Great Japanese Pop

Pop-off Tuesday!

The last 10 years has seen some decent if a little uneven garage action from Teengenerate, The 5-6-7-8's, Texaco Leatherman, Gasoline, Guitar Wolf, The King Bros. and The Zoobombs.

A friend of mine once gave me a tape by a really good indie rock japanese band, mid-nineties. They had a song called "White Volkswagen". Female vocals, mostly in english. I can't remember what they were called, but I think it began with an S. Ring any bells with anyone?

If the first disc is "Happy" and the second disc is "Trance/Mellow," then the whole thing would be ... ummm ... curses, who knows.

Also Mansfield's mini-album - can't recall the name - the one with his astonishing version of "The New Pollution" with Yukari Fresh.

Don't know much current 2002 J-pop, but Morning Musume are amusingly inept and occasionally hit the POP! button, while Speed's "White Love" has to be my all-time favourite quasi-sophisticated teenage pop guff.

Any more advice would be cool as I'm going to be DJ at a "cool J-pop" night in London soon.

escalator is also a great label for that type of stuff... yukari fresh, losfeld, neil + iraiza, american rock, cubismo grafico, miniflex (miniflex is GREAT)...

buffalo daughter is of cuorse great, they have a new one coming out in about 2 weeks called "i"... check that out most definately.

also investigate maher shalal hash baz and nagisa ni te, who have recently had retrospectives released on Stephen Pastel's Geographic Records in the UK. much different stuff, more of a belle and sebastian/syd barrett/neil young circa "on the beach" feel to it... good savant psych pop. they have become 2 of my favorite bands as of recent.

and, i back nick (momus) wholeheartedly when i say

BOREDOMSBOREDOMBOREDOBOREDBOREBORBOB

also check out OOIOO, yoshimi from boredoms' other semi-main band... feather float has been issued in the US on birdman and i pretty easy to get, and their last LP gold & green is also essential... and if you like that there's a remix LP of those 2 albums out on shock city/trattoria...

for some classic j-pop try the plastics, 80's new wave japanese devo shit... or pink lady, 70's japanese bizarro abba type shit...

i know i am missing stuff but there is a lot of great shit...

dig in and enjoy!!

thanks

a websearch turned up some joker hosting her new album online, I'd mention Shuukyo and Stem, who can tell me more?

Trattoria has become 1ct Records if I remember correctly.

Anybody remember when Pink Lady had a weekly variety show on U.S. teevee? I think it was a summer replacement thing, mid-70s. That shit was wierd.

and then... 2004 Pop albums from Japan I like to varying degrees:
Sweets - Sweets
Ex-Girl - Endangered Species
Tommy February6 - Tommy Airline
Olivia - Lost Lolli
W - Duo Uandu
Yukari Rotten - Not Dead

Late seventies.

In celebration

It's on DVD

I saw the damn thing when it first aired!

Karuki Zamen Kuri no Hana?

Yeah... but who doesn't?

Ever try staying a week in Tokyo or Yokohama without having your head explode from all the hot chicks walking around like the end of the world is not near? Damn near impossible!

Ever try staying a week in Tokyo or Yokohama without having your head explode from all the hot chicks walking around like the end of the world is not near? Damn near impossible!

The same's true for Nagoya, Osaka, Kyoto, Hiroshima, Fukuoka - the whole place is ridiculous.

Also

SUPERCAR

uh... japanese-american. they're from san francisco, california, usa.

not really "pop" either...

nippop

http://www.keikaku.net/reviews/102

it should be noted that I really don't like about 99% of j-pop though, it gives me the rabies. but I've been listening to Adult 2-5 times a week since it came out in January.

And thanks for the link to that site! I hadn't seen it before...not bad.

I'm looking for something that's really poppy and dancey though. I want like a japanese girls aloud.

