Shibayan Records - RETRO FUTURE GIRLS (2012)

One of the most enduring and difficult questions I've had to ask myself constantly for all the years I've been an active consumer of the Internet: how in the world do you describe the world of Touhou doujin music to a complete outsider? Is it even possible? The jury's still out, but in the meantime I'm going to try my best.

Let's start from the beginning. "Touhou" is a series of Japanese shoot-em-up games that first began in 1996. The games are well-known for a number of reasons ranging from the uniquely Japanese characters to the brutal difficulty to the unique and eye-catching art and music. Despite being created entirely by a single man known only as ZUN, the Touhou games are one of the most iconic series in Japan by far, to the extent that it is almost impossible to avoid seeing a number of Touhou references in almost any aspect of modern post-Internet Japanese culture. Fans of the series flood "Comiket" (Comic Market) every year to release boatloads of fanart, fanfiction, even fan remixes and arrangements (aka "doujin" music) of the beloved themes found in the expansive series.

(Attached below is "Bad Apple", undeniably one of the most iconic Touhou arranges, released by Alstroemeria Records in 2007. If you were a weeb before 2011, chances are you've heard this before.)

That leads us to RETRO FUTURE GIRLS (henceforth referred to as 'RETRO'). The eleventh release from doujin "circle" Shibayan Records, RETRO comes as a departure from Shibayan's prior history of bossa nova influenced remixes and goes full tilt towards being an entirely nu-disco production. Think Daft Punk instrumentals plus a little bit of dubstep / techno and anime-inspired female vocals, and you're not too far off from the sound of this album.

Don't let the lore of this album keep you out of a good time. Shibayan is my favorite doujin producer for a reason, and RETRO is one of their most consistent and enjoyable albums if you like the nu-disco / electro-house angle they take towards remixing well-known Touhou melodies. Their sound is hypnotic and explosive; melodies repeat and intertwine with others, and songs gradually build until they reach multi-minute masterpiece status. There's always something to love in a good Shibayan album, and there's never a dearth of complexity to find and enjoy, especially if you're treated with a good number of arranges that include vocals; more often than not, Shibayan songs sound cute and easy to dance to, but their lyrical subject matter tackles uncomfortable, difficult, and even disturbing aspects of character and society.

"レディメイド・シティライフ" (Ready-Made City Life) is one of my earlier favorites on here, and one of my most enduring Shibayan cuts to date. "Milka" is credited as the vocalist here, and she does an incredible job layering her cute and bouncy voice over an instrumental that just seems to explode with energy from the first second. It's easy to find songs like this a bit too repetitive, as once the groove is laid down it hardly changes much outside of a breakdown or two a few minutes in, but as I mentioned above the focus for suites like this is often the lyrics. The vocalist sings here from the perspective of a adolescent girl struggling to come to terms with adulthood, attraction to boys, and the startling trend of clinging to materialism to provide some sort of comfort and self-worth... as well as some fun nonsense in the chorus about shopping lists as a metaphor for puberty. It's way more complex than it sounds, and I don't know - I tend to really cherish when songs have more than a surface level "this sounds good" meaning to them.

My absolute favorite song on here is definitely "Desert Years", an enchanting and melancholy mammoth of a track. (Both "Desert Years" and "Ready-Made City Life" stretch for over 10 minutes!) Yana gives vocals here (yes, Yana as in Nagi Yanagi, one of the most well-known doujin singers ever and a contributor to the soundtracks of quite a few anime!), which already makes the track set to be an instant classic, to be honest. The beat jumps and grooves from the first few seconds, and though it takes Yana more than a minute to come in with her recognizable hoarse yet elegant voice, she spends the rest of the track cryptically threatening and haunting the listener at once with tales of endless desire and fruitless yearning. 

The rest of the songs on here are much shorter, for good reason. I'm of the opinion that Shibayan's arranges are at their best when accompanied by vocals. But honestly the few instrumental songs on here are fairly creative and far from boring, and they play with samples and well-known Touhou melodies in ways that only gets more rewarding the more familiar you are with them. There's a rabbit hole to be explored here for sure, but it's possible to enjoy the beats even if you don't know the original songs they're riffing.

I'm fully aware that this album is one of those that can be a hard sell if you're not into every one of its influences and subgenres. At the same time, if this sort of thing does appeal to you as it does to me, then I think it's a very strong retro-influenced dance album that has more than its share of memorable moments and sequences of stunning musicality. If you give this a listen and can get past the repetition and the foreign uniqueness of the package, I'm sure you'll find something to enjoy.

DREAM...