千晴　(Chiharu)
Baka Shoujiki

01: ラストSONG (Last SONG)
02: Stop!! (feat. Miura Daichi)
03: 今日 (Kyou)
04: もっと上に (Motto Ue ni)
05: シタクナイ (Shitakunai)
06: イエローカード (Yellow Card feat. 結城リナ)
07: 愛 FOR 愛 (Ai FOR Ai feat. 有坂美香 and Yuri)
08: Up & Down
09: 誓い (Chikai)
10: GO

Genre: Hip-Hop/Hip-Pop
Rating: 7/10

Download
 

Artist Info: 
Chiharu is under Kreva's "Ku" Album Label and is one half of the production duo "Stress Free," along with Kreva. The two jointly produced many of Kreva's hits including Have a Nice Day, Because, and Strong Style. Chiharu has also been featured as an emcee on other Ku Label artists' albums including Sonomi's and Kreva's.

Album Info:
Baka Shoujiki is one of two of Chiharu's debut albums, the other being Chiharu Kenbunroku. The two albums were both released on January 21st of 2009. GO and Ai for Ai were released as singles from the album. Stop!! also showed up on Miura Daichi's album, Who's the Man?.

My Thoughts:
I was really teetering between a 7 and 8, but didn't want to go into decimals or fractions. I was surprised how good this album is when I first checked it out. If you like any of Kreva or Sonomi's stuff you'll love Chiharu because you've already been listening to his production and his mic skills rival that of Kreva. The production is straight-up old-school Kreva-style stuff (old school as in Ai Jibunhaku and Shinjin Kreva -- not Oasys) and it's nice to hear someone other than Kreva spitting on such a distinct style of production. Chiharu's rhyme-skills are much better than Seamo and some other hip-poppers, yet his hooks are just as catchy. I will say this album has more high energy hip-hop than Kreva's usually do, and so I think Hip-Hop purists that aren't big fans of Kreva will still enjoy Baka Shoujiki. Enjoy!

On to other stuff. First off I have a pretty big announcement. JASRAC (the Japanese Society for Rights of Authors) has left a couple comments on my Seeda posts telling me to take down the download links to the albums. Although the comments lack a distinct professionalism (I wouldn't want to "be lost," now would I?), my only goal here is to promote the artists, and if a firm supposedly representing the artist is going to ask me to take these albums down, I'm going to abide by their request in some way, shape, or form. So, all four of Seeda's albums that I uploaded are all PM only. Just send me a message and I'll get the link to ya. If you don't have a LJ account, leave a comment with your email address (make sure to leave the @ or .com out so you don't get some epic spam mail from having your e-mail floating on the internet), and I'll send you the link. The comments only reference the Seeda albums, so there'll be no change to any other uploads as of yet. If these types of problems persist I'll probably end up making this place a private community for members-only. We'll see. I don't know if you guys remember that whole fiasco where all the Japanese music videos were taken down off of Youtube that happened a couple years ago, but that was JASRAC's doing as well.

So, now that that's out of the way, it's time for some music news. Speaking of Kreva, he's got a new mini-album/maxi thing out called Oasys but it is, in my opinion, pretty much garbage. I liked the Sonomi track, but for real, an 8 track album with 4 intermissions? That's a single, not even a mini-album. Throw in 3 of the 4 tracks completely sucking? Barely even worth the disc space is takes up on my computer. Speaking of being ripped-off, Iconiq has a new album out called Light Ahead that has three tracks from her last album, Change Myself, on it. I will say that I like some of the new material on Light Ahead, but I would be pretty angry if I paid money for that album. Kreva - 2/10 (two points for having a good sonomi song on it, otherwise it would be 0!), Iconiq - 4/10. Jay'ed has a new single out called Shine that has a poppy R&B vibe to it, almost Chemistry-esque. It's decent, I'm going to let it grow on me and see if I like it. I'm still on the fence about the entire single. Usually I love Jay'ed's B-sides. Minmi's new single, Patto Hanasaku, features Verbal and is definitely worth checking out. The beat to it is really nice. I love it when producers use Japanese instruments in modern beats. Exile's new single is called Motto Tsuyoku and is a pretty, albeit slow, ballad. Japanese chicks will like it. Check out the album reviews side bar for some direction on where to find those first two albums if you don't have them.  I've found a couple of pretty random Japanese music blogs but I misplaced the links to them (lol I think they are on my desktop) so I guess I'll give those a shout next post. Sorry for post delays, by the way. Busy busy busy. I decided I'm going to learn 20 kanji a week, so in two years I'll know all of the Jouyou kanji. Didn't realize how time consuming that would be lol. Anyways, that's it for now guys. Thanks for the support.