I'm not really feeling j-pop 2006 yet, it doesn't feel like anything very exciting has happened, musically at least (the current number one selling like 750,000 copies in its first week is more uhm culturally interesting?). Otsuka Ai has a new single out, which is supercute (music video on youtube here), but LOVE COOK was a bit of a disappointment, so I'm not expecting too much. Morning Musume's last single was good, if a bit typical.

The j-pop i'm listening to most at the moment is straightforward pop-rock and eighties chartpop, though, not post-shibuyakei stuff. Also m-flo, who are a.ma.zing, but more r'n'b/hiphop than j-pop. 2004's 'astromantic' is the album to go for with them.

Yukihiro Takahashi - Blue Moon Blue

http://www.neowing.co.jp/detailview.html?KEY=TOCT-25939

If you listen to the samples, you'll see it's in a similar vein as the Takahashi/Hosono Sketch Show collaborations, though bordering slightly more on the pop than electronic side.

Tomita Lab - Shiplaunching

http://www.neowing.co.jp/detailview.html?KEY=AICL-1731

Jazzy pop with lots of guest vocalists (including Takahashi on one track).

Buffalo Daughter - Euphorica

Can't find samples for this...but they're one of the more well-known j-pop bands I suppose.

The great thing about 'joy' is that I expect the usual gentle sweetness, but the first song is so startlingly synthpop (crypto-rave, even!) --
http://s54.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=153YM54R40SLM0PQ01UOPX10PR

Also compilations would be a good idea, as brought up on another thread.

I will second (third? fourth?) the Yuki recommendations in this thread wholeheartedly. Except I'll add that her solo albums (and, to some extent, her work with Judy & Mary) don't really have many of the tropes that one might associate with prototypical j-pop. Musically, I think they probably sound much less foreign to Western ears, but they're very solid and well worth checking out.

Here's the video for Yuki's "End Of Shite" (from Prismic, which is indeed great):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrC7zxjGCGc&search=Pv

I'm going to order 'Tadaima' and the Yukihiro Takahashi album 'Blue Moon Blue' from cdjapan.co.jp

Never used yesasia...but cdjapan is at least reliable.

http://www.waxpoetics.com/music/mixtape/citypop-japanese-aor-mixtape

Japanese DJ Bawxxx recently hipped us to his mix of citypop (Japanese AOR), lovingly called Melancholy of Suburbia, and we’re feeling this! Good luck ever finding these records! We don’t know much about Mr. Bawxxx, but with a little snooping we found out that he apparently hails from Nagoya and eats quite well!

i've been listening to tons of japanese electronic pop of the 1980s, esp. 1980-84, lately. there doesn't seem to be as much of a division between what we might consider "pop" versus "experimental" in japan. that goes for music as much as, say, film. people like hosono and others move freely--even on a single album--between modes. i like that aspect a lot. not that western pop music doesn't have its experimental elements.

that said, the "city pop" of the kind on that mix is not very experimental, but it can be very enjoyable. i don't have my laptop to hand to check out the names of the bands/albums in that mode that i've been enjoying, but i can check later. if anyone cares.

the album i've been addicted to in particular is a one-off studio group called "aragon" (that's what the album is called, too). it's a kind of electronic MOR/jazz fusion/4th world/ambient thing. which could sound terrible. amazingly my fave track is on youtube, i'm curious what others think. i think it's lovely:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAqNzycK7rY

oh yeah, I love the closer on that aragon album:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSBH2EGcNHo

oh man, somebody else who knows this record! it seems hopelessly obscure. good luck finding an actual copy in the states.

don't have a physical copy myself, but yeah, it's a good one!

if you haven't heard it, I'd recommend the ichiko hashimoto's beauty if you dig that aragon lp:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UELvVDDXEG0

similar understated experimental '4th world' pop vibe on a couple tracks (it's pretty eclectic tho, others are nothing like that one)

these 80s japanese LPs are some of things i don't feel bad about downloading, since in many cases i'd never find a copy. in some cases there have been reissues but given typical japanese prices and exchange rates they'd be like $50+

also it'd be hard for me to even look them up since i don't read kanji :(

haha yeah :-/

going back to this - there doesn't seem to be as much of a division between what we might consider "pop" versus "experimental"

def also really like that about hosono & lots of his contemporaries from that era. his work in the 80s kinda straddles the line between the two but even his ambient music has this abstracted catchiness to it. maybe bc a lot of this crew also did work for movies, anime, video games, commercials, etc.?

