My 2024 Q3 Roundup

Enfants' 3rd EP D. (after Q. and E.) is their best one so far.

They're basically splitting up their first album into 3 EPs, releasing them over a year and a bit? I thought that's a pretty interesting way to go about it.

NELKE, previously RIRIKO BAND, is a five piece band fronted by singer-songwriter RIRIKO.

I'm mildly surprised that I don't see more people talking about this release, I really enjoyed their new 3rd mini-album ジュブナイルのあとがき Epilogue Of Juvenile. Probably will be on my end of year list.

But I really do not like the intro track. I know it's going for a orchestra warming-up vibe, but I think it sounds too messy to work, and I think the quoting an upcoming song in the intro feels a bit cheesy. I didn't know it's possible for me to have strong opinions on an intro, but idk, I don't like it.

Probably this is because otherwise, ignoring the intro track, the rest of the mini-album is basically perfect, I really like it, give it a listen:

This song is more of everything that I've been loving recently: the mixed duo vocals, the fuzzy shoegazey guitars, it's just so good.

Check out their first full album Love is Over! . I really like most of the songs here, particularly M2 MIRROR'S EDGE, M5 SugarCrash, and M7 Enrique. But I do think the album as a whole just feels a bit too same-y, but at the same time not cohesive enough? Hard to describe.

I like their Spotify profile with instructions on how to be MoritaSaki in the pool.

Completely unrelated, but hello Nikos (and SpringStingray) if you're reading this, hope you're doing well 👋 (please ignore this)

𝑬𝒏𝒅 𝒐𝒇 𝒔𝒖𝒎𝒎𝒆𝒓 𝑺𝒉𝒐𝒆𝒈𝒂𝒛𝒆𝒓……

Otsukare Babys is a five piece vtuber band formed in 2020, and they're super good. Like, how have I never heard of them before?

They've only released one album in 2022, and two more songs for 2023 M3 Spring. But between this song, and my favourite song on the album: M7 ダイアリー Diary , and the other new song Sunflower that's very shoegazey, it was difficult to pick which song I want to feature here.

I would also like to recommend the member's own work, like 鷹森ツヅル Tsuzuru Takamori's new song REDEFINE from last year, or 樫野創音 Kashino Tsukune's recent new song .

Their old livestream where they talk about their music journey, and the bands that they've listened to, is also very worth checking out. There's so many great bands on there, and also a lot of band that I haven't heard of on there.

I swear it's not my Kamitsubaki bias (psss I think Patrick doesn't know), higma is one of my favourite vocaloid producer at the moment.

A lot of the new outstanding vocaloid producers leans into the hyper and chaotic, or more dark and gritty, but higma's sounds are really clean, simple, warm, and refreshing, and somehow still really catches my attention.

This MV was a part of Youtube Music Weekend , which is mostly just a showcase of what internet-based artists are popular, or is up-and-coming. I did have a lot of fun watching and live chatting with friends through the event. A lot of the live videos have been privated though, as per usual.

The highlight of the event is definitely 原口沙輔 Sasuke Haraguchi, and his new group / project thing CDs that has like 30+ members(?!), of which Sasuke Haraguchi, frog96, and higma has their own sections in the Youtube Music Weekend too, all of these are worth checking out if you have the time.

higma's entry in VocaDuo 2024 with somunia is also worth checking out.

Pasocom's new album Love Flutter sounds a lot more mellow, compared to their last year's album FINE LINE, which mean this is definitely more of my thing.

I especially also really liked the mid night vibes of Empty feat. Le Makeup

Limre is a bedroom solo band of KBSNK, a member of the electronic duo TEMPLIME.

I did not know what to expect before listening, what do you mean a solo band? From an electronics producer?

I did not expect to like this EP 知らない魂 Shiranai Tamashii as much as I do. Maybe because I haven't listened to much of this kind of stuff. I had a bit of an aversion of this... autotuned / vocoded whatever, but I somehow really like this.

魔法学校 Mahōgakkō probably will be most people's album of 2024.

My taste in music has changed a bit. I've been listening to more electronic stuff, more weirder stuff, instead of just straight rock, and I think it shows.

I really love Mao Sasagawa's Welcome to Sunnyside, my album of 2023. I think it's a lot more pop-er than Sasagawa's previous works, while still clearly having their own individual quirkyness in the sounds and voices, and it's just the perfect mix of oddity and poppiness for me to come back to the album again and again.

Comparatively, Mahōgakkō sits right at the very edge of what I can listen to comfortably. It's Hakushi Hasegawa on full throttle. And I love it.

I really did not expect Hakushi Hasegawa to be featured on The First Take, and this rendition of 外 Outside is soooo good, and featuring so many other great artists for the vocals, like ぷにぷに電機 and 諭吉佳作/men. It was very easy to pick which song from the album to include in this list.

I'll write more write more on this album on my end of year list.