 

Kuroki Meisa
Hellcat

01: Hear the Alarm
02: Like This
03: Bad Girl
04: Criminal
05: No, No, No
06: Sex
07: Lost
08: This is Crazy

Genre: R&B
Rating: 8/10

Download

 

Artist Info:
Kuroki Meisa is a model, actress, and R&B singer from Okinawa. She is a quarter Brazilian and got her start modeling for the fashion magazine JJ. Her most notable acting job is the Crows Zero series, where she not only plays the female lead but also performs on the soundtrack. Like This was released as her single debut in June of 2008 which was followed by her debut album under Sony Music Records, Hellcat, in February of 2009. Her latest album is Attitude. Her official website is http://www.meisakuroki.com/.

Album Info:
Hellcat is Meisa's first album release. Like This, Bad Girl, and Criminal were released with promotional videos. Though the lyrics are written by many different people, the production was mainly done by Jeff Miyahara and Meisa herself, with help by U-Key Zone and a couple others. Bad Girl was featured as the title track of the movie Crows Zero II.

My Thoughts:
So I had never heard of Meisa, as a singer or otherwise, until someone recommended I check this album out. I was not disappointed. Her music is somewhere between Amuro Namie and an updated version of Double (she's getting a little outdated, I'm sorry lol). I haven't really liked Namie's music in the last year and a half or so, but Meisa fills that gap quite well for me. The one thing I was surprised with is how good the production is on the album. Aside from Criminal, I love the instrumental for every track on the album, even the ones that I don't actually like as a whole. The beginning of Bad Girl makes me scratch my air turntables every time I hear it lol. I love Bad Girl, Like This, This is Crazy, No,No,No, and I just recently got into Hear the Alarm. I will say that her voice isn't great, but it works for the music she does. If she starts spitting out ballads every month then we'll have a problem lol. Enjoy!

Haha, gotta sneak something in. One of Meisa's singles just happened to have this remix on it:

Kuroki Meisa - Bad Girl (Bach Logic Remix)

Seeda
Breathe

01: Set Me Free
02: Flat Line (feat. TYC)
03: This Is How We Do It
04: Taxi Driver
05: ReBARS (feat. MoNDoH)
06: BIX 90's
07: Breathe (Skit)
08: Moments
09: 電波電波 (Denpa Denpa feat. D.Focis and 4WD)
10: Lights (feat. lecca)
11: Skit (Skit)
12: 道 (Michi feat. MC 漢  from MSC)
13: 影絵 (Eigai feat. bay4k from Scars)
14: Alien Me
15: 鋭利 (Eiri)
16: Dreamin'
17: Wisdom (Crada Remix feat. Emi Maria and Ill Bosstino)
18: Breathe (Skit 2)
19: Life Song (feat. David Banner)\
20: My Homies (feat. Oki for Geek and CN for BackYard)

Genre: Hip-Hop
Rating: 5/10

PM Only (Sorry Guys)
 
 

For Artist Info check my upload of Seeda's Hana to Ame.

Album Info:
Breathe dropped on August 25th of this year (2010) and is Seeda's latest album release. Seeda worked with a large number of producers on the album, but it is still predominately Bach Logic produced. Tracks 1, 4, 6, 8, 14, and 16 were produced by Bach Logic. OHLD produced track 2 and the original version of 17, Track 5 was produced by SkyBeatz, 15 by Hiroshima, 19 by Feukiss!, 20 by IDeA (gotta have at least one track by IDeA!), and Seeda self-produced tracks 9,12, and 13. Tracks 3, 10 and the Wisdom remix were done by German hip-hop producer Crada, who has just recently started producing for American Hip-Hop and R&B acts such as Drake and Young Buck.

My Thoughts:
Let me go ahead and say that I love Seeda, he's one of my favorite emcees from any country, and I love just about every album he's put out. At the same time, I gotta keep it real. This album is, in my opinion, one of his worst. I'm sure everybody knows how much I love Bach Logic, but I couldn't even get into most of the BL tracks on this album. I feel like that almost Coldplay-style track with Jay'ed on Seeda's last album influenced BL to keep producing stuff like that, and without a good singer doing the hook it just sounds like sloppy alternative pop/rock stuff (check out tracks 4, 6, and 16). I will say that track 14 is in that same style, but BL sings the hook and I really like that song. I love Bach Logic and part of the reason why I love him is that he fuses production styles from other genres into Hip-Hop, but at the end of the album you still have to be able to call it Hip-Hop. I wasn't particularly impressed with Seeda's self-production on the album either. Stick to spitting rhymes, homie. I don't pay a lot of attention to American Hip-Hop (or German for that matter lol) so I hadn't heard of Crada until this album, but I like his style, Three of my favorite tracks from the album are his (Lights, This is How We Do It, and Wisdom). This is How We Do it sounds straight off of Kanye's 808's and Heartbreaks album. I feel like that style works better for Seeda than the alternative stuff from some of the BL-produced tracks. To sum it all up I was a little heartbroken with this album. I really expected more of the same from him and instead got an album I can't help be ambivalent about.