*bookmarked*

ooh that hashimoto track is nice

here's one from colored music LP from 1981

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHL2e9VkiyU

here's some hosono-produced weirdness from 1980

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTiY4RbIaZc

that's not a takahashi track? it's on one of his solo lps, so just assumed it was

super hilarious hosono cmaeos in this sandii vid btw:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxSV8Xu0RUk

i think takahashi did it first, def his roxy music track -- so good.

re: finding aragon in the US...probably like 4 or 5 years ago i found a copy in the collection of a weird reclusive ex-EBM DJ from florida that used to be a buyer at princeton record exchange back in the day. still had the store-made hype sticker from (i'm assuming) the 80s, which immediately had me pretty stoked:

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b39/spencerd63/IMG_6603_zps37d828c7.jpg

not sure how to post pictures here, hopefully that worked. but yeah, remarkable album. there's a really weird "making-of" type LP called "the studio works" that was issued the same year made up of studio demos and outtakes, worth seeking out if you're a fan. nishimatsu kazuhiro (the vocalist) has a solo album form the same time too, though it's titled a little too far into schmaltz territory for my taste.

you're the same spencer d that did the "fairlights mallets and bamboo" mixes, yeah?

yup.

and oops, i meant tilted, not titled.

sweet, love those mixes and play them often

yeah those mixes are the best, i bow to you spencer.

btw the aragon vocals are sometimes "in japanese" per the sticker but i think a lot of them are just wordless oohs and aaahs etc.

there's a really weird "making-of" type LP called "the studio works" that was issued the same year made up of studio demos and outtakes, worth seeking out if you're a fan.

ha, i'm not likely to find this anywhere. YSI?

the album i've been listening to the last few days is satoshi ashikawa's "wave notation 2: still way" which is pretty purely ambient, and yet like some of hosono's ambient work (or eno's for that matter) there's a subliminal catchiness to it. i believe you can download the whole thing on root blog, just google around and you'll find it.

what else? there's the mallet-heavy yet (yet?) awesome mkawju ensemble LP from 1981, most of it written/produced by future film-score god joe hsaishi. can't seem to find a clip on youtube.

<3 still way so much. is it really the only thing ashikawa did? was never able to find any info about other recordings.

can we talk abt how great miharu koshi's "boy soprano" is

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8EPTE41c5Q

Lost that one in a crash. Only have one song now from it. Rice Music from Ippu Do also.

Digging the second volume of Fairlights, Mallets and Bamboo.

"sur la terra" - super beautiful hosono production

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKUcR2Z9DYY

starts ~4mins in

New music from Furukawa Miki:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KS1qzueR90

I pretty much consider this the perfect pop song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tdMHZRiGd8

this city pop mix is p tight overall but mariya takeuchi "plastic love" at 31:20 is a monster:
https://soundcloud.com/bawxxx/melancholy-of-suburbia#t=31:20

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14RxICxtM5Q

So good. Been listening to Miharu Koshi all across youtube. Lots of cool stuff.

And yes it does have a Led Zeppelin reference in the lyrics.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsPXl-OxW28

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEZSpj5R5L4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIVGQ-B9G38&list=PL36B51C25BBF3B00B

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2wW--l1OHk

electro prom in the foggy forest

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSYWR6jKjpA

The intro to this is straight out of a Final Fantasy boss.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u393a9VJo2Y

Mariah Carey cover

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTOfH3Sjb9U

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73e-gV50SKk

The piano necktie on a miniature red piano is amazing. So 80s.

