the shit music publications rhapsodize over in retrospect…) than most stuff coming out of Japanese hip-hop right now, though credit to the artwork to Lil’ Yukichi’s last release for being a great reference.
Yuta Orisaka — State Of Mind
I come with no deep thoughts on this, a heavily anticipated album from a singer/songwriter hailed by Japanese media as a decade-defining genius, because it requires more than one listen to really unravel. Instead, I share because…Amuse Inc., the talent agency supporting the likes of Southern All-Stars and Perfume, has a Bandcamp page for select acts? What in the? Like, that’s great, but bizarre coming from a company only a few notches down from Johnny’s in terms of access.
Oricon Trail For The Week Of September 27, 2021 To October 3, 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.
AKB48 — “Nemohamo Rumor” (350,677 Copies Sold)
I’ve already touched on what the low sales numbers…for AKB48…means for J-pop in general. How’s the song, though? Pretty good! Rather than settle for familiar AKB easy-breeziness, “Nemohamo Rumor” turns to an uptempo horn-centric arrangement that’s closer to their looser, wilder moments of yesteryear than the familiar idol-doms they often settle for. Shame this one has to serve as the aural end-of-an-era marker.
News And Views
Continuing on from ratings shared last week…someone gathered the top 100 Japanese albums on Rate Your Music according to actual Japanese users. It manages to both be closer to established canon (Happy End!) and way off from it (Boris, a band nobody in Japan cares about). An interesting counter to what’s come out before, even if you should still take it as niche (and not trust anyone who likes that Ogre You Asshole album).
Koichi Sugiyama, composer of the music to Dragon Quest but also popular groups like The Tigers and The Peanuts (you might know them as the twins from the Mothra movies), died.
Pretty slow week for music news, and I don’t want to shine a light on shitty write-ups about J-pop scattered about the web. Uhhhh, here’s King & Prince promoting Nintendo?
I wrote about the future of convenience stores in Japan…nothing to do with music, but hey, I’m proud of it.
Ado working with popular drama series Doctor X.
Let’s check in with Merzbow.
Written by Patrick St. Michel (patrickstmichel@gmail.com)
Twitter — @mbmelodies