Issue #70: Journey
Exploring the new Yurufuwa Gang album, X JAPAN's first number-one and favorite J-drama tie-ins of the year
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Half way into my year with J-dramas, the keepers have been slight and great combos of show and title tracks even slighter. Admittedly, not every show can be like last year’s Elpis: Kibou, Aruiwa Wazawai and its ambitious music direction, which with the help of STUTS and his commissioned band Mirage Collective produced five different, ever-evolving versions of the same song for its ending credits. And sometimes, an artist can’t be convinced no matter how great the show: as much as I loved Nichiyo No Yoru Gurai Wa as well as the trio of actresses driving it, I still can’t be persuaded even a little bit by Mrs. Green Apple.
But a lovely rom-com did get me to listen to SEKAI NO OWARI, another band I didn’t bother with in the past. Another show managed an impressive feat in delivering great songs for both the opening and ending rolls. TV can reward with discoveries to new J-pop music, and here are some of that in play.
“Hoho Ni Hitokuchi” by kojikoji [A.S.A.B. / BROTH WORKS]
from Kashimashi Meshi (Mondays, 11p.m., April 10 - May 29; TV Tokyo)
At a glance, Kashimashi Meshi resembles the many other dramas today operating in the genre of food and cooking. But while it often features some delicious-looking food, the show doesn’t focus much on the preparation of the meal. Kashimashi Meshi instead explores why we gather around the table to dine together through the friendship of newly reunited ex-college mates Chiharu (Atsuko Maeda), Nakamura (Riko Narumi) and Eiji (Akihisa Shiono). As an ara-saa myself, I personally found vicarious comfort in seeing characters in their late 20s rekindle a relationship long after college as life presents increasingly less opportunities to develop new social bonds.
“I don’t need any answers / I just want someone to listen to me about my day,” kojikoji sings in “Hoho Ni Hitokuchi,” the ending theme to Kashimashi Meshi. The hushed, acoustic-strummed R&B tune is comparatively low key to the show’s opening theme, KIRINJI’s also-great lite-funk jingle “nestling.” It’s made to slot into those quiet, vulnerable moments depicted in the show where we’d prefer to wade through with the presence of another. Lucky for the trio, they’re safe in the knowledge that they will be welcomed by company once they get home after a bad day. A round of delicious food, too, might be in stores.
Listen to it on Spotify.
“Butterfly Effect” by SEKAI NO OWARI [Universal]
from Watashi No Oyomekun (Wednesdays, 10 p.m., April 12 - June 21; Fuji TV)
SEKAI NO OWARI became impossible to ignore thanks to last year’s “Habit.” For someone who had spent little time with the band’s music prior, the viral smash introduced a sardonic, anti-social band whose rise in popularity being driven by social-media chatter proved almost too ironic. With that kind of impression in mind, it seemed rather uncharacteristic for the band to handle opening and ending song duties for a cartoonish rom-com like Watashi No Oyomekun, let alone writing a twinkling country-pop tune like “Butterfly Effect.”
If anything about the personality behind “Habit” carries over in “Butterfly Effect,” it’s in the insecurities and self-diagnosing tendencies exhibited by the narrator. The chugging drum beat and twangy riffs brighten the scene on the surface, but the lyric sheet displays countless episodes of mishaps and falling face first. “I wonder why / I’m unbelievably clumsy / the days are just repeats of mistakes and regrets,” they sing a confession you can also easily assign as dialogue from either of the main couple of Watashi No Oyomekun.
The sour, judgmental narrator of “Habit” would likely scoff at Watashi No Oyomekun and its wholesome comedy. More than its twists of the rom-com gender role, of the younger man (Mahiro Takasugi) as the housewife and the older woman (Haru) as the breadwinner, its cast of side characters who love to butt in the relationship keeps the growing office love an entertaining development. It’s going to be very difficult for any new drama this year to top Sawa Nimura as Akamine, the diabolical colleague whose obsessive admiration for Haru’s Honoka inspires her to go a great, comical length to block any undesirables to get near her beloved workplace idol. In between spring dramas exploring more existential ennui, the comedy of Watashi No Oyumekun offered a fine reprieve.
Turquoise / Saraba / Butterfly Effect is out now. Listen to it on Spotify.
Heads up, I’ll be taking a break all of August from This Side of Japan. Idol Watch might still be dropping on time at the end of next month, but to be honest, I have not started on production of that issue at all. Some things have started to take priority, writing-wise but also life-wise, so I think it’s a good time to take a little break.