I feel bad dissing a Seeda album like that. I encourage everybody to post up their own opinions about the album, I'm interested to see what they are. I feel like I don't like some albums just because I don't give them a chance, but I gave Breathe a couple chances and I still don't like it. Oh well, on to music news!

Let's see, Chemistry's got a new single out called Shawty, which, from the name, I assumed was going to be a nice R&B track, but it's definitely not lol. More pop from them. Not really feeling Dohzi-T's new single Ameagari either. I usually don't like his stuff though. Not sure what it is about him that I don't like. His mic skills are kind of lame and half of his songs are ballads I feel like. Lots of hatin' today lol. Anty the Kunoichi has a new album out entitled ANTY. It's better than I expected it to be. Definitely a step up from her other releases.  6/10 maybe? There's a nice collab with Jamosa on there that is worth a check. Shonannokaze has a best of album out that is actually a mix set of their more popular tunes. Nice album to get your reggae groove on to. Kuroki Meisa (I'll be uploading some stuff from her soon) has a new single out called LOL!. I feel like a more proper name would be WTF? It's the first release of hers I haven't even kind of liked in a while. She looks good though lol. Pop/R&B duo May's released a new album recently with a couple tracks featuring Wise, DJ Watarai and Dabo. Can't hate on that. What I can hate on is the rest of the album. lol. Just not my style of music, way too j-pop and not enough r&b. Here' s a link to the Dabo and DJ Watarai track if you want to check it out.

May's - Tokyo Drive (feat. Dabo and DJ Watarai)

Speaking of May's, one of the first tracks I heard from them was this collab with DJ Watarai:

May's - New World (feat. DJ Watarai)

Great song. Gotta love that Watarai electro-beat. Oh, I got a hold of that Bremen song that I was talking about last post. lol It's so Japanese. Here it is:

Bremen - Take Me to the Time

I checked out their other stuff and really didn't like it. I don't know what it is about that song that I love lol. Oh yeah! I found three of the albums I hadn't re-upped yet:

Jay'ed - The Gift
Hannya - Nekosogi
Hannya - Naibukokuhatsu

I'm still missing the Ku label album. I have no idea where I put that thing. I went around and fixed all my tags on here so it would be easier to navigate through the older stuff. Not too much else to say other than that. Gotta give a shout to the Blessing of Love community. Despite sounding like an attack from Sailor Moon, it's actually a pretty active international music community with albums from all of the world on it. I'm thinking about posting some of my not particularly Japanese stuff on there in a couple days. Maybe a little Lady Paradox and Pat D? Oh, and one last thing. If you download any of the albums on Miyako Flow, please comment. Just a thanks is cool with me, but I encourage everyone to give me their own opinions about this music or maybe even requests/recommendations for uploads. I put a good amount of work into this place, so just a wee bit of gratification would do good for the ego. Thanks for reading Miyako Flow and as always, peace!
 

 

 

Ken-U
Labyrinth of Lovelything

01: Intro (feat. Left Side)
02: Labyrinth of Lovelything
03: 始まりはこれから (Hajimari wa Kore kara feat. Shizoo)
04: Hey Lady
05: Dancehall Night (feat. Rudebwoy Face)
06: Ima ni mo
07: はじめて (Hajimete)
08: Warmth ~温もり~  (feat. La Gakku Suntro)
09: 君は今、、、 (Kimi wa Ima,,,)
10: Shine (feat. Dag Force)
11: Rachick (feat. Ent Deal League)
12: この道を (Kono Michi wo)
13: For You (feat. Tomo)
14: 迷わずに (Mayowazu ni)

Genre: Reggae/R&B
Rating: 8/10

Download

 

Manami
Back of My Mind (Single)

01: Back of My Mind (English Version feat. Pharrell Williams)
02: Back of My Mind (Japanese Version feat. Pharrell Williams)

Genre: R&B
Rating: 10/10

Download




Manami
Hold Back (Single)

01: Hold Back

Genre: R&B
Rating: 10/10

Download

 

Artist Info:
Manami is one of the newer artists signed to the BAPE label. In 2008 Pharrell Williams and BAPE creator Nigo held a contest to discover an R&B singer who could not only sing well, but also could be marketed to both Japan and the US as Bathing Ape's #1 Diva. The grand prize of the contest was having the opportunity to release a full album under the label with production by Pharrell Williams. On August 13th, 2008, Manami won the contest and was signed. Her official website is www.manami.tv. (Btw, if you go to her discography, it calls Nigo "NIGOR" lol)

Single Info:
Back of My Mind and Hold Back were both released exclusively as digital singles on 10/21/09 and 1/27/10 respectively. Both singles are fully produced by The Neptunes. They are Manami's first two singles. She just recently released another single, Yellow Stop, on 6/9/10.

