"that can never touch or see" (Towa Tei - Cute)

Towa Tei
Cute

Why you'll love it: Innovative + catchy

Why you'll hate it: not much depth

I am getting really tried of saying this with every Japanese release that I like:  trust me, this is awesome stuff.

Towa Tei is an art-pop musician, most known in the western world as 1/3 of this cheesy dance group from the early 90's, Deee-Lite.  I know him first as a solo artist due to my obsession with Shibutya-kei music ten years ago, thanks to the Katamari Damacy video game series.  No, really, trust me...

Towa Tei's solo output has mainly been focused on composition and production.  Bright and bouncy synths, weird obscure voice samples that all sound like they came out of a MST3K short, guest vocalists from all over the Japanese pop industry; all chopped and screwed together in a Picasso like manner.  He's been hit or miss his whole career.  His 2011 album (Sunny), is personally my favorite Shibuya-kei album of all time.  The 2013 follow up (Lucky), just threw a bunch of stuff at the wall that did not stick.  The kind of music Towa Tei makes is tough to manage.  When he focuses too much on a hook, it just gets annoying and repetitive.  Likewise, it's just as easy to find himself at the other end of the spectrum, when there are just weird sounds and no hook.

Sunny had that sweet spot.  Cute has it too, and in such a more innovative way.  There is much wider array of bopping, clicking, and hooting synths.  The opening tracks sound like playing with the sound test in an old video game's options menu.  "Fluke"and "Tope Note" demo the low and high end of whats to come.  "Luv Pandemic" is the first actual song, and boy is it a catchy one.  Towa Tei is expertly transitioning from one exciting hook to the next.  The drum and bass heavy verses, the stuttering pre-chorus... everything about this song screams summer hit.  I find it very similar to Hot Chip's "Ready For The Floor".

In fact, Cute has a lot to share with Hot Chip in their late 2000's.  Both use an abstract / art deco approach to music, and insert just enough pop before watering it down.  Both seem heavily influenced by Kraftwerk.  Just as Hot Chip follows up "Ready For The Floor" with the Kraftwerk-esque "Bendable Posable", Towa Tei offers up an instant reprise of "Luv Pandemic" with "NOTV".  It's a track with deep, echoey synths, very much like the kind you would hear on the 1977 Kraftwerk album Trans-Europe Express.

UA has an impressive showing on the mellowed out "Sound of Music".  Her oddly deep voice fits in wonderfully with Towa Tei's off kilter attempt at chill-wave.  I don't follow her solo career, so this is the first I've heard of her since the one-and-done Kenichi Asai collaboration, Ajico.  It's nice to hear she's still got it.

The bulk of this album is mostly tranquil instrumentals.  Towa Tei plays with his toys in an island / bossa-nova style.  Not much hits on the same level of "Luv Pandemic", but that shouldn't take away from his most consistent release probably ever.  Because of how all the sounds pop and echo, I'm engaged with Cute all the way through to the end; even as things wind down in the last ten minutes.  Going from synths firing away like pistons to reverberating into the ether by the end of the album is a nice little journey.

Towa Tei resists his urges to borrow from the corny R&B dance scene he grew out of, and sticks to robotic synthpop with a Shibuya-kei flavor.  As a result, Cute has its own unique sound and character; and Towa Tei comes off as confident rather than out of touch.  Cute is low on the hits, but makes up for it in consistency and style.  If you dig catchy music, Shibuya-kei, instrumentals, or weird robot sounds, Cute has what you're looking for in a very well put together package.