As you may or may not have read from my personal blog, boylikesmusic will no longer be updated. I will no longer be doing blm style reviews which defeats the purpose of this blog… Also, a lot of what I’ve been doing lately (releasing mixes, stepcharts, etc.) would be better served on my dotcom as opposed to an affiliate site to a Japanese metablog. In a sense, I’m not really going anywhere since everything this site was doing is going to be at my new blog, minus the reviews of course.

To everyone who stuck with me until the end, thanks for reading and commenting and adding extra unf to why I love doing what I do.

Please update your blogroll and feed readers to my new blog:

http://johpan.com

Thanks for everything <3

Love, johpan.

Firstly, and most importantly, I’d just like to thank all of you for sticking with reading, watching, listening to and playing my stuff, even when it seems so few and far between. Every comment and download brings a smile to my face, even if it’s constructive critism. Seeing that my feedburner doesn’t read zero makes me happy too! (It’s actually been steady at a high 30 for a while ^__^)

Content-wise, I’m finding it hard to balance out my time working a full-time summer job. I’ve got post ideas in my head but it’s having a hard time translating to words in the little free time I have. I still have to write about my Morning Musume @ AnimeExpo experience from early July though I made a few posts for International Wota about our official IW business in LA while it was going on. I’m still thinking about my TRIANGLE and Genie reviews.

While you wait for those, allow me to introduce my new stepchart site/blog. You can get to it by clicking above or by its easy to remember URL at: http://stepcharts.johpan.com. Subscribe to the feed to stay in the loop for all of my releases.

Thanks again for everything. Just wanted to say I’m not dead yet.

- joh

Tracklist:
1 // Perfume – I still love U
2 // MEG – LIES
3 // 소녀시대 (Girls’ Generation) – 소원을 말해봐 (Genie) // Tell Me Your Wish (Genie)
4 // Perfume – edge (⊿-mix)
5 // MEG – JOKER
6 // Perfume – ワンルーム・ディスコ // One Room Disco
7 // Saori@destiny – Shangri-La
8 // Perfume – The best thing
9 // MEG – SKIN
10 // MEG – FREAK -yasutaka nakata remix-
11 // Perfume – NIGHT FLIGHT

I was actually working on TPL4 pre-⊿ but then I decided to hold off because I didn’t really have any direction in what I was doing. I actually thought of doing a MEG-A-MIX that I might just do later (TPL5?). But anyway, I won’t say much about what I think of the ⊿ tracks because I’ll be doing a review of it eventually.

Something new in this TPL would be BPM changes. I have 6 BPM changes in this mix. It starts off at 110 with I still love U and ends off at 145 with NIGHT FLIGHT. Here’s a little table of all the BPMs:

I found it weird that all of MEGs songs had that .980 on each of them. Check it out yourself if you don’t believe me. Anyway, here’s the download link:

TechnoPopLove 4 // BEAUTIFUL TRIANGLE (and stuff) [54.74MB]

Comments and all that stuff are greatly appreciated <3

MEG - BEAUTIFUL (2009)
Regular Edition
Limited Edition /w DVD
Released May 27th, 2009

1. DAYS
2. PRECIOUS
3. TELEPHONE
4. LIES
5. STAR
6. STAND
7. WHY
8. JOKER
9. SKIN
10. BEAUTIFUL
11. FREAK <yasutaka nakata remix>

This is my view right now.

I listened to this album on the subway down here and doing it a second time as I’m typing this out. It might be a bit too soon to do it in standard blm album style but I’ll write in order of first impression appeal from ascending order.

DAYS doesn’t count as a song since it’s an intro so it’ll go first. Nothing too special going on in the song: a synth pad carried by MEG’s quirky engrish. The delivery is solid and almost haunting with a downtempo, minimalistic beat that builds into a solid percussion line. An interesting experimental piece.

STAR is a piano led, downtempo track that doesn’t quite do it for me. I don’t know what it is about it but it doesn’t really connect with me. She’s had more appealing slower songs like NATALIE. It’s cute enough and MEG does a solid vocal performance but I’m just not feeling this one.

STAND starts off very summery. It should be a perfect song to listen to considering my current situation but just like STAR, it’s just not carrying much of a catchy tune. Solid performances all around. The guitar and electric piano is a fun combo. It’s really just the melody.

