Hot dog!

The Bawdies - Hot Dog

Genre: garage rock
Song style: raspy, oldiesish

While I don't listen much to these guys' music, I'm very impressed with their ability to break away from normal standards of rock music, especially in Japan. Specifically - how does such a hot, young man get such a raspy, throaty voice!? These guys have been really active on the tour circuit recently and have thus been getting a lot of press. Well they definitely deserve it and I wish them the best.

(Yet another day where I post the music I'm not actually listening to - somehow I've gotten really into Korean dance pop in the past couple of days, like Mblaq's "Y").

Crazy crazy band

モーモールルギャバン - 裸族

Genre: experimental new-wave, electronic
Song style: crazy and erratic, sorta like Of Montreal

Here is a pretty new band, fresh off the press, with their first major album out today - "クロなら結構です". They have a very fun, crazy sound, though this song is by far one of their crazier ones. For a more normal electronicky one, check out ユキちゃんの遺伝子. As I'm writing this I just realized - here is yet another Kyoto band! Kyoto has really been active these days.

In other news, Asian Kung Fu Generation's new album "マジックディスク" is out today as well, with songs like 迷子犬と雨のビート. Not quite my cup of tea, but a respectable band, so check them out too!

Happy Birthday to DSK!

Rumania Montevideo - Still for your Love & 恋するベティー

Genre: alternative
Song style: girl alternative

This post is in honor of my friend, who's celebrating a birthday today! While it's already over by now in Japan, there's still an hour to go here in America. We were talking about songs from our childhoods that inspired our current music tastes, and this song came up. This is a very unique band that sadly had a short life - they were only active for three years (1999 - 2002). It's also pretty amazing to see a female drummer also be the main vocalist! While my friend has moved onto much heavier music (which I promise will be up here soon!), it's nice to reminisce on one's childhood every once in a while. How much has changed since this band was popular - it's been 11 years now. And imagine 11 years from now too, where will we all be...

Happy birthday, my dear friend! :-)

Grapevine

Grapevine - 指先

Genre: indies
Song Style: a soft ballad

Sorry, had to break the Kyoto streak for just a little bit - though these guys formed in the next-door Osaka. Not going to write much cause things are strange tonight. Some things have come out of the blue. I quickly wanted a song to suit my mood, and this one worked for me. Though the band has been around for a while (since 1993), I know nothing about them. Don't know if I will continue my search on them, but this song is good enough for me.

Kyoto is not all just cheery smiles

Sadie - Grieving The Dead Soul

Genre: metal, visual kei
Song style: frantic and high-paced with a lot of style-switching

So looking at the past two posts, one would think Kyoto is all about happy beautiful reminiscing upon a landscape. But no, Kyoto is a source of a lot of styles of talent, and here is one example. The vocalist of the band Sadie is from Kyoto (definitely met some guys like this while I was there...) and the other band members are from around the Kansai area as well. I like seeing Japanese bands that are willing to become heavy and edgy like this, it really adds some masculinity to the makeup. I'll be in Japan a month from today!!

Bring out the electronics

いしわたり淳治 & 砂原良徳 + やくしまるえつこ - 神様のいうとおり

Genre: electronica
Song style: like a female Depeche Mode

Random coincidence of a song! It's been sitting on my list of songs to update probably because it made the Oricon rankings recently so I decided to look into it. It's very chill but I like the electronic vibe a lot. I'm a big Depeche Mode fan, and it really has a similar vibe. The producer for this song is one of my true loves - Ishiwatari Jyunji is the producer of a number of other amazing bands on here, including 9mm Parabellum Bullet, Chatmonchy, and A Flood of Circle. Yoshinori Sunahara is a talented electronic keyboardist, and singer Yakushimaru Etsuko is the vocalist of band Soutaiseiriron (相対性理論). I'll be checking out the three of these rigorously in the next days. Anyways, this song is apparently the theme song of the anime "四畳半神話大系" ("The Tatami Galaxy") about a college student of Kyoto University. Fits perfectly with the last post and my reminiscing of Kansai as I prepare for Kanto. Expect a continuing Kyoto theme (well for at least one more post)!

Being a student in Kyoto

くるり　－　京都の大学生

Genre: indie
Song style: acoustic, bluesy rock

An song in honor of the time when I was a university student in Kyoto... feels so long, long ago. This comes from band Quruli, whose members all went to Kyoto's 立命館大学 (Ritsumeikan University). I'm proud to see some Kyoto-ites make it so far in the music industry. Actually, the Kansai area has a lot of successful musicians! This post is also to celebrate Quruli's new compilation album, out "僕の住んでいた街" which came out May 26 (okay so a little bit old news but hey), which this song appears on. Also haven't had enough chill music on this blog for a while. I miss Kyoto, Kansai, and Japan...