Details of the new album from Towa Tei

Titled EMO, the METAFIVE member and prolific Shibuya-kei fixture’s eleventh full-length studio album (ninth as Towa Tei) has a special website up, bearing the upcoming release’s tracklisting and guest list. Featured performers this time around are an eccentric bunch even by Tei’s usual standards, although the presence of METAFIVE is hardly a surprise. In addition to his band, singers Hiroshi Takano and UA, author and artist Tomoo Gokita (who designed the album artwork), Inara George of indie-pop duo The Bird and the Bee, Ano of alternative idol group You’ll Melt More! and Chilean electronic musician Atom™ are confirmed, although the site teases that the full list is yet to come.

Those who like getting extra songs as preorder bonuses have something to look forward to with this one, as Amazon is offering a CD-R with the Takkyu Ishino remix of Tei’s “GBI” and Tower Records offers a download card with an alternate take on new song “REM.” Additionally, orders through HMV are entered in a chance to win a signed Polaroid from either Tei or one of the other collaborators on the record. EMO comes out March 22.

Memories of Shibuya year-end wrap: 5 songs for 2016

Few people are sad to see 2016 go, perhaps justifiably so – but it wasn’t all bad. This year had no shortage of wonderful music released, and so Memories of Shibuya is looking back on 5 of the best songs to come out in 2016. Streaming options aren’t available for all songs, but links will be provided where available.

Album review: METAFIVE – METAHALF

The second release from Japanese alternative supergroup METAFIVE, containing members of Yellow Magic Orchestra and Denki Groove in addition to the likes of Cornelius, Towa Tei and Leo Imai, is a tidy five-song suite of new material. How is it to listen to? Review below the cut…

Get hyped for the new METAFIVE with “Musical Chairs”

Boasting more of a dance-pop sound than most of what we’ve heard from the Japanese alternative’s biggest supergroup, METAFIVE’s “Musical Chairs” has been uploaded to YouTube in advance of their new album METAHALF. While the first METAFIVE album sounded closest to Cornelius’s solo work out of any of the high-profile musicians involved in the project, this one seems to be shaping up to bear more resemblance to a Yellow Magic Orchestra album; but, of course, we’ll just have to wait and see how the finished product turns out when it’s officially released tomorrow.

New videos from Towa Tei and Negicco

The first video from CUTE is out now, with an appropriately old-school clip accompanying the star-studded “LUV PANDEMIC” – with Haruomi Hosono, Yukihiro Takahashi, Keigo “Cornelius” Oyamada, Leo Imai and actress Yuka Mizuhara providing their faces and voices to the incredibly bad song. It’s absolutely horrendous by all means, possibly the worst single Tei has ever put out, but just look at all those guest stars!

For those who prefer their music videos with far less wasted talent, Negicco and Sachiko Kobayashi recently revealed their “Niigata☆JIMAN!” video, a cute song made to promote tourism in Niigata city (soon to be home of the next regional expansion of Yasushi Akimoto’s ongoing 48G project). Negicco fans, rejoice! Everyone else, continue to be confounded by the continued presence of this only tangentially Shibuya-kei group’s presence on Memories of Shibuya!

New video for an old song by Towa Tei

A short version of the Bakubaku Dokin-supported number “Upload” from Towa Tei’s Mach 2012 album got the animated video treatment recently, and if this is your first exposure to “Upload”, be warned – it’s probably not going to leave your head for another year or so. Seriously. Thing is an earworm like few others. Tei’s Cute LP comes out July 29, and anyone who wants to hear more of “Upload” can find it on the fun (albeit brief) Mach 2012.

New album from Towa Tei? New album from Towa Tei!

His first full-length release since 2013’s Lucky, Towa Tei’s new album will be called CUTE – and the guest list  alone is certainly worth getting excited about. Boasting contributions from the likes of post-rock darling Leo Imai, frequent Tei collaborator YUI of Bakubaku Dokin, Yoshinori Sunahara of Denki Groove, and Shibuya-kei veterans Keigo “Cornelius” Oyamada and ASA-CHANG, he’s moving away from the international cast of contributors that had graced recent releases and focusing exclusively on Japanese talent – not, in any way, a bad thing.

The album comes out July 29 on Tei’s own MACHBEAT label, and Natalie has a full tracklisting.

Artist Spotlight: Towa Tei (week four)

Every month, Memories of Shibuya will be taking a look at a different artist or group, with featured songs – one per week – highlighting the peaks (and, occasionally, troughs) of their musical career.

Concluding our four-part series on Towa Tei a couple days late (all apologies, sometimes life gets in the way of these things), this time around we take a look at the man’s work in the last decade – work which is still ongoing, with his latest single having been released just last month.

Artist Spotlight: Towa Tei (week three)

 

Every month, Memories of Shibuya will be taking a look at a different artist or group, with featured songs – one per week – highlighting the peaks (and, occasionally, troughs) of their musical career.

Towa Tei’s work has always had more going on beneath the surface than it would initially appear; this week we take a look at what is easily his most controversial work. Like rap CDs back when we used to buy those, consider a “parental advisory: explicit content” sticker stuck on this one.

Artist Spotlight: Towa Tei (week two)

Every month, Memories of Shibuya will be taking a look at a different artist or group, with featured songs – one per week – highlighting the peaks (and, occasionally, troughs) of their musical career.

After leaving Deee-Lite and heading back to Japan, Towa Tei embarked upon a solo venture that found him taking his rightful place in the canon of Shibuya-kei artists. The Japanese scene welcomed him with open arms, bolstered both by his major-label connections from the Deee-Lite days and his own Shibuya-kei style, which could hardly have been more perfectly suited to the J-pop zeitgeist in 1994.