10 Japanese acts that would have been way way better choices than AKB48 for the Wreck-It Ralph soundtrack

I just saw that the super-creepy Japanese pop act AKB48 is on the soundtrack for the video game themed animated film Wreck-It Ralph*. While I suppose it should come as no surprise that such factory processed mega-sleaze could manage to shlerm its way onto the soundtrack (we are talking about Disney here after all), it does send this fanboy into something of a tailspin. Because for God's sake, there are exactly ONE ZILLION better Japanese acts to choose from for this sort of fun, nostalgic, vibrant love letter to video games. (I'm assuming most of that. Haven't seen it.)

So I took two seconds and wrote a list of the first ten acts I could think of. HERE IT IS, in order of relevance and everything, just in case you get bored of listening to incredibly awesome music halfway through like a moron who deserves total junk like AKB48 forced into your slack jaws and down your bloated food-chute.

*Looking up the correct punctuation is the beginning and ending of the research I did for this post.

#1 Sexy Synthesizer



If you get 15 seconds into this and don't know why it's number one then stop reading and smash your damn fool face into a brick wall until it's nap time. COME ON. Sexy Synthesizer is amazing and uses a handful of Namco arcade game sounds in just about every song he writes. Including Galaga which is the best game ever made. Disagree? See above advice.

You can hear his entire ROCK album below.



#2 Plugnet



THIS IS THE COOLEST CHIPTUNE ALBUM EVER CREATED. Why? LISTEN TO THE RAPPING OH MY GOD. Oh, and it should be obvious unless you're a dummy but Sexy Synthesizer had a hand in its creation. GOT MORE SPICES.

#3 Omodaka



OK, so we've been pretty spastic right out of the gate. Maybe what you'd expect. And then BOOOOM. Omodaka. That's right, funk-tastic chip driven funky funk courtesy of a Stevie Wonder bass line and some wickedly weird traditional folk singing layered over the top. If Disney really wanted to blow people's minds, THIS would be playing through Wreck-It (I'm too busy to bother with the Ralph and more) non-stop.

#4 YMCK



"Y! M! C! K! Let's go! Let's go! *clap clap* Y! M! C! K! Let's go! Let's go! *clap clap* Y! M! C! K! Let's go! Let's go! *clap clap* Y! M! C! K! Waaaaaaaa!"

I rest my case. (They also built their own chiptune software.)

#5 Perfume



I mean come on, it's called "Electro World" for crying out loud. And Perfume is HUUUGE. And waaay less creepy than those dead-eyed AKB slaves. Much more family-friendly and all that. And the bass line rules my soul.

#6 The Aprils



Alright, if the over-the-top commercialism is getting to you, then The Aprils are here to wash it away with a blissful wave of super duper cute synthpop. Absolutely non-ironic and just plain happy. All in a way only Japan can pull off. This should be the ending theme to every happy animated film, in my totally factual analysis.

#7 Halcali



Remember when people made good, clever videos? This is one of them! And it has blurred out Super Mario Bros in it! And it's an amazing song! COME ON GUYS JEEEZUS! AKB48? Really? When THIS IS A THING THAT EXISTS???

#8 Capsule



Screw Tron. THIS is what living in a video game from the 2000s would sound like.

#9 Floppy



Sorry if I fell off the chiptune tip for a second there. Back on track! Floppy brings a more rock/punk/weirdo vibe to their tunes. A nice foil to all the happy crappy girls, am I right? Look, we can all get along because chiptunes!

#10 Polysics



BECAUSE I WILL NOT REST UNTIL POLYSICS RULES THE ENTIRE WORLD. Because reasons, that's why.

So there you go. Take your stupid factory-pre-set J-pop and CHOKE.

Calendar 2010 - Omodaka - Live Stream

Bit of a different calendar post here. Just got word that electro-chiptune master Omodaka will be playing a show in Japan on Friday, June 25th. The cool thing is that sabaco radio will be live-streaming it on USTREAM.