Apologies on Album of the Week being small. I was thinking of not writing anything since I was on a real crunch time—this issue is already a day late—but I managed a capsule review at least. I wanted to get this issue out mostly for this issue’s Oricon flashback: it’s actually a song I’ve been playing this year, partly thanks to me seeing The Last Rockstars live—is that a good enough hint yet? The hip-hop continues down the singles, though, if the album review seemed a little slight on content.
Happy listening!
Album of the Week
Journey by Yurufuwa Gang [YRFW LTD]
*Recommended track: “Far Away” | Listen to it on Spotify
NENE checks on her voice messages during the halfway point of her latest album, Journey as one-half of Yurufuwa Gang. The exchange finds another voice missing the times spent with her and the group; “Let’s party together soon, cosmic friend,” she replies before the other hits back with equal excitement. The short conversation in the interlude “Cosmic Chat” serves as a centerpiece to a document of the rap duo’s head space in recent years: while partying has always been on the agenda, Yurufuwa Gang has approached their lifestyle increasingly with a spiritual, if not sentimental bent, remembering to give thanks for the precious time given on Earth.
The duo seem self-aware of their nomadic, hippie-like public personas with the theme of travel informing the album from the title to its featured tracks. While it provides glamorous setting for its flexing in “California Sunshine” and exotic atmosphere in “Electric People,” their wanderlust is best utilized as a source for bewilderment. Ryugo Ishida captivates in “Bon Voyage” by telegraphing wide-eyed awe as much as self-aggrandizement, displaying a wholesome sense of excitement and a charming naivete from how he tries to comprehend the vastness of the world and the seemingly infinite possibilities on offer.
“Far Away” presents the most touching moment as NENE self-reflects on her come-up. In between a boasting of her playground going international, she tucks in a quick yet memory-searing recollection that reminds me of Jeezy’s opening bars in “Thug Motivation 101”: “I was in the car writing lyrics / now I’m on a plane writing lyrics.” The mellow beat softens the duo’s biggest flexes into casual cataloging, with them sounding as though they are at a remove from their new lifestyle at points. Yurufuwa Gang know how to have fun and indulge in Journey, but their insistence not to take their moments for granted inspires music that compels in whole new ways.
Singles Club
“Intelligent Bad Bwoy” by BIM ft. C.O.S.A., Daigos [SUMMIT]
This year has been constantly handing me reasons to contemplate about how big of an influence UK music has been for Japan’s rap scene, and BIM’s new collaboration with C.O.S.A. will keep me occupied on the thought for a little longer. Daigos’s low-key beat draws from UK bass and garage from its fat, wonky bass line to its slinky drums. The music video, meanwhile, frames BIM as some kind of MC behind a pirate radio broadcast, delivering a rapid-fire series of rhyme in a dimly lit control room. Sure, the music is no grime by the way of fellow rapper ralph despite his crew all assembled in a combo of black parka and running sneakers, but BIM and C.O.S.A. seems inspired here from 2000s Rinse FM than the boom-bap or rattling trap that interests their peers.
Listen to it on Spotify.
See also: “DOSHABURI” by kZm ft. JUMADIBA; “BUST A MOVE” by ONJUICY & Submerse
“My Life” by Mall Boyz [self-released]
For their anthem marking their return as Mall Boyz, Tohji and gummyboy embrace an even shinier, larger-than-life sound. The neo-swag rap of the first Mall Tape evolves into dreamy dance-pop music informed by trance and Europop—an influence not too surprising if you’ve heard Tohji’s T-Mix last year. Their chase for thrill in “My Life” is hedonistic as summer anthems can get yet it also hits as a rather wholesome pursuit when driven by such sweet melodies and glossy synths. The world seems fully for the taking once Tohji croons the titular lyric in the chorus, stretching the phrase as vast and infinite as the possibilities offered by the season.
Mall Tape 2 is out now. Listen to it on Spotify.
