KODA KUMI
BEST ~third universe~/8th AL “UNIVERSE”
(Rhythm Zone/Avex)
Rating:

I am of the suspicion of late that a couple of years ago, Lady Gaga had to have caught find of some Koda Kumi videos on YouTube, because in what few Lady Gaga songs I’ve heard, I’m swearing she’s snuck traces of recent Kuu-chin tuneage like “FREAKY” and “TABOO”. And I am certain that Kuu-chin knows this as well, as while Gaga leans heavily on programmed arrangements in her work, Kuu-chin has pretty much gone organic [save for the reliance on drum machines throughout – there’s nothing wrong with having precise beats behind you!] with her instrumentation on much of 8th AL “UNIVERSE”, the studio portion of her new double-disc set. [Quick side note: I won’t be reviewing BEST ~third universe~, the "greatest hits" portion of the package, outside of saying it’s a highly recommended compliment to your collection if the only Koda long-players you own are her previous BEST compilations ~first things~, ~second session~ and ~Bounce and Lovers~. In fact, if you can swing it, go for the edition that also has the DVD of video clips from both portions of the album.] Perhaps we should have seen this coming – her 3 SPLASH EP, released last summer, was primarily guitar-oriented, save for the cut “ECSTASY”.

“UNIVERSE”’s opening cut, “Step Into My World”, doesn’t give much of a hint as to this direction, as it starts off the album much like her most recent LP’s, Black Cherry, Kingdom and Trick kicked off. After those potboiling three minutes, Kumi grabs herself a rock band and kicks into “Can We Go Back”. Between this, Black Cherry’s “Ningyao-hime” and Trick’s top-notch cover version of Shocking Blue’s “Venus”, Kuu-chin seems quite comfortable with Marshall-amped guitars behind her. This shouldn’t be much of a surprise, however – Kumi has always been a vocalist who doesn’t hesitate to slip into any musical arrangement that serves the song. Much of the first half of “UNIVERSE” is dominated by organic instrumentation, and her vocals float like butterflies over those arrangements.

Halfway through “UNIVERSE”, Kumi glides back into digital keyboard territory, but that is OK. Koda Kumi is a vocalist who has never been married or completely linked to one particular set of instrumentation, whereas someone like Gaga would probably seem out of place singing over anything not synthesized or without any AutoTune filtering on her voice.

Not counting the bonus live version of “Moon Crying” on some copies, Kumi closes out the album with “Alive”, yet another classic Kuu-chin ballad. Kumi always shines on her ballads (and someone at Avex must have thought as much to devote an entire compilation, BEST ~Bounce & Lovers~, to them a couple of years ago) and while that’s nothing new, it’s also always welcome, and you can’t ask for more than that.

5 out of 5 stars.

LIL WAYNE
Rebirth
(Cash Money/Universal Motown)
Rating:

When I first heard that Lil Wayne wanted to do a rock record, my immediate reaction was, I wanted to hear the end result just so I could bear witness to a train wreck of epic proportions. Considering that around the time news of this project broke, Chris Cornell had just released a pop record produced by Timbaland, one had to wonder what kind of Bizarro world they had walked into. “The tattooed guy that used to run with Juvenile and B.G. making a rock record? Why the fuck are you doing this, you asshole?” Surely all of the badly typed/written/spelled ‘reviews’ posted on iTunes since the “Prom Queen” single dropped can’t be wrong?

Here’s the kicker: He got away with it.

It’s not entirely a “rock” record in the purist sense – “On Fire” sounds more like pre-Purple Rain Prince than rock, “I’ll Die For You” (one of two bonus tracks on the deluxe edition of the album) is more of a pop/rock song than the more hard rock-oriented material on the album, and there is at least one track in Wayne’s old style (“Drop the World”, performed with Eminem). But Wayne’s vision/version of rock as at least guitar-oriented music with sung rather than rapped vocal parts is there, and it is obvious through his performances that he is enjoying what he is doing and putting his heart into it.