My Thoughts:
I was extremely excited when I ran across this little gem. Magical things happen when the Neptunes do R&B production (an angel gets its wings!) and this is no exception. If I wasn't extremely excited about sharing her to everybody I wouldn't have uploaded it, just because I normally upload albums, but this is something special. I encourage everybody to check it out, because both songs are great. Manami has a nice, sultry character to her voice that is a perfect match for the Neptunes' quirky synthesized beats. I still haven't quite figured out which song I like better, because they are both great. In my opinion, this is Pharrell's best work with a Japanese artist so far (that's right -- i said it's better than Tokyo Drift lol), and I can't wait for a full album. I will say that my only gripe is that there isn't a Japanese version of Hold Back. Manami's English isn't awesome, and even though I'm not a native speaker of Japanese, I understand her Japanese alot better than her English lol. Nonetheless, please partake in this musical excellence, for you shall not be disappointed!

So last post I said I'd up the Buzzer Beats remix of Jasmine's Sad to Say, and so here it is:

Jasmine - Sad to Say (Buzzer Beats Remix)

It's uploaded on zShare, so if you've got the plug-in you can just listen to it right on the site before you download it. Convenient! lol. Uh, anyways I've been around and about checking music out, so let me fill everyone in on what I've found. So, in the time I was away I really got into Beni (or the artist formerly known as Arashiro Beni), mainly for all the DJ Hasebe remix goodness that is on all of her singles, but I will say there is more than a couple of her album cuts and such that I really like. She's got a new single out for her song, Heaven's Door (Hate it!) that just happens to have a DJ Hasebe remix of Gimme Gimme (Love it!) on it. DJ Hasebe really saves her singles for me, I usually don't even like the song until the remix comes out lol. I'm planning to throw together a Beni compilation of all the DJ Hasebe remixes so everybody can check it out, in case they don't feel like chasing down all those singles of her. A nice little R&B singer by the name of Miura Daichi has a new single out right now entitled The Answer. It's a pretty good single and has a cover of Michael Jackson's Human Nature. I'm not really feeling the cover itself. I always feel like, if you're going to cover an extremely famous song like that, you've got to bring something new to it, because you certainly aren't going to sing it better than the King of Pop, or whoever made the song famous. If you're into Dancehall you should definitely check out Fireball's new album, Zero. It's decent, I really like a couple songs. 5/10 maybe? Can't get enough of that track, Dance Machine. Fireball's albums are always a bit odd to me. Maybe its because Reggae isn't my number one favorite genre, but I always feel like the guys from Fireball go into the studio, play around for like 5 hours, and release an album with whatever got recorded lol. I love some reggae though, especially the R&B crossovers like Ken-U and Akane. I ran across another decent album from this female emcee named MoNa, whom I had never heard until I found it. The album, Por Vida, is surprisingly pretty legit. I was completely expecting some ignorant El Latino-style stuff (lol I apologize to El Latino fans). She's actually like a poor man's Coma-Chi -- sings the hooks, spits fire in the verse. Can't hate. I'll say 5/10 again for that album too. Pick it up on Kyo Music City if you're interested.

Speaking of KMC, I want to go ahead and share the sites where I check out most of my stuff. Well, I used to use Jpop n Kpop, but poor Charisma hasn't updated in months (when it hits a year she'll have officially pulled a Joshiro). So now I've been on Azn Music City. Shimbi posts a ton of stuff from both Japan and Korea on her site and even gives a small review and number rating to it, the only problem is its most definitely in French (mon dieu!!). Oh well, don't need to know french to hit the download button, non? As mentioned, the other site I frequent is Kyo Music City. You need an account to download anything and just about every download has some oddball password that you have to play Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego to find, but the amount of stuff to download on the site is plain ludicrous. Pretty much any genre of music you are looking for is up there, it just takes some time and effort to fiddle through the site. It is in Japanese as well, which probably doesn't make things much easier for most. Don't forget to check out my brother blog (sister was too homo), King T's Ongaku Paradise. He uploads a pretty wide range of stuff, from Linkin Park to Tomogen and all the in between. He's been on the upload grind recently, so be sure to check his site out if you haven't recently. If you're into Korean stuff, Sound Resque is still the place to go for that. Gotta say, I haven't been in a while, so there might be something epic on the site that I have no idea about. If anybody has a similar site to the ones listed, whether it be your own or someone else's, please leave a comment and tell me where it is. I'll be glad to give it a shout in my next post. No matter where you're from or what genre you're into, we're all one big community. Oh, I almost forgot! The re-upping extravaganza continues!

