Latest news with #citypop
Japan Times
03-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Japan Times
Top billing: Tatsuro Yamashita, Vulpeck, Four Tet
Tatsuro Yamashita at Green Stage | Junichiro Nomi As already noted, one-day tickets for Saturday were sold out, and if any one artist on the day's roster was responsible it was probably Tatsuro Yamashita, one of the architects of city pop, who rarely plays live any more. The rain had stopped by the time he showed up on the Green Stage at dusk below red-tinged clouds. The crowd was densely packed and rapturous. Yamashita, wearing jeans and a watch cap, looked to be in exceptionally good shape for a septuagenarian, but more importantly his voice was as supple and pliant as it was when he was a youngster. Tatsuro Yamashita, his band and his wife, Mariya Takeuchi (right of Yamashita), at Green Stage | Junichiro Nomi He played his hits and brought out his wife, Mariya Takeuchi, as a duet partner and backup singer, which got a lot of applause since in many ways she's more famous than he is. Yamashita's band, many of whose members are as old as he is, were also in fine form and got funky when the song demanded it. The smiles were contagious and irresistible. Vulfpeck on Green Stage | Johan Brooks photos But Yamashita wasn't the designated headliner. Vulfpeck, an American collective that plays funk almost exclusively, was, even though they don't have what one would call a following in Japan. Still, people seemed to know what to expect and were dancing from the get-go. Four Tet at White Stage | Masanori Naruse photos The headliner over at the White Stage was Four Tet, better known by his friends and family as Kieran Hebden. It was a stylish and eclectic set of electronica that mostly stuck to danceable material with plenty of break beats. Hebden himself was mostly invisible behind his decks, so in way it could have been anyone up there, but the ease with which he transitioned from one pattern to the next is pretty much his strength as a musician and difficult to copy.
Times
22-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
Haruomi Hosono review — a rare glimpse of Harry Styles' inspiration
This Royal Festival Hall concert was an extremely rare chance to see one of the great figures of Japanese art music. A 78-year-old who passed through the early 1970s folk rock band Happy End and the electronic pioneers Yellow Magic Orchestra, while making a series of solo albums that forged the sophisticated style of Japanese music known as city pop, Haruomi Hosono has a back catalogue like no other — and also inspired Harry Styles' album Harry' s House. So it was a shame that he limited his actual time on stage, filling the gaps in various ways when really the audience simply wanted to be in his presence. The support act, a youthful Japanese experimental troupe, were given an hour's worth of stage time, a decision that might have had something to do with their having Haruomi's grandson on bass guitar. For the main event Hosono's female backing singers, also on xylophone and keyboards, sang a medley of his songs, including 1975's dreamlike Honey Moon. Finally the man himself arrived, a sprightly figure in beatnik cap and sunglasses, as did a handful of old favourites including the wonderfully laid-back Bara to Yaju, from his classic 1973 solo album Hosono House. Then he was off again. 'He is a legendary musician and a famous smoker,' his guitarist announced, explaining the reason for Hosono's exit, which left the band to play Firecracker, an old Yellow Magic Orchestra favourite, on their own while their leader went off for a cigarette break. He returned to do The Madmen, another YMO classic, and his own Sports Men, which with its bright electronic melody and urbane mood set the template for Japan's city pop sound. Backed by an extremely good band, this was complex music with a carefree quality, somewhere between tropical and avant-garde, which made it a joy to witness. Not least when Hosono left the stage while flapping his arms like a chicken.