A producer whose name I’ve forgotten at the moment commented that plug-ins like AutoTune are meant to make a 98% perfect, rather than a 20% perfect, performance sound 100%. In other words, the idea of a computer program making anyone off the street sound like Robert Plant or Kelly Clarkson is ludicrous. Yes, Wayne’s vocals are being very noticeably run through AutoTune. But, it becomes even more obvious as one listens to the album that he using the technology not to cover up his (self-admitted) shortcomings as a traditional singer but to make his voice sound weird. On a couple of the tracks, the AutoTune is not as immediately evident, making one wonder how his vocals would have sounded had they not been deliberately enhanced. (There are a few instances in his rap back catalog of him singing his own hooks – “Get Off the Corner” from The Block Is Hot comes to mind.) Rock is full of great vocalists who couldn’t outsing a Robert Plant or an Ian Gillian, but could at least sing in tune and/or put a song over from the heart, so in that sense Wayne’s rock vocals aren’t much different from what, for example, Lou Reed, Handsome Dick Manitoba, and Henry Rollins have done in the past.

If anything, Rebirth proves to be a successful experiment for Lil Wayne. It’s not perfect – His attempt at punk, “The Price Is Wrong”, is a shade weak (and not because it’s one of the few songs where his vocals aren’t enhanced) but still fun to listen to. And his working habit of not literally writing his lyrics and vocal parts down on paper sometimes has his shortcomings (Refining his ad-libbed lyrics on paper and then finalizing the results on the finished master couldn’t hurt). However, if he alternated between his more traditional rap recordings like The Carter and albums like Rebirth, I don’t think anyone would have many complaints, save for the OMGWTFBBQ “armchair critics” who hang out on iTunes’ comment boards.

4 stars out of 5.

AKB48
RIVER
(King Records)
Available on CD/DVD, CD, and on iTunes Japan
Rating:

I’ve been enjoying AKB48’s singles output in the wake of “Oogoe Diamond”, with that song and this past summer’s “Namida Surprise” being personal highlights. Their new single may have broken that streak somewhat.

“RIVER” starts off in an unusual way for a J-pop single. Unison chants from group are accompanied by the sound of stomp dancing. This introduction is different, but at over 40 seconds, it is also a tad overlong. Had this tack been done by an American pop group, the length introduction would have been excuse enough for listeners to reach for the radio dial and change the station – not a good idea when you’re trying to attract new listeners. When the song proper comes in, we do get a good AKB48 song. The problem is, it’s only good enough for an album track – and not as an opener, but more like at the halfway point of an album (where Side Two would traditionally start on a vinyl record) – it doesn’t seem to work as A-side material.

“Kimi no Koto ga Suki Dakara” (credited to the “Undergirls”, although not the same line-up as on “Tobenai Agehachou” – there’s no Meetan to be found), on the other hand, is more worthy of being the single’s A-side, with the verses recalling the band’s DefSTAR-era material and the choruses being in a similar vein to the band’s more recent singles. Had this song been the A-side, it would have made for a stronger single.

“Hikoukigumo”, credited to the “Theater Girls”, was originally a stage song from Team A’s 5^th Stage that was recorded with an entirely different lineup. While the intent behind having three different lineups on the single – highlighting members that haven’t gotten much exposure on past single releases – is worthy, the fact that producer/lyricist Yasushi Akimoto is recycling material for B-sides (“Shonichi”  from one of Team B’s stages was one of the “Namida Surprise” B-sides) should be some cause for concern. Could this be why we haven’t seen an actual studio album (that wasn’t a soundtrack to one of their stage shows) from the group yet?

For what is probably going to be (if past discographical history is any indication) the last AKB48 single of the year, this three-song disc is unfortunately their weakest of their releases since they switched labels from DefSTAR to King. Hopefully, AKB48 and their creative team can use the next couple of months to recharge and get some stronger material out on the market.

3½ out of 5 stars. (Ouch – looks like AKB just found something in common with Kiss besides being on my iPod.)

KISS
Sonic Boom
(Kiss Records [North America]/Roadrunner [elsewhere])
Available as a 2CD/DVD set in North America and as a single CD elsewhere.
Rating:

Kiss fans have had every right to be skeptical over the past decade or so. The band’s last studio album, Psycho Circus, was really a “reunion” album with Ace Frehley and Peter Criss that had very little Ace Frehley and Peter Criss on it. They embarked on a “farewell tour” at the turn of the century that turned out not to be a farewell after all. And – most damningly – after the reluctant-to-repeat-himself Ace Frehley chose to depart the band in order to decompress before resuming his solo career, Gene Simmons made the controversial decision to replace the influential guitarist with ex-Black & Blue guitarist and sometime Simmons lackey Tommy Thayer without initially telling the public. (Peter Criss, “the most miserable man on the planet” according to Simmons, was already on the shitlist of his ex-bandmates during the so-called farewell tour and was replaced by Eric Singer.) Follow all that up with Simmons claiming in his autobiography that there was no longer a market for a new Kiss studio LP, and it’s understandable to think why an album called Sonic Boom might easily be dismissed – like some fans who heard a leak of the album on the heels of the release of Frehley’s Anomaly album already did – as sonic bunk.

