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https://j1muzak.wordpress.com as an experiment.

CNBLUE - In My Head

I wasn't really paying CNBLUE any attention at all but that giant promo truck that's been doing the rounds in Shibuya has done its job very well...

The only past experience I had with CNBLUE's music in any form was Yonghwa's Banmal Song from the WGM series, so this single was a chance to discover for myself what they had to offer. I at least hoped they wouldn't be as cheesy as labelmates F.T.Island, whose bizarre mix of boyband pop, rap and rock never fails to make me laugh.

On first evidence, In My Head proves a very strong case for itself - with a confident Maroon 5-like swagger about it, its insistently catchy chorus line lodges itself inside your brain and refuses to move. I like it a lot!

The c/w tracks don't manage to hit such heady heights though; the Beatles-esque MR.KIA trundles along inoffensively (and unnoticed) and I didn't even realize it was in English until I looked the lyrics up LOL. Rain is Blessing can at least claim to have half its lyrics in English and half in Japanese, but it's got that kind of cheesy '90s overblown MOR rock-styled ballad feel to it - the kind of song I used to listen to when I was a heartbroken emo teenager. Not quite my kind of thing these days.

Still, I'm quite impressed by the single as a whole. Time to go dip into CNBLUE's back catalogue and see if I can root out any other gems...

#cnblue

BUMP OF CHICKEN - Zero

Wow, just wow. I can't remember the last time I felt this strongly about a BUMP song...probably Planetarium. I wasn't really aware of Zero's status as a Final Fantasy theme but that shortened, acoustic opening version found on this single just doesn't do the song justice IMO, lacking the majesty and grandeur of the original's arrangement.

If the world was fair then the boys would beat the crap out of NMB48 in the charts but well. When was the music industry ever fair?

Ahh, now to find out if I can grab a ticket to their December lives at AX. Fingers crossed...

#bump of chicken

Coldplay - Mylo Xyloto

Hooray for being based in Japan, where English-language albums regularly get released earlier than anywhere else! But first of all, let me make a confession:

I haven't consciously listened to Coldplay since their X&Y album.

That's more than 6 years ago now, both to my surprise (wow, that long ago?) and horror (oh my god, I'm inching ever closer to the big 3-0).

I was really curious about Mylo Xyloto though, having chanced upon the first single Every Teardrop is a Waterfall a couple of months back and finding myself quite liking it. How wonderfully different it sounds compared to all those tiresome tinkly piano ballads! And what else have we got on the album...hip-hop beats, folk and...Rihanna? Very quaint indeed. Still, Chris Martin & co are very much in the business of crafting perfect pop - they're just wrapping up their lovely little songs in prettier, more elaborate packaging. It's something I can totally go for though.

Maybe I need to go fill in the gap and sample the Viva la Vida album to see if I missed anything in those 6 years...

#coldplay

Girls' Generation - The Boys

Challenge for this post: remain objective.

I guess you could say I fall into the category of a 'hardcore' Soshi fan right at this moment, with pretty much every spare dollar I have going towards contributing to whatever amount of peanuts SM Entertainment is paying the girls, or putting money into their wig fund or helping out with fees for their English lessons.

Having said that, I only really become a fan of the group since that stunner of a Japanese album they released so I was really hoping that The Boys would build on that good work - bringing their Korean music up to date with a mature sound to match their slicker, more sophisticated visual image.

The signs were promising - all that hype & publicity surrounding the Teddy Riley-penned title track was justified when the full version was unleashed and it turned out to be an absolutely stonker of a song with its relentless catchy, in-your-face hooks. I can't say I feel the same way about the rest of the album though. As I feared, a lot of the songs venture into diabetes-inducing bubblegum pop territory, which was what made me loathe their music circa Baby Baby in the first place. Sigh.