WHY? It sounded like it had so much potential once that bassline dropped, but from there, it just didn’t really deliver. The melody is somewhat interesting and the main melodic synth is fun in its repetitive nature but where a song should grow on you, it just doesn’t do anything after it shows you its stuff.

Ahhh, the title track, BEAUTIFUL. It’s kinda downtempo but not so much. (~120 neighborhood) and it suffers what the songs previous suffers from, I mean, it’s cute and it’s entertaining, but the melody just doesn’t carry though. It could basically blend in with the scenery or if it happened to play on random, it wouldn’t attract my attention.

And this is where the album takes a turn for the better. TELEPHONE starts off the fun with a solid beat and a fun electric piano line with a splash of guitar. Aside from it being the third track, it’s a good start to the album and grabbed my by the ear and took me for a bit of a ride. It could just be that I’m a sucker for the big beat snare.

SKIN is more of an instrumental track than a vocal track. The lines that MEG delivers is more of a logical separator than anything else. It’s like lines – “I’m starting” – do a bit of stuff – lines – “I’m starting to build up momentum” – add something else to the mix – go for a break – come back kicking – o hi more lines – “I’m still here” – come back full-force – take another quick break – CRESCENDO! WITH LINES! – cool down – fin.

PRECIOUS is the only song I heard previous to listening to this album. I love this song on its own and already did a review of it. Why don’t you read that instead?

Starting off with a funky break of a beat and keeping the broken quality throughout, LIES really sets itself apart from the rest of the album. The chorus is so solid and really holds the entire song together. There are no words to further describe the song. I just suggest you listen to it and see why I’ve given it the #3 spot.

JOKER has, by far, the catchiest melody in the album. This is some extreme last.fm spam potential. MEG’s higher register is showcased in the chorus and it’s. just. love. When I can’t explain things, I turn to fanboy tactics to solve my problems. People tend to understand fanboy more than the little technicalities that I might blurt out for a song like this but It doesn’t need anything confusing like that to muddle its enjoyability factor. This would definitely be the number one track on the album if…

FREAK didn’t get the nakata remix treatment. HOLY. CRAP. Where did this come from!? It’s songs like this that remind me why I consider him to be a musical genius. I’m not going to say that the Hadouken version of the song was a complete train wreck but one needed to be in a particular state of mind to really appreciate that song. Lucky for me I enjoy Hadouken’s music and when I found out that they did a collaboration with MEG, I kinda flipped out for a second. Something about their styles don’t quite mesh well together but it was an experience. THIS, however… I can’t sing its praises enough. I think we may have a potential Song Of the Summer on our hands.

And that’s it!

Though, I would like to add, MEG didn’t really have a fashion show / clubby party song like she had on her past two albums: MODEL in BEAM and MAKE LOVE and SUPERSONIC in STEP. I kinda wanted one but it’s ok that it doesn’t have one. We’ve got some quality melodies and vocals and I find it to be quite BEAUTIFUL. HUR.

I’ll start watching 11PM EST. Click Here for a popout or hit the jump to view the post page directly.

The new charts are as follows:
capsule – FLASH BACK
Buono! – MY BOY [video]
DJ Hazard – Rubber Chicken
Girls’ Generation – Gee
Aural Vampire – Shounan Zoku -cannibal coast-
Tsunku – UFO Ping-Pong
Laura Shigihara – Zombies On Your Lawn!
Royksopp – Happy Up Here

And an old favorite I didn’t put on for some strange reason:
Teddybears – Hey Boy

I was thinking about putting some teaser charts from PerFuMix but I think they can wait :D…
Until then, ENJOY!!

Take it! Gee (Take it! Sailor Uniform / Motteke! Serafuku from Lucky Star)
This wasn’t the first song I mashed up with the vocals. The rip that it made had a lot of background noise so I needed something noisy to compensate. I just happened to have the Motteke! Serafuku instrumental handy. It was an interesting mix.

Gee Boy (American Boy by Estelle feat. Kanye West)
This was the first song I mashed it up with. You can hear the background hissing that the instrumental kept in. I didn’t like it enough to release it first but then I let some friends listen to it and they didn’t mind it. Also, considering the tools I have to work with, it’s acceptable. Also, the first thing I tend to do when it comes to mashups is somehow bring in some hip-hop. Why?

