the Shiina Ringo thread

Shuukyou is fucking awesome, needless to say. Distorto-orch pop with a TUNE et demie. Unbelievably cool.

omg this outro is mad! :D

ok Doppelganger just went down the freaking rabbit-hole

having begun track 3......alterna-dimension Mr Bungle is the best I'm coming up with. but poppier. this is truly unhinged and fantastic.

I think a violin died just then :D

Track 4 is simply gorgeous. :)

oh no my VLC player died :(

aaaaa fuck you FLAC format

:D awesome awesome awesome, Track 5 is cool as all hell

the way the baroque arrangements play off that drum-machine beat is so goddamn breezy

track 6 is a pleasant comedown from track 5's astounding heights - but there's so much still going on! bet this album is a grower...

and it has an epic ending :P

This single is a little generic and boring, but it was written by Kameda, and with the exception of "Toumei Ningen" from Adult, his songs tend to be rather generic J-pop ("Superstar," "Shiseikatsu," and "Senkou Shoujo"). For the record, I do think he's an excellent bass player.

I'm sure Ringo, Izawa, and Ukigumo will have more interesting compositions, as always.

track 7 is a freaking delight - love when the beat drops, and the chord-changes near the end - lush! :D
track 8 builds on a Beatlesy melody into something mighty. the bridge is lovely and then the song comes back with even more melody and force. this album drips with melody, and melody from unexpected directions at that. then some killah bass comes and finishes it off! and a kind of didgeridoo deathdrone...
track 9 begins with the aforementioned drone and then another ominous bassline...but just as quickly, a heavenly pop melody bashes through the mix! haaaa! and this time, with a recorder offering counterpoint! KEYCHANGE
track 10 is again segued into. actually I think all the tracks segue, and do so beautifully - another great detail. oooh and fairground organs! for a song about a 'poltergeist'! heee. this one will stand or fall on its melodies - fortunately it has some rather choice ones. and the XTC string quartet piles in on cue as well...middle-eight is cuuuuute! yeah this is her '1000 Umbrellas' pretty much...
track 11 is clearly going to be the greatest thing ever from the intro alone. *immerses self within the insane digital sensefest* OMG CHURCH ORGAN OMG DRUMSSSSSS OMG ENDING

Did you travel outside of your body during Souretsu (the last song)?

all right so now you need to either seize Shouso Strip (which is basically about as weird but with a few more hat-tips to J-Pop ("Gips," "Honnou")) or Tokyo Jihen's Kyoiku (which is kind of completely fucking unhinged, uh, "rock")

during the last song I kinda merged with the cosmos, like

then you understood the lyrics! http://www.nostalgic-lavender.net/ringo/kalksamen.html

new TJ song is clearly supposed to be boring, the video is going to lengths to depict them as bored by their own music, all is going according to plan

this morning's youtube break is Meisai!

studio PV
live (Baishou Ecstasy version)

Haha, oh god no, not more of this mediocre show-tune stuff:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RTb_QJhpO0

Hata arrested! Hit a police officer after being arrested on suspicion of breaking into a house. I thought this was a joke at first, but it sounds like it's for real. How bizarre.

http://forums.electricmole.net/showthread.php?t=1610

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20110212p2a00m0na008000c.html
http://www.tokyograph.com/news/id-7441

I listened to Sanmon Gossip for the first time in a while today and while uneven and choked with floral arrangements, it's pretty great overall, particularly when it allows itself to get lost ("Togatta Teguchi," "Bonsai Hada").

I have no intention of revisiting Sports, meanwhile, but I intend to see if Variety is still boring.

Sanmon Gossip and Variety both have some good-to-decent tracks, but I find them both uneven and unsatisfactory overall.

goddamnit kameda why you gotta write this rote j-pop ballad and make it track 4

way to kill the momentum

re: "Fukushuu"

why you gotta try to make this a dir en grey record, ukigumo.

Okay, so whenever I think of this record, I think, how can it be bad? The singles are incredible!

And then I remember that there's a track on this record with Ukigumo shouting.

fuuuuck "killer tune" is still so, so great

izawa definitely comes off as the best non-shiina writer in this band.

Eh, I can't agree with that. I haven't kept close track, but I think they're fairly closely matched.

this is probably posted elsewhere in this increasingly untenable thread, but if tokyo jihen mk 1 had stuck around to record adult:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY4VfDvHvZc

It's good, but I actually prefer the Adult version (and also think Adult is better than the debut).

oh yeah and then there's this infinitely superior version of tomei ningen

Chiaki Kuriyama/Shiina Ringo collaboration (SR wrote and produced and TJ are performing, if I understand correctly):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJGzjbigNAM

The Shiina Ringo thread where we are still embedded youtube whores.

Even when there's nothing to see.

Hirama working on a new project:

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fm20110204a1.html

New album soon?

Soon. End of the month, I think.

http://sadisticgossip.blogspot.com/2011/05/tokyo-jihen-phase-3.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWEC6QMgWCs

Don't like the video, not sure about the song. Maybe they will progress into being a really good ultra-commercial rock band.

I don't hate it.

She appears to be singing in English but I am not sure of most of what she's singing, but at least her English isn't annoying here. Better to be incomprehensible (like plenty of English language songs by singers whose first language is English).

It does sound like Tokyo Jihen, but how many times can I make that mostly pointless comment?

I like the video a bit more now that I've actually watched all of it. The slow-mo ending is my favorite part though. I still am not too impressed with it.

so, so boring.

dammit.

I don't get what they're going for in that video

I haven't been keeping up with Electric Mole, so it turns out there is more of this album on youtube already. (In fact, for all I know it might have leaked by now. I haven't gotten to the end of the thread.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozt6SPBZQ0U

Just wanted to thank you guys for bumping this thread so many times over the years that it got me to finally check out Karuki Zamen Kuri no Hana earlier this year. Loved it, and picked up a copy while in Japan this month. I also checked out ADULT and didn't like it as much, but I'll probably make my way through her/their other stuff and see if anything else grabs me.

http://motto-jimidane.com/jlab-maru/s/maru1309196052906.jpg

'Brand New Civilization' is one of my favorite Jihen singles in forever. loved it the first time I heard it too.

the last two singles really had me scared but this has me psyched for the album (even if it's got all the songs from those singles strewn through it)