Omodaka will be just one of a handful of artists playing. The show runs from 7pm-11pm in Japan, so that's 5am-9am Central time in the US. So make sure to set your bookmarks and alarm clocks now!

Omodaka / Far East Recording (沢瀉)

Omodaka and Far East Recording are both names used by one Soichi Terada.

Soichi has been producing a wide variety of electro/techno music since 1989. Browsing through his extensive discography is much like taking a lesson in electro history. He started out like many others in the early 90s with bare-bone, sample filled dance tracks. He gradually shifted into jungle/drum and bass territory with his "Sumo Jungle" series of albums. Much of his music featured bossa rhythms and other more sophisticated elements, propelling his tracks slightly further than the usual stagnant underground house and jungle tracks.

He continued to evolve his sound into a much more lively house realm, pushing the vocal element to the forefront. With his "Monkey Turn" single, he fused his older jungle style with a new, vocal-centric sort of cyber-house, with its robotized traditional style Japanese vocal track. After that he jumped straight into a Daft Punk style of upbeat house tracks with more traditional Japanese folk vocals courtesy of Kanazawa Akiko (I highly recommend checking out the video diaries on her site.) He also slowly incorporated the current trend of using modern/retro 8-bit sounds, eventually creating songs made entirely of vintage video game music tracks. While these songs would be great on their own as instrumentals, the addition of Kanzawa's anachronistic traditional vocals makes for a truly unique mix.

So far Soichi has released only one full album and two EPs featuring his new sound under the name Omodaka. The album CANTATA No.147 is basically a collection of singles (including his excellent version of Bach's Cantata No. 147.) The Favorite Games EP is a natural evolution, pushing the vocals to the bleeding edge and even including some acoustic guitar among the retro-bleeps. Plum Song follows suit, with the same pop sound with a bit more experimentation mixed in.

Omodaka has made a very strong showing at live shows in America. As part of the otherwise all-girl Japan Nite tour, Omodaka has wowed audiences with his odd stage show featuring recorded video of Akiko singing and his own version of shrine-maiden clothing, compete with a spooky mask.

With the amount of attention his work is getting, and (perhaps) more notably the excellent videos that accompany much of his music and a growing number of high profile remixes for the likes of Ram Rider, YMCK and Perfume, we can be sure that we'll be hearing (and seeing) a lot more from Omodaka / Far East Recording in the future.

BUY OMODAKA RELEASES AT AMAZON, HEARJAPAN AND ITUNES

[Photo by Ace0fClub5]

Kokiriko Bushi



Far East Recording
Power of Terada
Twitter

Major Releases
Omodaka - Plum Song EP (2010)
Omodaka - Favorite Games EP (2008)
Omodaka - CANTATA No.147 (2006)
Far East Recording - SUMO JUNGLE GURANDEUR
Far East Recording - SUN SHOWER REMIXES
Far East Recording - NEWS AND OLDIES 1996
Far East Recording - FAR EAST RECORDING 2
Far East Recording - FAR EAST RECORDING

Plum Song


Yosawya-san


Kyotei Zinc (video mix)


Kyotei Daiski


Cantata No. 147


Fortunate 1 Mark


Live


Live @ Holy 8bit Night 1/4


Live @ Holy 8bit Night 2/4


Live @ Holy 8bit Night 3/4


Live @ Holy 8bit Night 4/4


[update 4/28/10]

Review: OMODAKA - Plum Song EP

Big news! OMODAKA has just released a new four song EP called Plum Song.

Is it any good?

Check out Japanator for my full review, as well as links to listen, watch and buy.

FLOPPY

FLOPPY is a chiptune/8-bit/electro project from Sharaku Kobayashi of Metronome and Hiromu Toda of Shinjuku Gewalt. Since 2004, they've been producing some of the best and craziest chip-fueled electro mayhem around. Their somewhat retro-futurist sound is highlighted by their goofy no-budget sci-fi costumes and the music's dreamy yet chaotic atmosphere.