Notes: ・The intro of Say Yes blatantly rips off Ben E. King's Stand by Me, not to mention the opening English lines sound like something written by a lovestruck teenager with overly active hormones. ・I can only imagine that Lazy Girl was included for the sole reason of having dear Sica sing the 'I'm a lazy girl' line. It sounds like the sort of song my parents boogied down to in some dinky nightclub with a shifting mud floor, back in the '70s. ・Vitamin has the most epic instrumental opening of the tracks on the album, before we're brought back down to earth by the cheesiness of the music from the Vita commercial. So misleading... ・The inclusion of the Korean version of Mr.Taxi is wholly unnecessary, the song just doesn't fit in with the overall mood of the album. ・The ballads (How Great is Your Love, Sunflower) go down pretty well, but they're not on the level of Complete or Mistake. ・Telepathy is just so bad '80s disco. ・Imagine yourself wearing a bright pink summer dress & a straw hat with picnic basket in hand, skipping through a field of sunflowers...My J would be your perfect theme song at that moment. ・Trick is the best song (that is not The Boys) on the album by a country mile. It works the autotune to good effect, is snappy and has a purpose - to get you on the dancefloor. ・After Trick, I'd nominate Top Secret as my favourite album track - I like its retro feel, the harmonies during the chorus and most of all, Hyoyeon's rap. ・Oscar is nearly ruined by its similarity to the material of a certain someone named Britney Spears as well as its rather amusing nursery rhyme-like lyrics, but it just about works. Just about.

After some consideration, I would say at least that The Boys is the best of their 3 Korean albums so far, music-wise. If I were to score it on a 10-point scale, I'd say a smack-in-the-middle 5 based on initial impressions. That opinion might change over time though, so watch this space to find out how much more I grow to love or hate the songs...when the inevitable repackaged album hits.

For now I'll just sit back and re-watch the music videos, anticipating the day I get to watch some of these songs performed live (while waiting for my copies of the album to arrive >_>).

#snsd

marble - Utatane

I have never been marble's greatest fan. It seems the duo often are prone to choosing the path of least creative resistance, resulting in a sound that is far too lightweight to leave a positive or rather, any sort of impression upon me. Weak songs, weak melodies, snoozy arrangements...let's just say the only purpose I find for their material is as a potential cure for insomnia.

Utatane gives marble a chance to remedy that though - take a bunch of classic anime theme songs, give them an iyashikei makeover...can't go wrong, can't you? And they certainly don't, their gentle covers of Seikan Hikou (Macross F) and Sora kara Koboreta Story (Sherlock Hound) possessing an irresistibly quaint charm and dreaminess about them.

Ah, this year is certainly turning out to be an interesting one in terms of anisong releases...there's so much more I have yet to explore though. お楽しみ～

#marble

Wheesung - They are Coming

Maybe it's because this represents his 'final' release before his army enlistment next month, but Wheesung has really outdone himself with 놈들이 온다. About time too - he's been giving away his best songs to the likes of SHINee, Seven and G.NA over the last few years after all.

Previous albums tended to be patchy affairs with the odd highlight here and there, but They are Coming is flawless from start to finish - kicking off with Ailee's smooth rap on the title track, through to storming dancefloor-filler MUSIC and finishing up with the laidback reggae feel of Oh Lonely.

I think you'll be hard pressed to find a better Korean r'n'b release this year.

#wheesung

Various - SKET DANCE KAIMEI ROCK FESTIVAL

When I first read this arc in the manga I was really curious on how Tatsunoko would handle it in the anime - would the music the school bands played at the cultural festival actually turn out to be listenable? Turns out I needn't have worried at all.

Have to say that I'm a little surprised they kept on the seiyuu to provide vocals for most of the acts (obviously apart from the pre-auditioned The Sketchbook), though I suppose it does help when you've got a rock superstar voicing one of the characters ie GACKT doing Dante.

Be it by luck or by design, Sket Dance is blessed with seiyuu who can actually sing - the likes of Toyoguchi Megumi (Yabasawa), Kosugi Jurota (J-son sensei) and Nojima Kenji (Shinba) breeze through their songs with no trouble and even those who can't really sing (hello there Kayano Ai) get a helping hand by being autotuned beyond recognition.

With that troublesome ear-shattering vocal problem that permeates most anime character songs out of the way, what we get from the KAIMEI ROCK FESTIVAL is a really fun, energetic album, just as a school cultural festival should be. Especially love that YABASU! version of YABASAWABOOKS's 豪華絢爛ヤバヤバス - mad respect to Megu for managing to make the phrase 'Yabasu' sound cool even when repeated endlessly!

#anisong

KOTOKO - Hiraku Uchuu Pocket

I only needed 1 or 2 listens to Hiraku Uchuu Pocket to know for sure that it's the best album KOTOKO's made in her decade-long career thus far. That might not seem like high praise when you consider the fact that the four LPs that preceded it were...well, not very good.