But in the wake of Paul Stanley recording a follow-up to his 1978 solo album (and touring behind it) and Frehley working on Anomaly since 2007, it probably doesn’t take an Einstein to presume that Simmons was full of shit when it came to the Kiss Army wanting new material rather than another repackaging of back catalog.

In advance press when the album’s recording was announced, Stanley – who took the producer’s chair for the project – boasted that the album would have no ballads or outside writers, and would hark back to the band’s “glory days” both musically and sonically. Similar claims (sans the no-ballads comment) had been made about Psycho Circus. Here we go again?
Read the rest of this entry »

ACE FREHLEY
Anomaly
(Bronx Born Records/RED Distribution)
Available on CD, 2xLP, iTunes (with bonus track), and AmazonMP3.com
Rating:

I picked up the guitar because of this man back in 7^th grade. There were a few others that were pushing me in that direction (Rick Nielsen and Pete Townshend come to mind), but Ace Frehley and his smoking guitar (onstage, literally, thanks to his fertile imagination and the breeding ground KISS’s early stage shows provided) lit the fuse. Granted, that guitar stayed in my hands a couple of years down because of the likes of Johnny Ramone, Steve Jones, Greg Ginn, etc., but by that time (1982), Ace was already walking away from the band.

Ace’s self-titled 1978 solo album is an underrated, five-star classic that has never gone out of print. His post-KISS output – two albums and a live EP under the Frehley’s Comet moniker and a “second” solo album, Trouble Walking – were welcomed by fans happy to hear from the “Space Ace” but were not as consistent as they should have been. Still, even though he didn’t record anything since 1989, he still kept playing, touring on a regular basis to the delight of diehard fans and being an almost regular presence in Guitar World magazine and its then-sister publication Guitar School. (At one point during this period, Ace rebutted some comments Gene Simmons had inaccurately made to the same magazine about Frehley’s guitar skills in his post-KISS work).

Of course, Ace participated in the reformation of the original KISS lineup, making the band one of the biggest concert draws for the next five years. But the band only did one studio album in that time (Psycho Circus, which only really had Ace on two songs – Tommy Thayer played the rest of the solos). The group then stayed in back catalog land with their set list, something that didn’t completely please Ace. He left KISS for the second time after what was supposed to be their farewell tour, taking a little time off to recharge, explore a few other artistic avenues (including acting), and get sobered up (insert smartass remark incorporating the phrase “being driven to drink” and the name “Gene Simmons” here if so inclined).

When talk of a new Ace Frehley solo album, twenty years after Trouble Walking, came to pass, fans had reason to be skeptical. Ace had been talking about putting out a new solo album for years, especially after walking away from what was rapidly becoming an oldies act (albeit one that puts asses in arena seats rather than state fair bleachers). There was also talk that the album was going to “go back” to the style and attitude of the ’78 album. Thankfully, none of it is talk.

Anomaly is indeed everything it has been promised to be. Much of the album is the same five-star quality rawk and then some that Ace delivered 21 years ago: Out-of-the-box rockers (“Foxy and Free”, first single “Outer Space”), generous helpings of Frehley brand humor (“Pain in the Neck”, “Sister”, iTunes-exclusive track “The Return of Space Bear”), an Ace-ified cover version (Sweet’s “Fox on the Run”), and a closing instrumental in Frehley’s “Fractured series” (“Fractured Quantum”). Added to the mix this time around are a couple of introspective tracks and two more instrumentals. On “Too Many Faces”, Frehley appears to address with his lyrics the kind of second thoughts he was having near the end of his second tenure with KISS, while on the acoustic-based “A Little Below the Angels” he references his bouts with alcohol and (for the second time, counting “Rock Soldiers” from Frehley’s Comet) his related DWI and reckless driving incidents. He delivers a bit of lyrical inspiration with “Change the World” and “It’s a Great Life”. The two instrumentals, “Space Bear” and “Genghis Khan”, are two fine excuses for Ace to stretch out with his much-lauded guitar skills. His vocal skills, once a self-admitted weak point, sound much more confident than ever.

Ace didn’t miss a beat with Anomaly. Like the recent return-to-action albums from the Stooges, New York Dolls, and Mission of Burma, it was worth the decades-long wait. Five out of five stars.

