♪☆ Twinkle twinkle ★♫
Posted in J-music on April 8th, 2012 12:31 by HenkkaTags: cymbals, twinklestars
That is a disgusting post title.
I’m sure all you idol loving types are aware of the group Sakura Gakuin. I’ve mentioned them once or twice on my blog — BABYMETAL is one of their sub-groups — but other than that, I don’t think much of them. Same old story, lacking songwriting quality and all that jazz I always babble on about. However, they have another sub-group where I find they do not have that problem.
I’d like you to meet Twinklestars.
That to me is simple earcandy in it’s purest form. Perfection. After I heard that, I naturally checked to see if they’d released anything more, and indeed they had. Two more songs.
It was just as I’d guessed: all three songs are perfection. Who knew that a marriage of idol pop and good old Shibuya-kei could result in something this sweet?
However, they’d only released three songs at this point. Perfect as they may be, three songs won’t keep one busy for very long. But I mean, what is there to do but wait for more, right? So I waited and waited, and finally last month when Sakura Gakuin released a new album, Twinklestars’ fourth song was featured. Though I was anxiously looking forward to it, when I finally got to listen to it… you knew it: I thought it was bad. I know, I know, damn me and my high expectations, right? But seriously, gone was all the Shibuya-kei flavor, or anything else worthwhile. “This sounds like any other Sakura Gakuin song!“, I thought. (Why am I writing this post like it’s a shitty book?)
In any case, that was that. I was left with a sour taste in my mouth. Three songs full of such promise, but it wasn’t meant to last. However! Wait! Don’t go yet! This post has a happy ending!
So the key was thinking to myself, “Why is it just these three songs?! What makes them so special?! I want more of this!” That made me do what I should’ve just done in the first place: check the songwriting credit. For all three songs, it was a guy called Okii Reiji. Quick Wikipedia check tells me he was in a Shibuya-kei band called Cymbals. Alright, let’s do a quick YouTube check. Not like I have anything to lose.
Holy shit. It is more of the same. More of the same musical perfection. And they have a full-ass-discography! See, call me silly, but I didn’t know Shibuya-kei could sound like this. I thought it was all the cutesy stuff. You know, Takako Minekawa and that sorta thing, which is fine in its own right. What I didn’t know is that it could be, like, cool, groovy, summery, catchy band stuff!
That is basically my story of the day. I told it for two reasons. Firstly, I just wanted to tell you about my love for Twinklestars (their first three songs anyway) and Cymbals. If you liked the Cymbals song above, do give their last release “anthology” a listen. Secondly, a request. If you know any other idol groups that do this sort of mix of idol pop and Shibuya-kei like Twinklestars do, or if you know any other bands that sound like Cymbals, could you please do this Finn a favor and let me know. You’d make my day.
Thank you for reading.
Was actually listening to new Sakugaku album on the way to work this morning. Did disturb me that I knew another Twinklestars song was coming after Pleasex3, but then I was left disappointed by it. And miniparty sucked like usual. But still, I felt the normal Sakugaku songs were decent, but then I’m more impressed with the whole idols-doing-rock than you are in general :P Probably why I like Passpo’s music.
Still, this is the first I’ve heard of Shibuya-kei as a distinct musical genre. I just thought it was a more fashionable form of viskei. I just thought of Twinklestars as piano-heavy rock :P Still, Cymbals sounds pretty damn good.
Yeah, you’re definitely more idols+rock inclined than I. Not a fan of PASSPO either. Honestly, it’s just often not a combination that works very well for me, crazy as it sounds. On paper it sounds great. “I mean, idols AND rock?! How could this possibly go wrong?!” is how I thought previously… but often I don’t really like the end result. I like my idols poppy. I dunno, maybe I’m just old-fashioned. ;)
Yeah, apparently Shibuya-kei is its own genre. That’s what they tell me anyway. Heh, interestingly I didn’t even think of Twinklestars as rock! I just thought it was a little more hard-hitting pop than usual, with loads of piano and keyboards like you said. Well, rock or pop or whatever it is, I just think it sounds amazing. Love it. Happy to hear you thought Cymbals sounded decent! Feel free to give them a further listen if you’d like.
Early Capsule was Shibuya-kei, even if they’re technically not an idol group:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmZ4axgG9KM
The first thing that I thought of upon hearing “Highway Star, Speed Star” was this, although only this song, and not the entire soundtrack:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zU7wNWpJDY
Orange Lounge’s songs are actually sung in French:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72v4UAoG3MU
Thanks for the recs, Arbitrary_greay! Might have to investigate further into early capsule…
I absolutely loved your post! I would def, recomend Vanilla Beans, they have taken a more idolish route, but their early music sounds a LOT like heavy shibuya-kei. There also Nomoto Karia which did a lot of garbage post her awesome work http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MubPhGFQBU Karly is a great CD! My boyfriend listens a shitload of good music, and he can barely pass new japanese music but he loves Nomoto Karia just as me. Well… any old music from Yasukata Nakata is great, he had some really good collabs with a lot of shibuya kei groups in the 90′s. I love your blog!!!! My writing and english sucks so sorry!
Hey MaiMai! I’ve actually been meaning to check out Vanilla Beans for the longest time but I’ve never gotten around to it yet. I really ought to. I heard like one song once and thought it was promising. Anyway, that track by Karia Nomoto sounds AWESOME! A bit different from what I was originally looking for, but awesome all the same! It’s like a 00′s Japanese version of old 60′s ye-ye pop. I’ll definitely check her out further, right after I finish writing this comment. I listened to that track twice and it’s already looping inside my head… Thanks a lot for the recommendation!
And thanks for liking the blog! Your writing and English are fine. :)