Their songs are mostly made up of fast beats and stuttering lo-bit bleeps, burbling with video game blasts and arpeggiated bass-lines. FLOPPY has always put a little extra effort into their programing, never relying too heavily on loops and factory pre-set sounds. This serves to give their songs a more organic feel, though it can be hard to hear through all the electronic cross-talk. They are able to restrain themselves at times, occasionally achieving something along the lines of a grand Susumu Hirasawa epic. Most often though, they stick to their usual cartoon cat chasing a cartoon mouse sort of vibe. Stompy, silly and fun. Of course thought it all Sharaku Kobayashi's voice adds another level of geek-pop, what with his whiny pitch and pouty delivery.

FLOPPY managed to transcend the usual chip-tune stereotypes. They make genuinely good music using tools more often used to make much more trendy and obviously niche tunes. It proves its members are actually songwriters and musicians, rather than gamers who just happen to be able to mash a few notes together.

BUY FLOPPY RELEASES AT JAPANFILES, HEARJAPAN and CDJAPAN

"Everything"



Official Site

Members:
Sharaku Kobayashi - Vocals, Programming
Hiromu Toda - Programming

Albums:
PROTOSCIENCE - 2010
Deus Ex Machina - 2009
Sine Wave Orchestra - 2006

Review: Floppy - Deus ex Machina

FLOPPY is a chiptune/8-bit/electro project from Sharaku Kobayashi of Metronome and Hiromu Toda of Shinjuku Gewalt. Since 2004, they've been producing some of the best and craziest chip-fueled electro mayhem around. Their somewhat retro-futurist sound is highlighted by their goofy no-budget sci-fi costumes and the music's dreamy yet chaotic atmosphere.

Their growing popularity is only highlighted by the fact the both JapanFiles and HearJapan are stocking up on the new album Deus Ex Machina, offering it up to fans around the world. You can get it right now on both sites.

If you're still on the fence, or are a newcomer to the FLOPPY world, check out the full Deus Ex Machina review at Japanator!

YMCK

YMCK are arguably one of the more popular chip-tune bands in the world. Their songs are composed almost exclusively with the NES 8bit music chip. In fact, the group developed their very own software called Magical 8bit Plug that replicates the same sounds as the original Famicom system on modern-day desktops.

They manage to not only make their songs incredibly fun and poppy, but densely layered and complex. They take a page from the standard jazz handbook and make their songs swing like crazy, while at the same time holding true to their more rigid 8bit roots.

Singer Midori's whispery, smooth vocals coat the jazzy beats in pure pop sugar and add to the band's overall sense of childish playfulness. While other twee bedroom-pop bands might settle for simple song structures, YMCK goes much much further in developing their songs. The main melodies may be simple and catchy, but all of the underlying tracks are rather complex and never settle for the easy way out. They are continuously on the move up and down scales and arpeggios, tracing elaborate constellations through low-fi starfields.

YMCK has had a lot of success playing live festivals around the globe, like the Blip Festival in New York. While their core sound has evolved little over the years, the quality of their recordings and complexity of their songs continues to grow, not to mention their rabid fanbase.

BUY YMCK RELEASES HERE

"Go YMCK Go"



Official Site
MySpace

Members:
Midori - Vocal
Yokemura - Music, Lyrics, Arrangement
Nakamura - Music Video

Albums:
Family Music - 2004
FAMILY RACING - 2005
FAMILY GENESIS - 2008
YMCK SONGBOOK: songs before 8bit - 2008
FAMILY COOKING - 2009

"Magical 8bit Tour"


"Milky Blue"


"Panic Racer"


"Cette Annee"

August 09 Calendar - Halko Momoi - Aya Revolution (UK)

August 14-16
Halko Momoi

Aya Revolution - Warwick University - Coventry, UK

Source: Aya Revolution

Album Review: 8bit Prophet

The made up singing-idol-in-a-box known as Hatsune Miku has long been a subject of great interest around these parts, not to mention just about all of Japan. Her influence has spread across all genres, even spawning several new versions and like-minded characters.