(Special side note: Check out a podcast interview with Ace about the album from PodKISSt.com here!)

MORNING MUSUME
“Nanchatte Renai”
(Zetima)
Available on CD, CD/DVD, and through iTunes and JapanFiles.com
Rating:

Let’s get a few things straight. I can’t ever badmouth a Morning Musume single or album. I’d be lying to everyone that reads this blog, and I’ll leave the lying to Fox News. I’ll nitpick MoMusu’s efforts when need be, yes, and I’ll praise them to the heavens when the record deserves it, most definitely, but I’m not one of those “fans” that starts going all OMGWTFBBQ1111!!!!eleventyleven online just because a new Morning Musume record doesn’t sound like something from the so-called “Golden Era” (the occurence of which seems to vary with some really picky fans and tends to lead to really spirited debates).

Now, I like the mature, serious direction that Morning Musume has taken with their last three A-sides (this single included). Like “Naichau Kamo” and “Shouganai Yume Oibito”, “Nanchatte Renai” is an uptempo song whose tone leans minor-key – only more so than the previous two singles. Takitty, Koharu, and Reina are all in fine voice – Koharu surprised the hell out of me especially with her parts on the record. The song seems to turn from minor to major key during the final chorus and coda – nice little composing/arranging trick. This one will take a couple of listens to get into, but it’s worth it – the band’s vocals are spot-on and Tsunku’s songwriting skills are still as sharp as ever. (I still don’t like the hats in the PV, but that was at least one post ago, and I’m writing about the actual music right now.)

“Aki Uhara”, the “main” B-side, whips out the serious disco. Gritty rhythm guitar and a non-clichéd dance rhythm (lots of great interplay between the piano, strings, and analog synth here) back up some great MoMusu harmonies; it’s a surefire winner as far as MoMusu B-sides go. “Subete wa Ai no Chikara”, the alternate B-side on the 40th Single Anniversary Edition, mines a Prince-esque 80’s electro-pop direction for its arrangement – something I don’t think the band has explored before, making this a nice surprise for the ears. (The digital version from JapanFiles contains both B-sides.)

If there’s a problem with the single, it’s probably because, for that is the band’s 40th single release, some fans may have been expecting something other than this. While issuing 40 singles is a hell of a milestone (this will no doubt go top 5, at the very least, on Oricon’s daily and weekly charts), I do admit that maybe a more upbeat A-side would have been more fitting. But it should also be noted that the band had just gotten back from their American performing debut – an even bigger milestone in the band’s career. An upbeat A-side along the lines of “Koko Ni Irusee!” and “Mikan” can’t hurt for single #41, though, but still, come on – with three songs to choose from on this single this time around, certainly at least one of the songs has to hit you over the head right away while the others mature like fine wine. Just get it.

5 out of 5. Here’s to 40 more singles.

Two weeks ago, I saw a review of Horehound, the newly-released album by Jack White’s new project The Dead Weather, at this link. I had already enjoyed the album, and was not surprised to see nothing but nice reviews about it so far because, well, it’s a good album! However, I was surprised when I checked the above-linked review and saw that the reviewer had given the album two-and-a-half stars and spent most of the review bitching about the fact that Jack White was mostly playing drums instead of guitar on the record, and thus accusing him of not having any real impact on the project. From the looks of the review, I have the feeling that the hack behind this particular review only half-listened to the CD once while doing things around his house before dropping the disc in a pile marked “Sell at used CD store”.

That particular kind of reviewer – the one doing it only because it’s a job and it gets him a few bucks for writing about the record and a couple more for illicitly selling the played-once CD at a local used store or on eBay (either way, such a move is technically illegal, since promotional copies are considered by law to be still the property of the record company) – is one I don’t have much respect for, as they don’t really seem to care about what they’re writing. Many music bloggers (myself included), on the other hand, do their writing because love the music they write about. I might be nitpicky about how some of them describe what they’re writing about – a prime example that comes to mind was how some of my younger colleagues in the J-Pop blogosphere mistook Morning Musume’s funk-heavy 2008 single “Resonant Blue” to be disco instead – but they still like the music. (Just as a side note, the disco genre is more befitting of “Love Machine” and a few other early MoMusu tracks, rather than “Resonant Blue” with its heavy 70’s funk influence.)