RIP

Yumi Ito
1941 - 2016

Death of Yumi Ito of twin pop duo The Peanuts confirmed

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AX0rrArs46A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lR7GAvKBIO4

man I could tell in the first 5 seconds that was Hosono

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Arg36CZvHA

Not 80s but Nihonjin:
https://open.spotify.com/track/4mrih3yZgEBes83YSy3WXM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KKCt_Ur2ik

i've been listening to Salon Music's "My Girl Friday" (1983). i absolutely love the opener song "Muscle Daughter". kind of reminds me of The Vaselines.

was surprised when they apparently got robert fripp in to do the guitar solo

yeah that solo rules

also that must be an early mix (i think for a vinyl release) on the album, she sings first. can't get enough of this song lol. every time i hear it sounds more and more like an alien version of Roxy Music.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzLi5M7iQhE

i downloaded this from youtube a few years ago, it's not online anymore so i re-uploaded it. wish i had the full thing but it's not easy to find this stuff.

the video for "muscle daughter" by salon music has been taken down and i can't find much of their music available legally or illegally in the u.s. if anyone has any leads on how i can get that song specifically or their albums in general, i would appreciate the info. i asked my one friend who has lived in japan for years and is into indie/punk/shoegaze music and she had never even heard of them.

i ended up buying two Salon Music LPs off ebay, "My Girl Friday" (which opens w "Muscle Daughter") and "La Paloma Show". both really cool records. "Muscle Daughter" feels like the intersection of Roxy Music and Beat Happening. they have a kind of amateur DIY sound at times but clearly have a lot of good influences (they cover "See Emily Play" and a lot of songs seem to ape Brian Eno's pop albums (Frippertronic guitars throughout)). "Din of Love" is cool, it has a Bollywood style to it. "Hunting on Paris" was a guitar-and-organ indie hit single and is a really cool New Wave pop song. they did a remake of it for a wonderful Trattoria compilation called "Bend It! Japan '98". the "La Paloma Show" album has a more synth pop feel to it, "Voyager of the Beagle" is a trippy early stab at exotica revival, "Paradise Lost" is pretty cool cold war synthpop ("Too much doubt/in America/Too little trust/in Russia"). overall i really love these two albums and recommend picking them up on vinyl. they can be had for under $25 w shipping.

XP - sent you a mail NA

What? Give the drummer some

https://we.tl/IMAu8QFWSU

thanks dudes

ty listening to "Chew It In A Bite" right now "Paper Doll" this is some solid 90s alternative rock right here w Japanese punk flavor. love it.

"Paper Dog" rather

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLZ8ddRbQ5o

Salon Music good at shoegaze

Nice one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhetXL7KmZA

this is some really sick 80s dance pop. that snare is pure cocaine.

yes! all late 80s toshiki is fucking awesome ("sea is a lady" is my favorite)

oh this one, yeah, i have this comp called "made in the eighties" that has this and some other great stuff, dee-dee-phone by the ab's, dress down by kaoru akimoto, free way 5 to south by fujimal yoshino...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVYqqrw6eQU

been listening to this cos of the amazing album cover. also the Hosono production!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOZac0bNJqw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=brec06BA6JU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FT5BlCZsiCQ
nonstop doopees for me the past 3 weeks. I've become a treble head for Caroline's vocals.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlhukAkkSN8

untootooku gets posted in these threads like once a year (not complaining, it's amazing)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUQjdwRno5g

why is none of this music on spotify?

spotify hasn't been in japan very long and is missing many label deals there. digital music also just never quite caught on in japan in the way it did elsewhere etc

ah yeah, I seem to recall Tower records thriving in Japan...

This guy runs a little engine with 30 something hours of City Pop and leaves it streaming on Youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCOIZMzsiZw

Poison Girl Friend - Fact 2 (from Melting Moment)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQZ7O7GWuN0

oh word, i listened to that EP for the first time last week and have had the same track in heavy rotation since. love it.

original love, tomoyo harada, olivia, clammbon