So I’ve been doing J-Rock Fridays biweekly for the longest time. Let’s see how long I can keep this up every Friday.
saisa- “Blessing the Circulation”
To tell you the truth, the post rock scene hasn’t been doing much for me lately until I found saisa’s cassette tape last year. Their melancholic instrumentals and off kilter vocals struck a chord with me that bands like Mono have failed to do with their extravagant orchestras. “Blessing the Circulation” comes from their debut album, released last month by Chinese label 1724 Records (apparently the first debut of a Japanese band on a Chinese label, politics).
salyu × salyu- “Jibunngainai (Studio Live Version)”
Ghost in the Shell fans were surprised by the announcement of a new OVA series this year. Instead of going with Yoko Kanno for the music department again, they chose Cornelius who then reunited with salyu for the theme song. “Jibunngainai” continues in the salyu x salyu tradition with Salyu’s ethereal voice and Cornelius’ production touches. Unfortunately, the only project we’ll remember her for (aside from Lily Chou-Chou) when her pop career ends.
BiS Kaidan- “好き好き大好き (Special Edit)”
BiS is back again this week, this time teaming up with members of legendary noise rock band Hijokaidan. Seriously? What kind of idol group does that. This video is a delightful mess, with the girls SCREAMING in blood soaked dresses destroying EVERYTHING. Thankfully, we have a full album of this to look forward to.
Did I really write 100 of these things? Thanks for sticking around these past four years and I hope you continue to enjoy it.
andymori- “Neverland”
In a few short months, andymori will be gone forever, so they might as well start pumping out those musicvideosnow. “Neverland” is presented as a short film, and tells the story of adult size Peter Pan. While Captain Hook adjusts to the corporate life, Pan continues on his childish exploits even after losing the ability to fly. All it takes is a child to believe in him!
sakanaction- “Inori (Extended Mix)”
In case you’ve only been keeping up with sakanaction through their singles, they’ve been including one track over their past few albums that is much more dance than rock. “Inori” is from this year’s self titled album and is being released as an extended mix on vinyl. This may be a boring black and white video with the band standing around with their Macbooks, but I assure you this is one for the clubs!
Czecho No Republic- 「１人のワルツ」
Czecho No Republic heads to the country for the second video off their Tower Records exclusive single. They meet some llamas and ostriches but mostly sing and dance all happy like in the park.
Another column of videos I already featured on Tumblr! It’s okay, but I’d like to get some love on my real blog every once in a while too. By the way, I finally added “J-Rock Explosion” to our header image. Maybe I’ll change it again in another 6 years…
a flood of circle- “Dancing Zombiez”
The Walking Dead may have ended its season last Sunday, but the walkers have decided to “dance” for a special J-Rock video. Will a flood of zombies eat this rock trio or get a drum stick to the eye?
uhnellys- 「体温」
Rap/rock duo uhnellys takes us on an emotional ride as a man says goodbye to his wife on her deathbed. We see him breakdown and eventually accept her passing, a very moving and accurate portrayal of anyone who has lost a loved one.
sugardrop- “Love Scene”
Fall asleep where you are. The lead singer of sugardrop performs his version of planking with a blanket, which includes some humorous locations such as an escalator and the middle of the freaking street. He better be careful or this will turn into a crime scene!
Now that we’re done with the best videos of 2012 we can get around to dedicating this column to new J-Rock videos! By coincidence there was a new J-Rock Fridays every week in January. I don’t know if you enjoyed that but we’ll probably go back to biweekly from now on even though I have to cut a lot of videos each time (I guess that’s what Tumblr’s for).
sakanaction- “Music”
Get your headphones ready it’s the time of the year that sakanaction releases new music. Here we’ve got a bit of a split screen video with the vocalist tiredly watching a cute girl running away from handsy dancers.
Man With A Mission- “Emotions”
When emotions run dry, the wolves come out to play! I can’t tell if their English has gotten progressively better overnight or if they hired a foreigner to sing the verses but this song is pretty tight.
Baroque- “Tatoeba Kimi to Boku”
If you enjoy watching women wrestle each other in wet bikinis then “Tatoeba” is your new favorite J-Rock video. I was shocked by the negative reaction over at Tumblr, but still this is the first visual kei video I’ve watched all the way through in a long time.
I have run out of ways to tell you it’s Friday. In any case here’s your usual assortment of Japanese indie rock and even some rap!
Jesse- “Access Violation”
We just heard from RIZE last month but busy frontman Jesse McFaddin has his own solo album that apparently came out this week. Jesse has worked with rap groups before and also in RIZE but it seems like he’s going all out rap on his solo project. “Access Violation” still has a BACK-ON rock edge though. Check out his duet with American Idol finalist Julissa Veloz at SoundCloud.
The Beatmoss- “Flippin’ Out”
Unlike Jesse, rapper MC ILMARI is taking his break from Rip Slyme and using it to front brand new rock band The Beatmoss. That doesn’t mean the flow stops though. Ilmari still raps in “Flippin’ Out” but there’s a good rock chorus.
indigo la End- 「白いマフラー」
Bouncy blue balls! Indigo la end really loves the color blue and four minutes of this color scheme really is making me feel blue. Nice indie rock anyways…
On his first album, oono yuuki got tired of singing folk music and invited his friends over for a jam session. The resulting tracks were far and away the highlights of that album. He does the same on the first single off Tempestas, recruiting 8 of the brightest minds in Japan for this epic collaboration. If Yuuki would drop the solo act and form a real band with these guys they’d be a major force in the indie scene.
Stabbed in the heart and he still makes it to the show on time! After their stellar debut mini-album, Turntable Films made it into my most anticipated for 2012 and “Misleading Interpretations” does not disappoint. It is sad though to see they’re a trio now, which must be a recent development as I can hear former keyboardist Nozomi Funada all over this track (I think she even has a cameo in this video?).
Programming the common people’s subliminal orchestra to wake up and say yes. Rocknrollas let out a doggie howl that’s wasted on Scarface’s shining head. You’re in treble, boy. Tonight’s forgotten story.
Pay Money To my Pain- “Deprogrammer”
PTP added disco to their screams. Turns out pretty good, even the old man in the top hat is dropping balls over it.
Hey, those polls meant something! Here’s your top voted videos for 2010. The final 14 videos had a total of 5 votes or more. I felt sorry for those with only 4 votes so they made the runners-up list. Honestly, there were a lot of great videos with even less votes than that so I decided to make a personal list in the future. Vote for your top 3 videos of the year and I’ll give the winner a “fan favorite” award!
0.8秒と衝撃。- ビートニクキラーズ
The pants-dropping 0.8syooogeki had the most voted video. Definitely one of the craziest videos I’ve seen this year. If no one votes this week consider them the default winner!
J-Rock Explosion 