“Aoi” is atypical of Sakanaction’s self-titled album, as much as something can be atypical of an album that is quite sprawling and varied. It’s also my favourite track on it, at least for now.
For all the different things that they do with rhythms, all the different ways that they skilfully blend rock elements with dance, Sakanaction has a constant calmness that’s one of its major assets. Even when “Yoru no Odoriko” goes in hard and Ichiro Yamaguchi is gasping for air, I still get a sense that they’re holding something back so as to not interrupt how damn smooth it all is.
“Aoi” is not smooth. Not at all. The way that its guitar riffs buzz in an angry swarm reminds me of some of the best moments of Bloc Party’s Silent Alarm, but they never went for a choral vocal treatment to ram home the melody of those. Not even when they had a choir at their disposal! The effect could easily veer off the edge into ridiculous, but Sakanction play too sharply and with too much momentum to let it - the snapping transition out of the first verse is particularly great. They manage to take the power of the vocals and the very different power of the music and get the two to add up to a greater whole while even still not sitting entirely comfortably together.
When they finally use the choir over a softer backdrop in the bridge there’s a tension that comes from knowing that the guitars are going to crash in at any moment, as they gloriously do.
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