[I don’t even have to bring up the age-old adage about opinions being like assholes (i.e. everybody has one, etc.), except in passing. Which I just did. And because I don't want any of my peers to think that I'm dissing them - I'm not. Moving on…]

Reviewing records is one of the easiest and the hardest things to do, and while it’s something I’ve tried to make a focal point of on this blog and its predecessor, other things tend to delay my attempts and desires to write more reviews. One is time, which is a factor for everyone and thus not worth devoting further time itself to. The other reasons are more, well, life-involved. Many has been the time when I’ve needed to review a current or recent release only to find myself wanting to listen to something else instead. Does it mean that the album I want to review sucks? Usually, no. The reality is that I have so damn many different musical interests that whatever I feel like listening to at the time becomes more important than dissecting a new CD.

Another factor in my not doing as many reviews as I should is the approach. Most of my reviews are usually track-by-track affairs, and this is fine for the J-Pop material because I try to write those reviews for a general audience and I want people coming across this blog to get a good idea as to what the record sounds like before they search out a copy. For the Western stuff, it’s harder to write about – the artists usually have more established sounds and perhaps a more encapsulated approach is needed. I would also blame a lifelong habit of writing more than the minimum amount of words needed, most likely out of the concern that I want the reader to understand. And then of course, there’s other projects that some people may have on their mind or their schedule or both. In my case, there’s the manuscript that I’ve been working on for close to two years now; I am only recently just starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel there.

The final factor – which goes with everything I write, and with those who care about their writing – is quality. A well written review, even if it’s not a glowing one, and even if the writer might not know Jack White from Jack Black [sorry for the bad pun] without a scorecard, will go a long way. It doesn’t have to be agreed with, but it should be respected. As far as non-professional reviews go, a well-written review in an age where anyone can post what they think about a particular CD is practically a rarity outside of dedicated music blogs. Browse around RateYourMusic.com (where I’ve been occasionally been re-sharpening my reviewing skills on some albums in my collection that are way out of the chronological and stylistic boundaries TGML covers) – or the comment areas of Amazon or iTunes – sometime. See how many well-thought-out reviews written by average Joes are in place (especially for more well-known artists), and how many reviews are actually the product of trolls, attention whores, and people who couldn’t spell a word correctly, control their shift keys or capslocks, or structure a sentence if their life depended on it.

It probably would not surprise you – and it definitely wouldn’t surprise me – if the latter category of “armchair reviewers” never actually listened to the record or artist they were gleefully bashing. Those “armchair reviewers” are more good reason why I’m going to try to keep doing reviews here, and I’m going to be getting quite a few out of the way over the next month – because the music deserves it. And because quality always perseveres.

CONOR OBERST AND THE MYSTIC VALLEY BAND
Outer South
(Merge)
Available on CD, 180-gram 2xLP with download code, iTunes, AmazonMP3 and eMusic
Rating:

It is a little hard to listen to Conor Oberst recent solo output and not be reminded of Bob Dylan. Hell, with his self-titled 2008 solo release – his first recording for Merge after an almost lifetime association with Saddle Creek (the independent label he practically helped build thanks to his prodigious output under the Bright Eyes moniker) – had a lot of shades of Bringing It All Back Home/Highway 61 Revisited Dylan throughout.

Indeed, Outer South smacks incredibly of Dylan even more than Conor Oberst. Until now, it was unusual for Oberst to retain the same general musical style from album to album in a row, given that the past several years of his studio album output have ultilized electronics (Digital Ash for A Digital Urn), nu-country (I’m Wide Awake Its Morning), and a cross of Pet Sounds and Electric Warrior (Cassadaga). Then again, Conor Oberst the solo artist and his Mystic Valley Band are a wholly different beast than Bright Eyes.

The more consistent personnel of the Mystic Valley Band has brought in a new dimension to Conor’s world: The band is co-credited on the album itself, while several of the members contribute their own lead vocals and/or songwriting to the new album. On the front cover photo, Oberst has even gone so far as to deliberately obscure his eyes with a black marker smudge to divert attention to the rest of his bandmates. The presence of compositions from the rest of the band would explain why this album is appearing a mere nine months after the release of Oberst’s last full-length effort.

When I first sat down to listen to the album, I hadn’t given a glance to the credits and didn’t know that Oberst was sharing lead vocal and songwriting time with the rest of the band. When I was taking notes while first listening to the album (double vinyl edition), I had written “Conor’s singing voice [on “”Big Black Nothing”] is almost unrecognizable here, resembling a consistently on-pitch Dylan.” Nope – it was guitarist Nik Frietas singing his own composition.  (Yeah, sorry for the Dylan comparison – I can’t help it with this album). Same with “Air Mattress” where I thought Conor was taking on a slightly more nasal voice – the band’s other guitarist, Taylor Hollingsworth, is the vocalist (and songwriter) there. (Frietas, Hollingsworth, and drummer Jason Boesel contribute two lead vocal/songwriting efforts apiece on the album; bassist Macey Taylor sings a song specially penned by Oberst; Conor co-wrote one song apiece with Frietas and keyboardist Nathaniel Walccott respectively and wrote the rest of the album himself.)