Hinouchi Emi - Goodie Memories
DJ Deckstream - Deckstream Soundtracks
Epik High - Swan Songs
Epik High - Black Swan Songs
DJ Celory - Beats Legend
Doberman Inc - Best (Time for Some Action)
Sonomi - Everyday
Yoshika - Timeless
Sphere - The Influence
By Phar the Dopest - Haji ja nai

That's about it for now. Check the original posts for info on them. Look for some reggae on my next post which hopefully I'll get in sometime in the middle of the week. I will go ahead and say that since Sunday is my day off from work that there will almost always be a post on Sunday. I think I said I was going to share some pics from my trip to Cali, but it's not happening tonight. Maybe next time? lol. Putting the "pro" back in "procrastinate." Anyways, thanks for reading Miyako Flow and don't forget to keep the peace!
 

Jasmine
Gold

01:  Pride
02: Sad to Say
03: L.I.P.S.
04: Jealous
05: Bad Girl
06: Dear My Friend
07: Stage ~Interlude~
08: This Is Not A Game
09: Clubbin'
10: 恋 (Koi)
11: What You Want?
12: No More
13: Dreamin'
14: Why

Genre: R&B
Rating: 9/10

Download
 

Artist Info:
Jasmine is Japan's new R&B queen. Born Murakami Asumi on May 19th, 1989 (First year of the Heisei, of the Heisei lol) in Tokyo, Jasmine first aspired to be an R&B singer after watching a gospel choir at the Yokota US Military base. When she was in 10th grade she dropped out of high school and auditioned with Sony Music soon after. She was given her contract with Sony after she sent in a demo of her debut single, "Sad to Say." The single was such a huge success that she is claimed to be the first artist to reach no.1 on the charts before her actual official debut. She writes all of her own material and has created such a buzz in the music business many are deeming her the next Utada Hikaru, whom Jasmine has said is one of her biggest influences. Her official website is http://www.jasmine-world.net/.

Album Info:
Gold is Jasmine's debut album and was released on July 21st, 2010. It was highly anticipated after her release of "Sad to Say," "No More," "This is Not a Game," "Jealous," and "Dreamin'" as singles.

My Thoughts:
If someone asked me, "In the last year, what's the biggest thing that has happened in Japanese urban music?" Jasmine's sudden emergence would be it. This album was so highly anticipated that I was afraid I would be disappointed, but Gold not only satisfies my R&B appetite, it leaves me craving more and more. If you haven't heard of her or are hesitant to check her stuff out (I was at first), use this opportunity. I guarantee you'll get hooked. Jasmine's vocals are great, her lyrics are deep, her beats are infectious, and more than any album I've listened to in a long while, her songs are purely enjoyably catchy. If you're a fan of any kind of R&B, whether it be slow ballads or poppin' dance tracks, you'll love this album. The only three tracks on the album I couldn't get into are "Bad Girl," "Clubbin'," and "Dreamin'". "Bad Girl" and "Clubbin'" threw me off with their heavy guitar loops and "Dreamin'" is just a bit too slow for me. I'm a little bit disappointed that the Buzzer Beats remix to Sad to Say didn't end up as a bonus track on the album, but I'll be sure to upload it as soon as I can. Ya know how much random chicks love the Twilight movies? That's how much I love Jasmine's music. lol. I can't pick a favorite track so I'll just go ahead and say "L.I.P.S.," "Jealous," "This is Not a Game," and "Koi" are all my favorites lol. Anyways, I encourage everyone to check this album out -- you will like it!

It's been too long my peoples, too long. Thanks to everyone that still follows this blog, you all have every right to have given up on me. I certainly thought after quitting last time I was done with the blog thing for good, and I even wasn't into Japanese music for a good six months to a year, but I got back into it, even broadened the genres of Japanese music I listen to a bit, and now I'm back better than ever. In that respect, I want to go ahead and say that I'm going to broaden the scope of music uploaded and reviewed on Miyako Flow a little bit to go along with my new tastes. I'm definitely going to be posting some Reggae very soon, and I'm planning to follow-up the DJ Taka post with some more Japanese electronica music. I've got into to some lesser known artists in that genre that I'd love to share. Rest assured, the majority of posts will be about R&B and Hip-Hop though. I gotta say, I haven't seen a lot of good Japanese Hip-Hop out and about recently. Maybe I'm looking in the wrong place, I dunno. It seems like the trend for the smaller emcees is to go completely pop or completely ignorant. BL is still doing his thing and until he stops I'll have plenty of stuff to talk about here ^_^. Anyway, I found a little R&B singer by the name of Manami that has a couple singles out produced by none other than the Neptunes that I'll be posting in a couple days. I've also got into some random artists from listening to last.fm that I'll be sure to post up stuff from soon.