This happens to be KOTOKO's first album release since switching to Warner Home Video, a new label founded by Kawase Kohei, ex-employee of her former label Geneon. It's also her first completely self-produced record (previous releases were handled by I've sound) so with greater control over proceedings, Hiraku Uchuu Pocket finds KOTOKO venturing outside the I've circle to experiment and expand her sound, collaborating with the likes of kz (livetune), Saito Shinya & DECO*27.

The I've tracks remind as typically I've as ever which should go some way to pleasing long-time fans, but it's the less conventional songs like the excellent 8 & 1/2 minute trance track Command+S (in partnership with the multi-talented animator/illustrator/musician Hiroyuki Oda) and the dark, slow-burning masayoshi minoshima-arranged mirror garden that make Hiraku Uchuu Pocket essential listening.

#KOTOKO

Hawaaii - Two Tickets Please

When I ventured back into Kpop earlier this year, one of the first voices to catch my ear was that of Earip's - sweet and lilting, like a gentle breeze (no, really). She's a veteran in the Korean indie scene having released a couple of albums as part of Sweater as well as pursuing her own solo career, and Hawaaii is a side project featuring Earip and gipsy&fish guitarist Lee Ho Seok.

Their first album 티켓 두 장 주세요 was released in mid-August and I shamefully did not give it a good listen until recently - what a mistake. Such a gorgeous set of stripped-down songs, often with just 1 or 2 guitars accompanying vocals from either Earip or Ho Seok. Goes to show you don't need to spend months & millions of won twiddling knobs to produce orgasmic sounds. Ahhhh, this album so deserves a spot on my quarterly best-of list...guess it'll have to wait a few more months before I rectify that with my annual lists.

Word of warning though - finding info about Hawaaii (하와이) can be fairly hard what with how similar their name sounds to a certain popular holiday destination...but despair not! You can find some of their live performances on Youtube starting from here.

#hawaaii #earip

Hoover's Ooover - Kotae wa 156-page

Really, the style of music Hoover's Ooover makes is oh so charming. Unfortunately, every single track they produce has the distinction of sounding exactly the same as something else they've recorded in the past.

This fact hit home pretty hard when I went to watch them live a few months ago - despite enjoying their set, I could not recognize a single song they played by name and trying to rack my brains by cycling through their albums only served to confuse me even more with how similar everything sounded.

The same can be said of Kotae wa 156-page, their 5th full length album. It's all so cheery, so catchy, so hummable, yet so, so familiar. Fine for first-time listeners but for people familiar with Hoover's Ooover - it's déjà vu to the extreme. The only exception is the ballad Stove, showing a tender side to the band you won't hear too often.

Not a bad album; too bad it's the same one they've been making since 2000.

#hoover's ooover

Spangle call Lilli line - Piano Lesson

After the disappointment of New Season I lowered my expectations for Piano Lesson down by about 10 notches but it turns out I didn't need to do that at all.

Piano Lesson features 8 hand-picked tracks from the group's back catalogue and as the album title suggests, they're given lush new piano-led arrangements in collaboration with ex-Kukikodan member Koyama Izumi. I was prepared to be bored to death but instead, I'm enthralled with how songs like nano and inc. turned out. 'Beautiful' may be an understatement.

No longer complaining 'bout Spangle call Lilli line rehashing their material to death - especially not if they're as good as Piano Lesson is.

#scll

Kim Bo Kyung - the FIRST DAY + GroWing

Kim Bo Kyung was a contestant on Superstar K2 (the competition that Huh Gak won) but didn't get very far - voted out before the top 10, her sob story nevertheless touched enough people to gain her a single release of her signature song Because of You, a cover of her heroine Kelly Clarkson's popular hit.

Earlier this year came Kim's first mini-album the FIRST DAY which proved to be a huge surprise for me. To my ears, it was stylistically closer to the kind of Jpop female singer-songwriter music I favour - bright & breezy in parts, heartfelt & as opposed to the copycat r'n'b rubbish that most Kpop artists churn out these days. The material chosen proved a perfect fit for Kim's husky, powerhouse vocals and lead promo track 하루하루 (Day by Day) is probably amongst my top 10 favourite songs of the year - check out one of her live performances for a taste of what she has to offer.

After that ballad she did for the City Hunter soundtrack, we've now got a second mini-album from Bo Kyung. GroWing carries on in a similar vein to the FIRST DAY with its mix of power pop tunes & ballads which is all good and fine if they weren't taking the whole Kelly Clarkson thing a wee bit too far by ripping out entire pages from the Idol singer's songwriting book. 아파 (It Hurts) is still a mighty fine song though.