See also: “Cho Fast” by GOSHI ft. Yurufuwa Gang & ralph; “SWAG” by JUBEE & Yohji Igarashi ft. Mori of Dongurizu
“no rhyme nor reason” by TOGENASHI TOGEARI [UNIVERSAL SIGMA]
Fellow Bang! Dream fans shouldn’t be too blindsided by the release schedule behind the upcoming anime Girls Band Cry with its central band TOGENASHI TOGEARI and its music released in advance of the actual attached show: like Bandori, the anime seems so far only a part, rather than the center, of a grand universe that is the Girls Band Cry project. And yet it rings curious in the wake of Bocchi the Rock and the hit success of Kessoku Band at the beginning of this year, or at the very least reminiscent of it since both the 2D bands crib from similar alt-rock styles.
If the spiky guitars of TOGENASHI TOGEARI’s debut single “no rhyme nor reason” doesn’t sound more caustic than Kessoku Band’s songs, the lyrics and, really, overall personality scans way more maudlin than Bocchi and the gang. The depressive nature is partly by design: the brief press release lists a rather miserable biography of one betrayed by her friends and another abandoned by their parents, and rock music ostensibly acts as not just a hobby but an all-or-nothing salve. But for all of the emotional stakes, it doesn’t toll on the music in the slightest with its razor-sharp guitars moving lithe as it does urgent. With songs this solid, the anime seems almost a bonus.
Listen to it on Spotify.
See also: “Kimi Ni Naritakatta” by Blue Journey; “Hitoshizuku” by MyGO!!!!
This Week in 1994…
“Rusty Nail” by X JAPAN [Atlantic, 1994]
No. 1 during the weeks of July 18 - 25, 1994 | Listen to it on YouTube
The vulnerability on display in the chorus of “Rusty Nail” took me back at first. “I wonder how many times I have to let these tears fall / so I can forget you,” TOSHI laments in X JAPAN’s first-ever Oricon number-one. It’s easy to get swept up by the ferocity of heavy metal, even more so with X JAPAN during the late ‘80s. The band’s hunger for chaos in a song inspires an imposing yet thrilling sense of terror: take the relentless speed-metal riffs and double-pedal drums in their pseudo-title track, “X.” But their indulgence in aggressive music can also put on an impression of them being an act in opposition with emotional softness, especially when TOSHI mean-mugs you from the stage looking like this.
Concluding X JAPAN as an anti-emotion kind of act, though, would be a huge misunderstanding. It’s worth remembering that the song following “X” in the band’s landmark album Blue Blood is “Endless Rain,” a 7-minute piano ballad where TOSHI yearns to be cleansed of “all of the hate, all of the sadness.” One of their most known songs, “Kurenai,” is a thrash-metal elegy to a love lost forever. Metal is all about the exploration of the heart and psyche, and X JAPAN’s music is no different.
YOSHIKI can’t help but write in an earnest, sometimes painfully sentimental mode as a lyricist to this day, and yet his lyrics befits TOSHI as its vocalist. Armed with a grandiose yet graceful voice, TOSHI is a magnificent balladeer as he is a thrash-metal frontman. His voice practically call for lyrics nothing smaller in scale than the most monumental declarations. Despite the early image of the band as a lawless punk entity—or because of?—the singer also comes across as a dignified soul, who upholds a deep respect for love and brotherhood. And so while the ironclad metal riffs of “Rusty Nail” suggests a steeliness to his character, TOSHI displays a raw emotional tremble in the chorus that feels true to his person.
The band’s appetite for speed is admittedly better displayed elsewhere, like their future number-one “DAHLIA” from the same album. But for “Rusty Nail,” they write a rather concise rock tune without restraining their strengths. Steady in comparison to their past works, sure, and more polished in its mix, but that main riff packs as much punch as their best. Five minutes should scan as being incredibly lean for their standards, too, coming after the half-hour epic “ART OF LIFE” or their previous single, the 10-minute orchestral ballad “Tears.”
From the accessibility of the music to a slim-down in structure, “Rusty Nail” can be understood as X JAPAN gone pop. Not the most outlandish description when the song served as a title track to a drama, but by 1994, X JAPAN had already been a phenomon in popular culture. If the band didn’t have to doctor its ferocity to land on Kouhaku Utagassen few years prior, and if their nearly 30-minute song can land number-one on the Oricon album charts, all their moves qualified as “going pop.” Thirty years later, that’s personally still an astounding thought to sit with: when I was watching morning TV in Japan, I saw a comedian cut vegetables while singing “Rusty Nail” as a dumb gag. This pained metal song, sung by the most imposing frontman, as fodder for TV filler at 9 a.m. on a Monday—it’s astonishing, really.
You can listen to all of the songs covered so far in this section in this playlist here.
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