Speaking of last.fm, if you haven't checked it out you totally should. It's an online radio station player that is completely customizable and has a ton of great Japanese music on it. You type in an artist you like and it creates a radio station based off artists that are similar to the one you typed in. It works really well if you put in cross-over artists that do a lot of genres. I normally use Beni or Kuroki Meisa as my station. For some reason, the Beni station also plays random electronica (most of the time not even Japanese). You can even tell the program whether you like or hate a track and it will add it to your favorites or ban it accordingly. I will say, my main gripe with it is that artists with common names get confused with other artists with the same name. Jasmine is a great example, because if you try to use her name to create a station you'll get all kinds of crazy things. My favorite screw-up is Melody. It will show pictures of Melody and then play mariachi band music lol (that's a win-win!). Despite its flaws, it's totally worth using, especially if you want to get into some new Japanese artists but don't know where to look. You can always hit the skip button if you're not feeling the track they play ^_^. People with X-Box Live Gold accounts can get it on their 360 too! You can find me on last.fm under the moniker "Joshirou." My normal tag was taken. Damn impostors.

So I'm back on my re-upping grind. Since none of the links work, I'm going backwards re-uploading everything. I've got everything from the two most recent pages except for Jay'ed's The Gift, which I seem to have misplaced on my many data disks. I'm sure I'll find it soon. I'm going to update the links on the respective entries, like usual. Here's the list:

Sonomi - Midnight
Sonomi - SONO
Simon - Simon Says
Seeda - Heaven
Seeda - Machikaze
Doberman Inc - Zero
DJ Celory - Beats Japan
DJ Taka - Milestone
HGSP - High-Grade-Special
TBNY - Masquerade
DJ Oasis - Waterworld
Kreva - Best of Mix CD Vol. 1
Harlem Ver 2.0
Soul Tree: Tribute to Kubota Toshinobu
Big-O - Control (The Spiritual Matters)
Equal - The Rock City

So what have I been doing for the last two years? Nothing! lol. Still working at Starbucks, still haven't finished the Bachelor's degree, I'm just older and allegedly wiser (allegedly as in that's what I tell people). I've been doing a lot of random stuff hobbies-wise. Haven't been playing video games as much. I almost exclusively play Pokemon and fighting games lol. Just quit Dragon Age recently -- too damn glitchy. Do they not test their games or what? I've been playing around with some random projects. I started a DJ mix album a while ago, trying to mix some Bach Logic produced stuff. Got about 5 or 6 tracks in and realized it was crap, so I started over. I've got about five chill BL hip-hop tracks mixed together right now, but I haven't worked on it in a month or so. When/If I finish it I'll post it up and share. For the last couple years I've been writing story for an RPG game I want to make. I'm using RPG Maker XP for it and have actually started working on the battle system somewhat recently, but once again I'm not sure if I'll finish it before I realize it's a waste of time and decide to do something else with my life lol. I've been re-reading Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment recently, and I just bought a book about Japanese Hip-Hop that I plan to read afterward. When I start I'm sure I'll blog a bit about it. Rhymester is on the cover! I bought the book at Kinokuniya in San Fransisco. Just got back from Cali a couple weeks ago. I might talk a bit more about that later, but I had a lot of fun. There's a ton of Japanese stuff to do out there. I think that's good enough for now, I'll elaborate on my many adventures in the future. Well, thanks to everyone who has stuck around and I hope you enjoy what I put up. I'm always taking requests if anyone is looking for some odd-ball stuff that they are having trouble finding. I can be pretty resourceful when it comes to finding music ^_-. Peace!

The Return 2.0
8/22/2010
This time, it's for good.
Or at least for longer than last time.

DJ Taka
Milestone

Disc 1
01. Quickening
02. Tomorrow Perfume (Vocal Version feat. AiMEE)
03. Votum Stellarum (Forest #25 Remix)
04. Absolute 2007
05. V ~Conclusion~
06. Pandora (Vocal Version feat. Mochizuki Erika)
07. Thunder
08. Snow Storm (Original Mix)
09. AA
10. Inori
11. Blue Rain (feat. AiMEE)
12. Frozen Ray
13. One More Lovely ~After Hours~

Disc 2: Remixes
01. Spiral Galaxy (LED Spreading Particle Beam Mix)
02. The Safari (Ryu☆ Mix)
03. Don't Stop (Kors K Mix)
04. I'm In Love Again (DJ Yoshitaka Remix)
05. Rainbow Flyer (In the Dream Mix by Fujimori Sota)
06. Giudecca (Remo-con Size M Mix)
07. A (Shonen A Mix by Radio Shonen)
08. Moon (Sun Mix by Yamaoka Akira)
09. こっちを向いてよ (Kocchi o Muteiyo Midnight Jazzin' Mix by Tomosuke)
10. Memories (Still Remain Mix by Furukawa "Good-Cool" Tatsuya)
11. 嘆きの樹 (Nageki no Ki Arbre Triste A La Viennoise Mix by Kubota Osamu)
12. Gradiusic Cyber (Vic Viper Born Duv Mix by DJ Nagureo)
13. Tangerine Stream (The Catastrophe Mix by Naoki Underground)
14. Colors (InPhase Mix by TaQ)

Rating: 10/10

Download

Artist Info:
DJ Taka (real name: Ishikawa Takayuki) is a Techno DJ that is mostly widely known for his work with Konami and the Bemani series of games (which includes Dance Dance Revolution). He has gone by many names, including TAKA, DJ Amuro, Lion Musashi, DJ Setup, and Risk Junk. He has been doing his thing in the music business since 1997.

