By Jonah Morgan By Jonah Morgan
The past 2 years have seen Japanese music labels mounting a greater push into the American marketsphere than at anytime previous. At the forefront of the effort have been pop label giants Avex Trax with their Tokyo FM @ New York project and Sony Music Imports who have to-date released 2 Japan For Sale compilation albums of their cream of the crop pop exports from the land of the rising sun. Originating as the non retail Japan NOT For Sale compilation in 1999, promotional CMJ chart listings alone prompted Sony to start the commercial Japan For Sale series in 2000. The "Japan For Sale Allstars" played the SXSW in the same year to critical praise. As of this review volume 2's sales have surpassed 5000 copies.
April 29th sees the US release of the 3rd album in Sony's sampler series and we've had the opppertunity to listen to the disc for 1 solid month previous to this writeup. As music goes in general the most novel sounding tunes to someone when they first hear them can quickly turn into melodius torture in the course of a few days. Amplified about 1 gazillion times in this age of unrivaled music disposability and "music on demand", how does JFS Vol. 3 hold it's ground? The concept behind this album as a compilation goes a long way to seeing after listening durabilty and Sony scores big points for making the variety present on JFS3 as diverse in Sony's cache of artistic properties as possible.
The 1st 4 tracks on the album have a very urban feel to them. From the ambient 'Time' in which rhymes and raps spit by GOKU come down to the underground house sounds of DJ Krush's custom sampling work in 'The Lost Voices' we go back into an ambient/trance sound with Matally's Four Seasons V.S. YoYo-C and finally a lyrical R&B Loop Junction 'Ja:pon'. Track 5 features 'Black Out Fall Out' by an electronica roick group called Polystics. This group reminds me of a cross between Devo and a mid 90's American synth side project by Weezer's Matt Sharp called The Rentals. Polystics has had music featured on the 3 previous JFS albums as well as 3 independant albums and are being brought stateside this summer in May and June, stay tuned to ANS for more info on this. Track six is Guitar Vader's English heavy 'Super Brothers' and has a similar rock/electronica type sound. Tracks 7-8 are wonderfully warm and soft female pop melodies: Mai Hoshimura's 'Stay With You' and Mayu Kitaki's 'Latata'. The Brilliant Green's 'I'm A Player In TV Games' featues 100% English lyrics and an addictive rock melody remeniscent of Siamese Dream era Smashing Pumpkins that would not be out of place at the top of contemporary alternative rock charts. The Final 3 tracks are contributions from the strictly electronic Japanese scene: Kyoto Jazz Massive's 'Substream' , Takkyu Ishino's 'Gimme Some High Energy' and one of my personal favorites Yoshinori Sunahara's 'Spiral Never Before'. Sunahra has had music on JFS previosuly and represents the the true edge electronic music compostion in or out of Japan.
The final analysis on JFS3 is you've got a great variety of music here representing the contmporary hits in Japan with awesome playback value. Artwork for JFS3 is reprised by LA based artist Shag, the CD is expected to be promoted widely on the retail scene and on Cartoon Network and MTV2 on television.
All Stories, Graphics And Material © Jonah Morgan - Anime News Service Unless Otherwise Cited
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