Monthly Listening: January 2022
This month's round-up of great new Japanese releases from Hikaru Utada, Crispy Camera Club, Tomggg and more
Hi! This is January’s Monthly Listening list, a quick rundown of new Japanese albums I checked out this month that I enjoyed. You can browse past Monthly Listenings in the archives.
Previously, the monthly playlists attached to these Monthly Listening lists have been an excuse for me to get somewhat selfish in terms of coverage. There’s no place for all these songs, but they all deserve to be shared, so let’s throw the rest on a playlist. Now, I really didn’t think or care much about whether or not people actually browsed them. I understand the playlists can overwhelming, if not a pure data dump, with upwards of 100 songs in every playlist.
What I wanted to do going into 2022 was put more curatorial consideration for each of these playlists, so they can actually be something of use. Every month, I will organize a top 40 song playlist of tracks I liked from the month—so kind of like the newsletter’s own monthly Top 40 chart. The songs will be loosely ranked, though I’d recommend you just put the playlist on shuffle and see what you get.
Here is January’s playlist. You can also access it here.
And further below are new releases I enjoyed from the month. Happy listening!
ANTI BLUE by ako
pop / R&B | ► “Joushou”
Placebo by ASP
punk / idol | ► “NO REASON”
FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD by Awesome &roid
pop punk / emo | ► “Yesterday”
W by Boris
doom metal | ► “Beyond Good and Evil”
Kisetsufuu by Crispy Camera Club
indie rock | ► “rock’n’roll wind”
BAD Mode by Hikaru Utada
pop / R&B | ► “BAD Mode”
Humanity by Koji Nakamura, foodman, Takashi Numaza
electronic / experimental | ► “no.2”
Sunset Park by KUNG-FU GIRL
indie rock | ► “Pet my head”
C Toshiikerumono by Regal Lily
indie rock | ► “Wakusei Trash”
Reflection EP by Riho Sayashi
pop / R&B | ► “Melt”
Dark Ritual by Shapeshifter
hardcore / powerviolence | ► “Black Liquid”
“Shapeshifter freely sidestep into other pockets of interest in between the brutal metal assault without a loss of edge or momentum, and the economic ways in which they cover so much ground do right by their very name.” —Read more about the album on issue #45.
Love of Plastic by Shinichi Atobe
house / techno | ► “Love of Plastic 5”
Asakusa Light by Soichi Terada
house | ► “Double Spire”
Same Place, Another Time EP by Soshi Takeda
deep house / vaporwave | ► “Analog Photography”
ALIENS EP by Taku Inoue
pop / EDM | ► “Sanji Juunifun” ft. Suisei Hoshimachi
counterpoint by Tomggg
electronic / pop | ► “License of Love” ft. kiki vivi lily
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Next issue of This Side of Japan is out February 9. You can check out previous issues of the newsletter here.
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