Hitsujibungaku's pop-fueled rise to stardom

Japan Times

3 days ago

Moeka Shiotsuka remembers being amped for the 2016 Fuji Rock Festival. That year's three-day summer gathering at Niigata Prefecture's Naeba Ski Resort featured two of her favorite artists — James Blake and Sigur Ros — performing on the Green Stage.
The lead singer and guitarist of rock band Hitsujibungaku recalls just one detail stopping her from fully getting into the Fuji Rock spirit.
'I had to prepare for our own performance on the Rookie A Go-Go stage, starting Sunday night at 1 a.m.,' the 29-year-old musician tells The Japan Times from a Sony Music office in central Tokyo. 'So I was nervous for all three days.'
Hitsujibungaku's set went smoothly, so much so that 'we didn't want the festival to end at that point.' At the 2025 edition of Fuji Rock, the group — consisting of Shiotsuka, bassist Yurika Kasai (who joined a year after the Rookie A Go-Go performance) and drummer Hiroa Fukuda, who has been on hiatus since May 2024 — finds itself as the penultimate act of Sunday night on the White Stage, ahead of American trio Haim. It's the band's fourth appearance at Fuji Rock and its most prominent spot yet.
'Since it will be at night, we've prepared beautiful lighting and visuals to go with it,' Shiotsuka says, adding that the performance will showcase songs from across the group's career, dating back to its 2012 beginnings.
Hitsujibungaku's promotion to a more coveted slot mirrors its evolution from indie-rock darling to an unlikely cornerstone of Japanese music's current global expansion. That's a theme underlining Fuji Rock 2025. The most prominent Japanese acts set to perform this year represent the sonic variety that has defined J-pop in the 2020s. Hitsujibungaku's blur of alternative rock and shoegaze coexists with the frantic rap of Creepy Nuts and the chameleonic pop of Vaundy, among others. Not one act sounds alike — but they all have, somewhat unexpectedly, shaped Japan's musical identity on the global stage.
'(Going to the United States) was like diving into a new world,' says Kasai regarding the unfamiliar cultures and behaviors the band encountered during its first U.S. tour held earlier this spring, marking one of the project's bigger international leaps. 'It was freeing. Nobody would care if I was like, skipping down the street. It's not unusual.' Just a week ahead of Fuji Rock, the band traveled to London to play the Hyper Japan festival and announced its first European tour for this October , coinciding with the release of a still-to-be-named album.
Hitsujibungaku's slow and steady rise feels like a throwback in the current fast-moving social media age. The band emerged from the Tokyo livehouse ecosystem to something bigger, thanks to feedback-glazed songs. The trio's absorbing concerts coupled with critical acclaim for its 2018 debut full-length 'Wakamonotachi E' ('To The Youth') helped land a deal with Sony Music's F.C.L.S. imprint in 2020.
A major label connection didn't just get Hitsujibungaku's hypnotic rock in front of domestic fans but also brought the trio to the world. Its anthemic 2023 song ' more than words ' served as the closing theme for the incredibly popular anime series 'Jujutsu Kaisen,' while the following year the group provided the chugging ' Burning ' for 'Oshi no Ko.'
This gave Hitsujibungaku the chance to reach a wider listenership via anime, the chief delivery mechanism of J-pop in the 2020s. Yet it also presented challenges for the band.
'We never really wrote pop songs before. Previously, if 100 people were listening to our music and 30 of them liked it, that was fine. But with a pop song, you have to please all 100,' Shiotsuka says, also noting that deadlines for these bigger projects can be hectic. This reality has sharpened the group's ability to write the hooks that anchor hits, while also teaching them how to use source material to craft a song that stands on its own.
'It's quite challenging, but I enjoy the challenge,' Shiotsuka says.
Hitsujibungaku's latest releases ' Feel ' and ' mild days ' put the group to the test. The songs are respectively the opening and closing themes for the anime series 'Secrets of the Silent Witch,' a 'light novel' (a genre of young-adult Japanese fiction) adaptation currently airing on Tokyo MX. Shiotsuka says she followed a familiar path with 'Feel,' reading the original story and finding an angle that could be married with a driving rhythm.
'With 'mild days,' it was difficult because I had to use the same light novel as inspiration,' she says. 'I decided to take a break and have dinner with friends. It was really fun. In 'Silent Witch,' there's a bit about friendship, so I was able to apply my own experiences to the song.'
Shiotsuka says that during the past two years, she often felt overwhelmed by everything happening to the band, from Fukuda's break and a series of critical shows across Asia to all those deadlines for prominent anime. 'Yurika was very supportive, and we talked a lot,' she says. 'I was able to gradually see that maybe this isn't so bad, maybe I can have fun with this.'
The price of becoming one of the world's biggest Japanese rock bands means trading the sweaty intimacy of Shibuya clubs for a nonstop schedule. Yet it makes other moments sweeter — like being able to perform during a prominent slot at Fuji Rock.
'With other festivals, if we are playing on the second day of it, we wouldn't go on the first day,' Shiotsuka says. 'We'd just get ready in the hotel room. But all of us love Fuji Rock. For all three days, we are there. We enjoy being in the audience, watching bands from all over the world and being inspired by what we see.' Kasai notes that she goes to the same pizza stand outside of the Red Marquee stage year after year as a kind of tradition.
Whereas other festivals find the band trying to please every punter in attendance, the Hitsujibungaku members see Fuji Rock as something closer to a solo show where they can dig into their older catalog and 'be a little more picky.'
'We can create the world of Hitsujibungaku, that's the most important thing,' Shiotsuka says.
It's this ability for Japanese artists to simply be who they are and express the sounds they are drawn to that has helped the country's music stand out in recent years. Despite industry realities, the members of Hitsujibungaku still find rock magic in the Niigata festival, a reminder of what brought them to this point in the first place.
'Step by step, we just do what's in front of us. And once we reach a big stage — like playing Yokohama Arena, or touring abroad, or Fuji Rock — we realize we've come this far,' Kasai says.
Fuji Rock Festival takes place at Naeba Ski Resort, Niigata Prefecture, July 25 to 27. Follow our coverage on our dedicated liveblog and on Instagram . For more information about the festival, visit en.fujirockfestival.com . To learn more about Hitsujibungaku, visit hitsujibungaku.info