Wednesday, 12 August 2009

Japanese Techno-Pop Makes Me Wee Rainbows

(via the ever-giving wellspring of EPIC WIN that is Metafilter)

So yeah today I watched these performances from an 80s Japanese kids' TV show, three Techno-Pop bands, P-Model, Hikashu and Plastics. The sound quality is mildly anus, but you get the idea:



Everything I know about J-Pop and all its bizarro corollaries could be written on the back of a postage stamp in fat-nibbed magic marker, but regular readers of my blog (I'm looking at you, Mum) will know I reckon proggy girl trio eX-Girl are rather spesh. (you should check out Waving Scientist @ Frog King - it's probbo my fave track) Wikipedia reveals that the first band on in the vid, P-Model, are fronted by Susumu Hirasawa, who did the soundtrack for spooky millenial angstathon Paranoia Agent. I got sent a review copy of part of the series when I was writing for NEO, and I can confidently say it's one of the best, most unnerving anime series I've ever seen. It follows a succession of people who get attacked by a rollerblading, bent baseball bat wielding kid known to the media as Lil' Slugger, and explores estrangement, insanity, and people's pasts coming back to haunt them. It's endlessly inventive and manages to have a great sense of humour while being genuinely disturbing.

I remember even finding the opening credit sequence upsetting for reasons I couldn't quite put my finger on, but it provides a great opportunity to show how Susumu Hirasawa's music helps create an atmosphere of weird uneasiness:

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