Again, the general musical tone of the album, like its predecessor, reminds me of mid-60’s Dylan, but there are other musical influences rearing their heads throughout Outer South. “Bloodline”, Nik Frietas’ other lead vocal/songwriting contribution, recalls George Harrison’s mid-to-late ‘70’s solo work – on first listen I kept expecting the band to go into “Crackerbox Palace” at any moment. “Roosevelt Room” channels louder Neil Young & Crazy Horse (Hollingsworth does some very Neil-esque electric guitar work not only on this track but on “To All the Lights in the Windows”). “Cabbage Town” finds Roger McGuinn 12-string leads, Phil Spector drum rhythms, and Roy Orbison-esque guitar strums vying for sonic space.

Some talk elsewhere on the internet (mainly early armchair reviewers on Rate Your Music working from leaked copies of the album) accuses the presence of the other band members’ songwriting contributions  as actually weakening the album. This is not the case. The contributions of the other band members’ songs are equal with Conor’s, and Conor himself has definitely not lost a step songwriting-wise, given that he really hasn’t lost a step since at least Lifted or The Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your  Ear to The Ground.  Having a solid team behind him no doubt helps, but even with the rest of the band sharing the singing and writing duties, Outer South is still USDA prime Conor Oberst – you can consume with confidence.

HANGRY & ANGRY
“Sadistic Dance” (single)
(JapanFiles.com)
Available as a digital download through JapanFiles.com and ITunes US & Japan
Rating:

This is, admittedly, a quick review because I only have one song to deal with. I hadn’t even thought that Hitomi Yoshizawa & Rika Ishikawa would hit the studio again before coming to America this weekend for SakuraCon, but go they did.

If you liked the Kill Me Kiss Me EP (I certainly did), “Sadistic Dance” is more of the same, basically – which is not a bad thing: a dark-sounding lyric over mostly major-key punk/goth/pop music. The song starts off with an almost snake-charmer-esque lead guitar line, while the body of the song, whose instrumental arrangement is dominated by techno-influenced keyboards with early Jesus & Mary Chain guitar rhythms (without the excess amplifier feedback), is propelled by an almost poppish beat (especially during the choruses). Yossy and Charmy’s vocals, which have never needed any post-production tricks in their entire careers to date, take on an alternate dimension by way of whoever produced the track (JapanFiles didn’t provide any production credits) making an exact copy the duo’s original unprocessed vocal tracks (one of the many creative advantages of hard-disk recording systems like ProTools and Logic, compared to analog reel-to-reel tape), processing that copy with a touch of AutoTune, and then folding it underneath the original vocals so that both the clear and “robotic” vocals sit side-by-side on the track. In an age where some artists are using AutoTune more as a gimmick to hang (or lengthen) a career on, the deliberate side-by-side vocal production on “Sadistic Dance” comes off as a much more creative and honest way of using that particular ProTools plug-in.

Here’s hoping this is a teaser for a new HANGRY&ANGRY album!

MORNING MUSUME
Platinum 9 DISC
(Zetima/Sony [Japan]/JapanFiles.com [USA])
Available on CD and through JapanFiles.com and iTunes US and Japan
Rating:

Man, talk about playing catch-up. The last time I saw a favorite band release a shitload of long-playing albums in such a short period of time was when Black Flag had come back in 1984 from a couple of years of legal limbo during which they couldn’t record or release new material. In one calendar year, they had released the studio albums My War and Slip It In, the live cassette Live ’84 and the half-spoken word/half-instrumental project Family Man – all in one calendar year. While that may sound like an odd comparison anywhere else in the J-pop blogosphere, I myself don’t think so. While Morning Musume didn’t have any legal holdups to speak of, 2008 was a somewhat idle year release-wise for the band, with only two singles and a side-project for them to speak of until the release of COVER YOU last November. Now, we already have a new album and single out, and a second single already in the can and scheduled for release in May – now that’s the MoMusu release schedule I’ve been acquainted with for the past five years! 

On to the album itself… Read the rest of this entry »