TM Network began its life in the early '80s, making synth-pop and upbeat rock songs. After taking a bit of a break in the '90s, they managed to get back together just before the turn of the century.

Chiptunes, those delightfully nostalgic songs made from the sound systems embedded in retro gaming devices, have always been popular, at least among a certain crowd.

Now, all three of these great tastes are smooshed together into one awesome collection from VORC Records. Titled 8bit Prophet: TM Network Tribute - Generated by Chiptuine & Vocaloid, the album consists of eleven songs from a wide range of chiptune producers, wrapped into one incredibly beautiful package (illustrated by TOKIYA.)

Follow me over to Japanator for a full review and sound clips!

Album Review - 8bit Project - Spicy Innovator vs Superior Marionette

Quick, what do (deep breath) Perfume, Michael Jackson, Exile, Utada Hikaru, Ai Otsuka, Studio Ghibli, Southern All Stars, Juicy Fruits, Coldplay, Raiders of the Lost Arc, Led Zeppelin, Yellow Magic Orchestra and many more all have in common? (gasp)

Well, nothing really.

Until now!

Because now they can all be linked by the power of 8bit chiptune music! Ah yes, the glue that sometime seems to hold the very fabric of the universe together has spawned yet another compilation full of both incredible and very clever covers of some classic (and not-so-classic) songs.

The album Spicy Innovator vs Superior Marionette (see, isn't that clever, now?) was put together by a group going by the innocuous name of 8bit Project. This humble name actually obscures a rather intimidating trio consisting of Ito Toshiharu (of Mansfield), Matsutake Hideki (Logic System and the sound programmer and so-called fourth member of the highly influential 1970s-80s Japanese electro super-group Yellow Magic Orchestra) and Saito Hisahi (of YMO cover band Y Setsu O). Spicy Innovator is the group's second full release (they've also recently remixed Shoko Nakagawa). It seems to take the previous effort to a whole new level of insanity across twenty one tracks of pure 8bit overload. Sure, it may be over twenty tracks, but some of those tracks consist of five song medleys! This is, like, fifty songs, people!

If you're not already running over to HearJapan to download it or to CDJapan to get the CD (either of which I can assure you, without hesitation, is the right thing to do) then follow me after the jump to get a bit (ha ha) more background on what's going on here. Then go buy it.


There is far too much going on here to do any sort of play-by-play, so instead, the highlights.

[NOTE: All video clips are the original songs, not the 8bit covers. Just in case that wasn't screamingly obvious...]

Perfume "Polyrythm"


The album kicks off with two of the strongest tracks, both a Perfume medley and a Michael Jackson medley. The Perfume track consists of four of the singing-trio's most recent singles, “Polyrythm,” “Chocolate Disco,” “Baby Cruising Love” and “Love the World.” While none of these are really any sort of revelation when presented in 8bit form, (they are an electro/chiptune-ish band already) it will nevertheless instantly get you into the right frame of mind for the onslaught to follow. Much more shocking, and simply wonderful, is the Michael Jackson material that follows. “Bad,” “Beat It” and “Thriller” are an ascending scale of perfection (come on, a chip version of an Eddie VanHalen guitar solo?!), culminating with the album's coolest trick. When it's time for Vincent Price to give his monologue at the end of “Thriller,” 8bit Project chooses to instead use the default text-crawl blips sound heard in so many early 8 and 16 bit games. It's an obvious yet at the same time surprising gimmick, topped off with a very lo-bit laughing sample at the end that you won't be able to help but giggle at yourself. This track alone is worth the entire price of the album.

