It is later than I intended to be up while writing this, so it will be briefer, but first let’s have today’s Music Video Pick (#12!), Ado’s “Monstruo”:
It’s a very bombastic song. I like it. There’s not really anything by Ado I haven’t liked. I own something like four concert blu-rays by her. Have merch. You get the idea.
There was another band who released a song yesterday that was a potential for the slot but they will be tomorrow because I wanted both of them to get spotlight near one another.
Technically in the wrong order, but we’ll get to that.
It is probably pretty obvious that, so far, all the songs in the Music Video Pick series have been Japanese. It’s not precisely intentional. Just a side effect of me being really into a particular flavor of Indie/Alt-Rock at the moment and that flavor being represented, essentially, by Japanese artists and by folks featured on the I Saw the TV Glow soundtrack. Also hey, nothing and generally I would put a few others but you get the idea without spoiling the joke.
The odd thing is that despite being a pretty massive tokusatsu nerd for years, I’ve not really done a whole lot of listening to Japanese music outside of a few bursts. The Pillows were absolutely influential in my overall musical tastes. On par with Rush and Smashing Pumpkins, really. Moreso than Nirvana. Maybe behind the Pixies but we are splitting hairs.
I was pretty obsessed with Do As Infinity through the first three albums. I had a Nana Kitade greatest hit album. Utada Hikaru. Sheena Ringo. Jammed out to those two pretty hard. Ringo was a primary inspiration for a character in my solo RPG playthroughs. She stuck with me. I still listen to all these bands, but we are starting to hit the edge of fandom pretty fast. I had a single EP of Asian Kung Fu generation. An album by Rip Slyme and maybe two by Orange Range. I had an album by Beat Crusaders and not the one with “Hit in the USA” on it. I went to a Dir En Grey concert. I actually ordered direct-from-Japan multiple deeply experimental albums. Kenji Siratori and such. I used to be into a lot stranger variety of music, let’s just say.
Stuff that featured on some Kamen Rider openings got picked up here or there. Especially in the Kamen Rider W/OOO-eras and after. Not consistently, though.
Back in my heavier Spotify days, the only Japanese music on my playlists that wasn’t from something toku related was frederic’s “Oddloop” and Superfly’s “Kakusei.” And The Pillows. Whole albums by them. There was various bits from Kenji Ito and other game composers, as well. I added a Scandal video to my Youtube music video playlist somewhere in this era and liked a few others.
Then a couple of years after “Oddloop” there was some stuff like Mondo Grosso. Kana Boon. I got my first taste of Majiko (through someone making video which used it, kind of a fake music video type thing). Leo Ieri, though I never knew her by name, she just showed up and at some point I subscribed. Ueda Marie is also in this era for me though like Ieri it took me this most recent resurgence to really start recognizing her.
Time and time again I listened to some music from Japan, generally stuff a bit more in the Pop-Rock range, but nothing quite like The Pillows. Either in style or in just the intensity of how much it actually stuck with me.
Then there was Necry Talkie, which fired off an entire wave of Youtube flinging Japanese Pop and Rock music at me which I think made it all the way into the early-ish days of Hitsujibungaku (pre-“More Than Words” or it might have stuck a LOT harder, that track absolutely slaps).
Necry Talkie is tomorrow, though. Today we are going to fast forward up to just a couple of years ago, when I got into Ado. Because I first I absolutely did not get into Ado. She was another artist that showed up from time to time in playlists and recommendations.
I came across a song or two by her. There was her collab with Imagine Dragons. With that I saw how passionate her fans were (and still are) and based on their passion, picked up a couple of albums by her. But didn’t quite listen to them, yet. I played them in the background or put them in a massive collection of “play these, sometime.”
Then, bit by bit, I started paying attention. “Lucky Bruto” and “Readymade” got stuck in my head. “Ibara” and “The Show”. I started watching clips of her playing live.
I think it was around the time I sat down and just listened to “Elf” that whatever slight roadblock had kept me from appreciating her completely cleared. This was the build up to Ado’s Best Adobum. By the time we moved to Belgium (sadly, it was something like 2-weeks after she played here in Brussels) that album was my primary music disk. The Pillows level of being replayed.
I listened to something off that album essentially once a day. Every day (or, as we say in Flanders: elke dag). At some point I started picking up physical albums and getting concert disks and all that. Dandadan and Creepy Nuts would have also been around this time and hooo boy, that was another deep dive for me. I had already heard, and enjoyed, MindaRyn’s “Black Star” (linked because of those glasses, hot dang) but I her second full album was out also around this time.
And the way Youtube works, once I started consistently playing a couple/three artists singing in the Japanese language then it decides I am a complete and total weeb and 90% of the music recommends need to be from Japan.
It’s ok. Shortly after that I got back into Necry Talkie. I got re-introduced to Majiko — with apologies to the “Adomination” types, Majiko is my preferred solo female singer…like, most preferred across all languages I’d say, though Ado, Pommelian Thijs, and Paloma Morphy are all close behind — and even some old “music flames” like Sheena Ringo. I’ve never really stopped being into Do As Infinity. I possibly should buy higher quality versions because I’m pretty sure I’ve been using the same 128bit MP3s for years.
More importantly, in my eyes, I started getting the kind of Japanese music that would not have been shown to me a few years back. Stuff like Crazy Blues and tiny yawn. Stuff like Monthly Shonen Irony. Muque I think would have gotten there. And thank all the gods for Brandy Senki and 171 getting in front of my eyes. Yorushika was another one that I’m sure I would have gotten along the way, and likely did before I clocked who they were, but am also realllly glad to have heard them.
What I am saying is that pretty much every artist on this list is because of that weird frederic to Necry Talkie to Ado pipe line and the way those three clusters of music (around 3-4 years apart) brought in other artist that seeded my liked videos, Spotify playlists, and music video playlists. Spotify has been gone for a year, now, and I mostly buy stuff and then just play it off my own devices rather than rely on streaming services, but I like being exposed to the new.
Also, I am getting a lot of acts that only have a few hundred views (regularly under 2k) and that is a bit interesting but I am starting to fill up on all the new music I can even mentally conceive. Fun, though.
My Music Video Picks [MVP] is a series of posts highlighting various music and dance videos from Youtube (usually). No particular schedule (sometimes lots, sometimes little). It might not even all be music or dance videos. Absolutely picked by me, though. Usually I have to like both the song and the video, but we’ll see.
You can see the most recent songs here: [Doug’s] Music Video Picks [Youtube Playlist]. Size of that list will change as the mood strikes. Playlist might contain spoilers for unpublished posts. Just enjoy.
