LAST YEAR'S MODEL

My last post about Japanese music explored some influential bands in the Shibuya-kei scene of the 1990’s.  This time, I wanna talk about the bands that crossed over from the world of lounge pop into the world of punk rock.  Which is where my heart lies.  Psyche.  I have no heart.

While many of the “new wave of new wave” bands had their strongest influences in late 70’s and early 80’s American punk and new wave, several of my favorite J-pop acts transitioned very obviously from the bossa nova heavy music of the 90’s straight into electro punk.   Among these bands are Macdonald Duck Eclair, Hi-Posi, and one of my very favorite bands, Plus-Tech Squeeze Box.

Here’s a couple tracks by Macdonald Duck Eclair.  Sorz, no real vids for these.  Both songs are off  their first full length, “Short Short” (2004).  They cite both french pops and Atari Teenage Riot as important influences.  You can hear this quite clearly on the album, and on these two tracks.  more after the break so click it dbag.I also recommend their second album, “The Genesis Songbook” (2005), which takes their strange combo of influences and further expands upon it in odd sonic ways.

Hi-Posi is also an important part of the move from cafe music to punk, as she spent her early years pursuing the same jazzy style as P5, but moved into fuzzy pop punk territory on her final album, “The View of Human Nature as Fundamentally Good”.  The new wave influence is apparent, and the second track on the album is actually a new wave cover.  I can’t find any vids to post, but I love this album and I think you should get it now.  For more info, check out the blog about her on Mutant Sounds.

Another rad electro music project rooted firmly to a french pops tradition is that of Miss Wonda.  Her sole album, “Wonderful Tangent” is not truly a punk new wave record, but more of an electro pop dreamscape that shares equal footing in the worlds of jazz pop and new wave.  I discovered her because she shares a label with Macdonald Duck Eclair.  Highly recommend it–the songs are simple and pretty, combining the breathy vox of Kahimi Karie with a sonic landscape somewhere between Freezepop and early Hi-Posi.

Pop pastiche one woman project, Yukari Fresh, also made the transition from pops to punk.  She debuted on Escalator Reocrds (Neil & Iraiza’s label, too) in 1997 with “Yukari’s Perfect” (1997) and released a string of cute bedroom cut and paste pop through 2003.  In 2004, however, Yukari moved on, declaring that french pops were over and that punk was the new thing; she changed her name to Yukari Rotten.  Below is a song by Yukari Fresh, but to hear Yukari Rotten, go to her myspace.

Of course, there are a couple bands that have taken the jazz plus punk aesthetic and run with it that I have talked about before–namely, Urbangarde & Plus-Tech Squeeze Box.  I’m reluctant to rave about them yet again, but that won’t stop me.  On both of Urbangarde’s records, “Girls Only Live Twice” (2007) and “Girls City Project” (2009) you can clearly hear how almost Neil & Iraiza style piano has been combined with a more hyper fuzzed out aesthetic to deliver a kind of jazz punk hybrid.  I’ll stop talking about how much I love them and leave you with a couple vids.  The first is “Revisionist” from “Girls City Project”.  The second is “Aprils War” from the first record.

Let’s finish this with the other fave band of mine, Plus-Tech Squeeze Box.  Releasing their first album, “Fakevox” in 2001, they showed themselves to be of a very similar ilk to “Fantasma”-era Cornelius, but louder and faster.  Less beach boys here and far more cartoon and television theme songs.  As I’ve said in a previous post, this record is my favorite of the last decade and shows perfectly the movement of the Shibuya-kei scene towards the Ramones flavored new wave of bands like Polysics.  First up among the vids is a “live” t.v. performance that PTSB did of “Early Riser” off of 2001’s “Fakevox”.  The second is a fan made vid for one of the intro tracks off of 2004’s “Cartooom!”  Third is a homemade vid by NIJIURA for my favorite song on “Cartooom!”, “(f)ake” (sorz…can’t actually embed it, so click and watch it on youtube!)

So I think that about wraps up my post.  Not quite as epic this time, huh?  I hope you can see how my love of cheesy lounge pop transformed itself into an obsession with synth punk.  Anywayzzzz, good pop music is still good pop music.  So listen to something new for a change.