Album Info:
Milestone is DJ Taka's first major album release. Forgive me for being out of touch with the many types Techno, but I'd classify the album somewhere between Electronica, general Techno, and Trance. The album came out June 29th, 2007. Unlike many techno albums the songs don't run together and all run at normal times (3 to 5 mins on average).

My Thoughts:
I decided to go with something a little different this time. I'm not a huge fan of Techno, but I LOVE this album. I highly recommend this to everyone that's into any kind of dance music. The first disc is great song after great song after great song, and the second disc is full of nice remixes to DJ Taka classics. The complex beats of DJ Taka are enough to satisfy even my ADD lol. This is an album I love to put on and clean or play video games to, just because it's great music with limited vocals. There's a couple kind of goofy sounding tracks I wasn't too fond of, but as an experience, the sheer number of awesome tracks definitely makes this album deserve a 10 of 10. One thing I was slightly disappointed about was that the original version of Colors didn't make it on disc one. Nevertheless, this is a hot album and you'll love it if you're into dance joints. Enjoy!

Hope everybody likes that one. I got into DJ Taka from playing Dance Dance Revolution a long time ago actually. I used to freestyle dance. Wasn't big on the arcade scene just because of the random anime otaku hanging around the machines and the lack of anyone even trying to really dance, but I played a lot in my house with friends and as exercise. I stopped playing a couple years ago, but last year I found out about this album and had to check it out. I actually got recognized somewhat recently for my dance skills in DDR lol. There used to be an arcade in the mall I work in, and I used to go up on my breaks and get a couple songs in. Random dude recognized me and was like "Yo, you were that dude that was like...dancing!" lol like it's something weird to actually move to the music. It's lot better than stomping roaches. Anyways, on to music stuff!

Not a ton going on I guess, but still a couple things worth getting out. King T put an LL Brothers album on his site, Ongaku Paradise. Pretty good album. They are an R&B duo that works with Giant Swing and Michico a lot. If you're into dance R&B I'd check it out, it's pretty good. Speaking of R&B, Octopus Theatre put Color's latest album on Ongaku Street. I wasn't really feeling it, just because I don't like some of those guy's voices in the group. If you're into Color, I'm sure you'll like it though. Me and King T have been playing around on YouTube, so I got a couple videos for all you J-Urban enthusiasts to check out:

DJ Yas - Strange Voyage (feat. Coma-Chi)

Hot song from DJ Yas and Coma-Chi. One of Coma-Chi's best. Relatively recent from what T was telling me. Coma does a nice job singing the hook.
 

Coma-Chi - Name Tag / Tokyo Hikou Shojo
 

Some more hot stuff from Coma-Chi. The second song is produced by DJ Watarai!
 

 

 

Bron-K - 奇妙頂来相模富士 (DJ Isso Megamix)

That's a megamix of one of Bron-K 's albums. With the right production he sounds pretty tight. Check out the BL produced tracks and the slower, R&B stuff. He does slow stuff well. You might have heard Bron-K on Norikiyo's Outlet Blues. Bron is also from SD Junksta. If I can find this somewhere I'll put it up.

BTW: I re-upped KM-Markit's Mark-Out. I somehow missed it in my big re-upping extravaganza. Anyways here's the link:

KM-Markit - Mark Out

That's all I got for now. Enjoy the stuff and thanks for checking out the Miyako. Peace!

HGSP
High-Grade-Special

01: Intro
02: PLATINUM# (feat. Dabo and 4WD)
03: PRIDE!! 〜アジアの星〜 (feat. Hi-D, Q, Minesin-Hold, Ry-Double, and 茂千代)
04: Get Down (feat. Sphere of Influence, L-Vokal, and A.O)
05: Do It! (feat. ia)
06: Shaker Shaker (feat. ahhco and Skipp)
07: Doo Wutchya Like (feat. Equal, Jazzy Blaze, and Baby Hi-Fi aka ヨノヨハ)
08: Lethal Weapon
09: Ｈ☆Ｇ☆Ｓ☆Ｐ (feat. Zeebra, YamadaMan, and KM-Markit)
10: Brain Buster (Skit)
11: 4 Ever (feat. Jamosa)
12: Better Days (feat. DJ Mitsu the Beats and Asiah)
13: Keep on Dreamin' (feat. Keyco)

Rating: 6/10

Download

 

Artist Info:
HGSP is DJ High Switch and DJ Green Peace, the production team of Gaki Ranger. The two have been with Gaki Ranger since 1998 and have been constistently release albums since then.