So, maybe a slight step backward with GroWing then but Kim still offers plenty of promise - let's hope she's afforded more time to make the next release something truly special.

#kim bo kyung

RO-KYU-BU! - pure elements

With my tolerance level of badly-written, badly-sung bubblegum idol music now at an all-time low, it took me a good 10 minutes or so to decide whether or not to touch this album - which on paper, held the potential to melt my brain Chernobyl style.

Well...I wish I had trusted my instinct. I shall...refrain from being nasty and just offer some sage advice.

AVOID LIKE THE BUBONIC PLAGUE.

#69bu

Takahashi Hitomi - PICORINPIN

You have to feel sorry for Takahashi, the forgotten woman in Jpop - a promising start to her career aided by the power of Gundam has petered out to almost nothing, culminating with the embarrassing No.200 chart position of recent single Poolside (a collab with PE'Z's H ZETT M).

Or perhaps she's content sacrificing chart success for a chance to work with some of the rock/indie scene's more famous names - the aforementioned H ZETT M, Chara, Nakamura Koji/iLL, Hidaka Toru & ROLLO all lend a hand on PICORINPIN.

The results are not always cohesive or pretty; Wo Ai Ni is pretty much as drearily dull as it was a few years ago, but there are moments of absolute splendour - the bombastic Le Théâtre du Grand-Guignol, the in-your-face attitude of Walkin', the effervescent 恋するピエロッティ.

It's a fine balance between the good and bad, but there's enough on here to warrant at least a couple of listens.

#takahashi hitomi

Jess Lee - Gan Xie Ai Ren

Lots of controversy has been swirling around the promotional video for Jess Lee's 煎熬 - the 10-minute long sexually-explicit, violent clip has garnered over 2 million views on Youtube since it was first posted 2 weeks ago. You have to wonder whether Lee herself had any say in the decision to attach her name and face to something as opinion-dividing as this, but I suppose that Warner Taiwan is really determined to generate enough publicity to make Jess a success and if means ruffling a few conservative feathers up then so be it...?

感謝愛人 (Gan Xie Ai Ren) is the Malaysian lass's first release since her truimph on popular Taiwanese reality competition One Million Star in 2010 - we all know she can sing the hell out of any song you throw at her, but what use is an angelic voice if the material is weak? And that is a major problem I have with this album, and Chinese-language releases in general.

Lack of variety seems to be a given - in the dull world of Mandopop where snooze-inducing ballads rule the day, there is indeed very little on Gan Xie Ai Ren that engages the listener's attention. Mournful song follows mournful song follows mournful song, eventually lulling one into an eternal slumber - if you were searching for a cure for insomnia, this might just do the trick.

At the very least, you can watch the video for 煎熬 to see what the fuss is all about - see the shorter version here, and the original one here.

#Jess Lee

Sungha Jung - Irony

Boy wonder's second full-length album - this time, Jung chooses to tackle a whole lot less covers than he did on his debut CD Perfect Blue, preferring to toss in more of his own compositions. Good idea?

Let's begin with the covers. Nostalgia obviously plays a huge part in my liking of Jung's reworking of 벌써일년 (Been Already A Year), originally performed by balladeers Brown Eyes, while his version of 2NE1's Lonely sounds as fab on record as it did in the initial Youtube video. Elsewhere, Jung's love of Michael Jackson continues with covers of They Don't Care About Us and Beat It...I could do without the former - never was a fan of the original anyway. Beat It is passable but honestly, I prefer the song with vocals. Sting's Fragile & ABBA's The Winner Takes It All also get the cover treatment here but neither song is particularly memorable IMO - I wish some of Jung's other Youtube covers (SNSD's Hoot, 10cm's 오늘밤은 어둠이 무서워요) had been included instead...licensing issues maybe?

As for Jung's original material, it's really hit and miss. The jaunty, fingertappin' Farewell & cheery Fly Like The Wind are two of the tracks that hit the right spots for me but it's unfortunate that they're the exception rather than the norm. Most of the other tracks meander without purpose, hookless and tuneless from start to finish. I think the boy needs a lot more time and life experience to refine his compositions, but for a 15-year old kid...it's not bad going.

Hopefully Jung's star won't burn out too fast, I'm really keen to see what sort of music he'll be producing 10 years down the line.

#sungha jung

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