Baby Gee Love (Baby cruising Love by Perfume)
Perfume’s always gotta be involved. Also, these songs were practically meant for each other; I didn’t have to do much chopping for the instrumental; everything just kinda fit into place…

MY Gee BOY (MY BOY by Buono!)
MY BOY is 206 bpm. Gee is 200bpm. Might as well. The track volume on this one’s a bit quiet… I don’t know why.

but I’ll be taking the “talent over looks” argument in a slightly different angle.

I think it’s safe to say that most people hear people’s music before seeing them, or is it really that safe considering every band on the planet has a myspace and their music videos up on youtube? There was a time where you’d have a chance to sit down and LISTEN to music before the visual judgments get tossed around. Or maybe that’s just me? Everything’s all about having “the look” or whatever it is. Many musical acts have been shrugged off by producers because of their lack of “the look”. I guess it makes sense for them to do it because everything’s about first impressions these days. Also, sight processes faster than sound so if you can’t capture a potential customer’s attention within that timeframe it takes them to surf to a new page or change the channel, you’ve lost a battle.

Perfume

Angela Aki

Morning Musume
(circa Summer 2001)

The Pipettes (circa 2007)

Being a Japanese music fan living in Canada, media exposure of my favourite musical acts is limited to what I actively search for online and through my RSS feed subscriptions. In comparison to MuchMusic, local radio, and just walking around malls and anywhere that plays music, you’d think that I have more exposure to North American music – it’s actually quite the contrary. That or the music here is just so easy to ignore since it doesn’t tickle my fancy at all. Or at least the pop genre here doesn’t. In the case of non-visual media, people might come across a song that they haven’t “seen” yet, but with music videos playing practically everywhere (movie theatres, music stores, mall food courts, etc.) it’s practically impossible in the pop world. It’s funny how much longer a song’s lifespan becomes when it isn’t constantly force-fed into your system.

Given that I’m not on youtube looking for new music nearly as much as I’m exposed to the local stuff, most of the new music I come across is heard instead of seen. This helps me in a few ways: firstly, I don’t fall victim to the visual marketing ploy and listen to just the music first, and secondly, I toss judgments purely on musical ability and not on unimportant things like looks. By the time I become unlazy and actively search for what this new act looks like, I’m already enough of a fan (or antifan) that it doesn’t matter what they look like for it to make much of an impact on what I already think.

This was the case for me with Perfume, Angela Aki, and even Morning Musume. For Perfume, I heard them before seeing them and was pleasantly surprised that the extremely cute voices behind Sweet Donuts were accompanied with extremely cute girls. For Ms. Aki, I heard a lot of her stuff bleed into my room from my sister’s room and she’d always have her playing in the car and now that she has her piano books, there’s some serious Angela fever in the house. I must admit, though, I didn’t expect her look to be so casual and I’m not usually a fan of the “poof” hairstyle. The weird thing with me is that I’m such a positive scanner when the vibes around me are good that Angela’s style is growing on me. Morning Musume went the other way around though. I first heard Love Machine without any knowledge of who they were and wasn’t quite turned on to it. Then I found out who they were (while in their 4th generation) and listened to a bunch of their other songs before it clicked that they were the same group, plus or minus a few members.

Sadly, to answer my question, I can say that I am a bit shallow in that if I see a cute girl in the music biz, I check her out to see if she’s good. Is that really such a bad thing though? It happened with me and The Pipettes and look what happened there. But recently, The Pipettes went through some member changes. They haven’t released anything since but will I be as entertained as I was with the old line up? I don’t know for sure but I loved Rosay’s sass. Something I do know is that with Morning Musume, there’s no contest between a Love Machine with the original line up compared to today’s line up.

Wota Wonderings 4 – Are You a Shallow Wota (Solo Space)
WW04 – Are Looks Everything? (Tsuyoki de Yukoze!)
Wota Wonderings: On looks versus abilities… (boylikesmusic)
Wota Wonderings 004:Looks Or Talent? you decide (take off is now!)
[Wota Wonderings 04] It’s what’s outside that counts. (Renai Revolution 21)
Wota Wonderings 004 – Are You In The Shallow End Of The Pool? (Selective Hearing)
Wota Wonderings 04 – Case of the Body Snatchers (fields of maiZe and berryZ)
Wota Wonderings 004 (H!P Fangirling like Nobody’s Business)
[WW] Would I love Airi if she weren’t adorable? (Tsuugaku Vector ☂)

I won’t bother talking about the game other than it’s awesome and click the link to check it out on the Steam store. My friend, Sei from Sekushii Island, told me to watch the Plants Vs. Zombies Music Video from the Steam Product Page. At first, there was a bit of a facepalm. ~Oh wow. The marketing on this game is crazy.~ Then the lyrics kick in, and from there, it’s just… infectious? Maybe? Not quite on the Gee level though. After getting a heads up on Destructoid about there being a Japanese version to this song, and there being links to the Composer/Performer, Laura Shigihara’s blog, I had to investigate. There’s a really cute back story to how “Zombies On Your Lawn” came to be so give ‘er a read!