Album Info:
High-Grade-Special was released in December of 2007.

My Thoughts:
Decent album. For real, I'm not gonna hate on these guys, but the beats could be better. Don't expect DJ Watarai or Bach Logic quality production, but it's decent. I really felt like the last three tracks saved the album. HS and GP have a way with R&B tracks on this album. Better Days is nothing short of audio beauty -- do check that track if nothing else. Lots of pretty big names on the album strutting their stuff, so check out the tracks with your favorites there. L-Vokal's verse in Get Down is fire! I didn't even like the song until I heard his verse. lol. That's about it. Enjoy!

Well, not a ton of stuff has happened since my last post, so I'll keep it short and sweet. If you haven't checked Norikiyo's Outlet Blues on Ongaku Paradise, do it NOW! Right now! I had only heard of the guy a few times and I like every single track on the album. Part of it is due to BL's production on the album. You gotta check out the track All City Bombing. Only BL could pull off some random stuff like that and make it sound like anything lol. Oh yeah, I've been informed that the girl on the Japanese version of Timbaland's "The Way I Are" is Hiromi, who just happens to be on the Special Calling album as well. Also, Jpop n Kpop has the single for Jay'ed Superwoman on it. The B side is a sweet little song called "I Do" featuring 4WD. Very nice. Must hear for R&B enthusiasts. Oh, this is mad random, but has anybody watched any kind of Japanese pop concert before? You know how normally it's like nothing but random girls in the crowd? Well I watched Perfume concert a couple days ago and it was nothing but middle-aged dudes lol. It was hilarious. Kinda scary too. Anyways, thanks for visiting the Miyako, and peace!

 

Seeda - Heaven

01: ヒダマリ (Hidamari)
02: 自由の詩 (Jiyuu no Shi feat. A-Thug)
03: Lost Heaven
04: Homeboy Dopeboy
05: Son Gotta See Tomorrow
06: 空 (Sora feat. Luna)
07: 紙とペンと音と自分 (Kami to Pen to Oto to Jibun)
08: 光 (Hikari)
09: I Try
10: Nyce Dream
11: Mary Mary
12: Outro
13: (Bonus Track) Monkey See Monkey Do

Rating: 6/10

PM Only (Sorry Guys)
 

For Artist Info, Check My Upload of Seeda's Hana to Ame.

Album Info:
Heaven dropped January 1st of this year (2008), only a couple months after Seeda had released his first major album, Machikaze. Heaven's production is done half by Bach Logic and half by I-Dea. Here's how it's spread out: Tracks 1,2,5,7,9,and 13 were produced by BL, while tracks 3,4,6,8,10,11, and 12 were produced by I-Dea. Son Gotta See Tomorrow had a PV made for it.

My Thoughts:
Pails in comparison to his last two album releases in my opinion. I only really liked the Bach Logic produced tracks. Sora was the only I-Dea track I liked. I don't dislike I-Dea's production, as a matter of fact, I like his style a lot, but I just wasn't feeling his tracks on this album. I recommend Monkey See Monkey Do and Jiyuu no Shi if you're into Seeda's up-tempo stuff. Anyways, hope you enjoy Heaven!

Sorry it took me so long to get another post out. Been a little bit busy with working and everything, nothing out of the usual though. Just got back from seeing the movie "Burn After Reading." It's pretty funny stuff. Anyways, what's up in the music world?

Yoooo. You have to Ongaku Paradise and check out Norikiyo's Outlet Blues -- hot album. For real. Some of Bach Logic's best production work since Hana to Ame. I'm not gonna put a rating on the album just yet, because I haven't got to really check it out in depth. He's also got L-Vokal's Laughin' (his album before Free) and Special Calling, a compilation CD of R&B divas produced by Hi-D. Laughin' is a pretty decent album -- definitely worth a check. Special Calling is pretty hot too. I'm wondering if Hi-D didn't miss his calling -- maybe he should have been a producer. Wait, maybe that's why it's called "Special Calling!" lol Yeah probably not. Anyways, you're bound to like at least one of the R&B songstresses on the album, so check it out. Speaking of which, it's nice to see Asami, Chihiro, and Yamaguchi Lisa floating around again. Chihiro had a decent solo album out a while back, same with Asami's Dabo-produced album, Badonkadonk. Jpop n Kpop has the single for Jay'ed's Superwoman to download. You gotta check out the b side out. It's a track called "I Do" featuring 4WD. Hot stuff.

That's all I got for tonight. I might get another post in on Tuesday. Enjoy Heaven!