Utada Hikaru "Beautiful World"


Then there's the Utada Hikaru medley, complete with an overt Final Fantasy break and Galaga sound effects, the Ai Otsuka “Tsubomi” cover with its Metroid backdrop, and the classic pop song “Hajimete no Chu” with a ton of Kid Icarus callbacks. All of the myriad of classic game samples and homages are handled with subtly and class, so much so that you'll probably often find yourself wracking your brain to solve that “where the hell I have I heard this before?” feeling.

Yellow Magic Orchestra "Computer Games"


While some of the tracks on Spicy Innovator might leave non-Japanese music fans scratching their heads, there are also plenty of more “universal” hits for the rest of the world. The most obvious being Coldplay's “Viva La Vida,” followed by the main themes from Raiders of the Lost Ark and even a complete (though slightly compact) version of Led Zeppelin's “Stairway to Heaven.” The whole thing ends with an unsurprisingly brilliant medley of Yellow Magic Orchestra tracks. It's a perfect choice, since they are the ones who (unofficially) started the movement toward seeing video game music as something serious and something to love.

That's the real story here, too. Sure, some 8bit versions of “normal” songs can be the most tired and worn out hack move for shallow musicians to make. Anyone can run something though a modded NES and people will be there to blindly flock to their side. Here, it's the obvious love for the genre and the craft of making these songs that sends 8bit Project and Spicy Innovator vs Superior Marionette far beyond the also-rans. It's full of both silly fun and professional production. The sound of a few old-school electro masters playing around and relaxing with some of their favorite games and songs, and doing it better than anyone else. This is an album that any fan of the genre should buy right now, end of story.

May Calendar - Halko Momoi - FanimeCon 2009

May 22-25
Halko Momoi

FanimeCon 2009
San Jose, CA

Source: FanimeCon

February Calendar - YMCK & Aural Vampire - Katsucon '09

February 13-15
YMCK & Aural Vampire
Katsucon 15 - Arlington, VA

Source - Katsucon

YMCK


Aural Vampire

The Aprils (エイプリルズ )

Effortlessly moving from electro-disco, to folky rock, to 8-bit chiptunes (with the help of YMCK,) The Aprils are a factory of cute, catchy and creative music. Switching between equally light male and female vocals, The Aprils conjure up electric Takashi Murakami landscapes full of gummy bears and happy anime aliens.

Formed in 1999, the trio quickly established their own unique sound. While they have elements of Shibuya-kei, namely the jazzy, upbeat bossa rhythms and crazy sampling a la Pizzicato Five, they mainly focus on electronic sounds. Classic 8-bit bleeps and buzzes from Nintendo's NES era are the most prominent element, along with other retro influenced sounds making up the bulk of their sonic pallet. Perhaps it's not surprising the they've worked along side other like mined artists like YMCK, Strawberry Machine and Plus-Tech Squeeze Box in the past. Still, they are far from your standard synth-pop band. They do incorporate actual guitars and drums, as well as well polished duel lead vocals, giving them a much more personal and “human” feel.

The tone of most of their songs is upbeat and bright, full of rainbows and Technicolor pandas, a toy box of musical ear candy. They temper the unabashed positiveness with a slightly melancholy mood from time to time, but it's a rarely used tactic. More a preciousness than a sadness. Their spaced-out tracks are more about a blissed-out quietness than an inward self-examination. Even their more obviously poppy tracks like "Cosmo '80s" seem to have a slightly darker edge. Their videos show that same art-school pop mentality with pandas and other cute, childlike animals playing a major role. (They do have both a song and an album titled “Panda” after all.)

After releasing three albums in three years, not to mention their various collaborations and touring, The Aprils have taken a much need break. They are currently working on their fourth album.

Kirameki Moon Diver


Buy The Aprils' releases here!


Official Site

Members:
Kentaro Imai - Vocal, Guitar
Miho Iguchi - Vocal, Synthesizer
Yuhki Shotokuji - Drums

Releases:
Astro - 2003
Pan-da - 2004
Space Dream Bathroom - 2005

Time After Time


Panda


Aprils In Stereo


Live


Live


Live


Kentaro singing live with Marino