So anyway, what can I really say about this track other than it’s got everything that it needs to be as cute and viral as it already is. The instrumental is simple, yet fun and playful, and doesn’t take away from or drown out the main focus – the lyrics. These lyrics are just so adorable. They totally fit the theme and flavor of the game and get the point of zombie-hatred and kick-assy-ness of the plants across while retaining it’s light, playful nature. Ok, so I said a bit. Just give this song a listen. Then go and support and play the game. It’s only $10.

From Left to Right: RiotBecki, Rosay, and Gwenno

The Pipettes - We Are The Pipettes (2007)
North American Release Shown

Released October 2nd, 2007

1. We Are The Pipettes
2. Pull Shapes
3. Why Did You Stay?
4. Dirty Mind
5. It Hurts To See You Dance So Well
6. Judy
7. A Winter's Sky
8. Your Kisses Are Wasted On Me
9. Tell Me What You Want
10. Because It's Not Love (But It's Still A Feeling)
11. Sex
12. One Night Stand
13. ABC
14. I Love You
15. Dance And Boogie
16. Baby, Just Be Yourself

The first thing I looked for were their names. Gwenno, Becki, and Rosay. Easy enough! Also, not nearly as confusing as those super-groups in Asia especially since each of them were completely unique from the get-go. I think the first music video I bumped into was for Pull Shapes and was blown away with how much awesome was in that track: the dance, the style, the music, the everything. I definitely got a Beatles and Monkees from the 60’s kind of feel from the musicality. The lyrics, though a bit more modern, still had that playfulness and child-likeness to them which makes this kind of music so easy to listen to. The trio really takes advantage of each member with their harmonies and different layers of vocals.

But anyway, they were to be playing at a small restaurant and my friend and I called in the day before the show asking if there were any tickets left but sadly, there were none. We still ended up going downtown that day. I was kinda hoping that we’d bump into them but we didn’t and ended up watching 300 at the Scotiabank Theatre. It didn’t take them too long to come back and give me the opportunity to see them live. I do believe it was June 1st, 2007 and again on November 18th of the same year. 3 visits to Toronto in a year. We were spoiled. With the first visit, I got them to sign my UK release of “We Are The Pipettes” that I got shipped. On the second, I got them to sign my NA release. Also, RiotBecki said she remembered me. But then they kinda disappeared for a bit and said they were going back to the studios. Then Rosay and Becki left. Then two new girls came, then one of them left, and now I don’t know what’s going on with them more. :( I did manage to pick up that vinyl in LA while down there for my cousin’s wedding in the winter holiday season of 2007-08.

But on with the album commentary. I’ll be using the US release for this “review”. While writing the above, I’ve sat through the album twice already. It clocks in at just shy of 40 minutes, including the bonus tracks that weren’t included in the UK release. The longest track clocks in at 3 minutes and 8 seconds, “A Winter’s Sky“. Overall, it’s quite easily one of my favourite albums of 2007.

And in no particular order, my favourite tracks and a little commentary on each. Pull Shapes would have to be my favourite, not because of the music video or because it was the first video I saw of the girls, but because of its simplicity and the makes-you-want-to-dance factor. Dirty Mind’s lyrics make me lol. Also, dance factor. Judy features Rosay and her awesomeness. ‘Nuff said. ABC is just cute and energetic and again with the dance factor. I Love You is more of a sentimental song for me but is still completely danceable. Dance And Boogie makes me want to dance and boogie. There’s not that much more to it than that.

If you’re looking to enjoy some music reminiscent of the swingin’ 60’s with some girly attitude, check out this album. It’s sad though, you won’t be able to experience this group of girls live anymore. I do look forward to if the Pipettes of new end up visiting Toronto.

And just thought I’d add this in because it’s cute…