“Can I Have Hopes for the World Unseen?”

Exploring my favourite Japanese songs from 2023

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My 10 favourite Japanese songs of 2023 were just published on the Friends List from This Side of Japan (Thank you Ryo for inviting me again!) alongside many other amazing writers! I wanted to write this piece to shed a bit more light on exactly what I loved about them all, and also elaborate a little further on the songs I’ve loved this year!

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There were some songs I wanted to include but sadly couldn’t due to them releasing just outside the 2023 window, so I wanted to quickly mention them first!

Quruli- Loveless

A song full of so much warmth that it actually knocks the wind out of me: even with the loudness it has, the laidback singing has such a soothing induction. I first heard it during a stressful lead up to the end of the academic year, and it was indispensable in acting as a mental balm. Sometimes, all you really need is a video of a family going about their day to day: playing baseball, driving to and from the baseball pitch, conversations in the car, and frequent visits to a local restaurant. It’s tranquility manifest in a runtime of exactly 5 minutes, and I love every second.

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DENIMS featuring AYUNI D- Futari

For a video that features the premise of its two lead singers struggling to make eye contact with eachother, my eyes have been absolutely glued to rewatching it over and over. Not only do I think they share such beautiful vocal chemistry that really emphasises the endearing nature of the song’s lyrics, but it makes the final stretch of the song even more beautiful to witness when the duet’s energy reaches its peak and they both finally look eachother in the eyes as they sing. I also can’t help but smile whenever I hear the ragged electric guitar, especially towards the end! The house the video is set in strongly reminds me of my childhood home, too, so the song carries both memories and beautiful sentiments whenever I experience it.

I first heard a snippet of the song in an Instagram advert from FRIENDSHIP label, but I forgot to record it and only managed to get a screenshot. After reaching out to the page to ask them what song it was, they graciously and promptly responded, and I’ve been in love with the song ever since.

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Jamie’s Theme from Street Fighter 6

I first heard it when the trailer from SF6 released in summer 2022, and even into this year I haven’t been able to stop listening to it. I’m not the most-proficient fighting game player, but Street Fighter will always be special to me, and from the moment I first heard Jamie’s theme, I knew he’d be the character I’d use. I mean, a breakdancer who practices Drunken Fist and gets more powerful the more he drinks during a match is the coolest thing from Street Fighter in years! The number of changes the song goes through is enough to make your head spin, and it conveys so many different aspects of his personality: from boisterous and big-headed to cunning and slyly sinister. Whilst the game itself has yet to give his character much of a spotlight so far, I feel like through this song alone I’ve gotten to know everything there is to him, and danced along every second of the way.
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Last year, ‘SOLAR KIDS’ by Wienners was my favourite song to release, and it’s not an understatement to say Wienners are one of my favourite bands of all time. They only released one song this year, ‘TOP SPEED’, but as much as I love the song itself I didn’t place it on the list as there were so many other stellar releases this year that it became a no-brainer which would be included (that, and also because the music video is a messy AI deluge, which I really couldn’t enjoy watching. WIENNERS, I STILL ADORE YOUR MUSIC BUT PLEASE DO NOT EVER USE AI EVER AGAIN).

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10. PASSEPIED- ‘Basilico’

I’ve paid keen attention to PASSEPIED’s yearly releases ever since I discovered them in 2020. They’ve maintained a consistent yearly album release schedule ever since their debut, and I’ve personally found them to all be really interesting and enjoyable releases! Basilico stands out to me because it really spun off in a different direction compared to their previous album ‘Ukubaku’ from 2022. The album ‘Basilico’ belongs to is easily one of my favourite PASSEPIED albums, and ‘Basilico’ cemented itself as a favourite because it highlighted PASSEPIED’s  ever-evolving and ever-experimenting nature more starkly than all their releases from the previous year.

9. QUBIT - ‘G.A.D’ 

DAOKO and Seiichi Nagai create musical magic whenever they work together. I was so happy to see him feature on Daoko’s 2020 album ‘Anima’, and then as a live support member for her 2021 Happy New Year livestream performance! It’s clear they have as much fun creating music together as I do listening to them, as they’ve become bandmates through QUBIT and continued their impeccable collaborative streak (just ignore the AI music video released for their song ‘Mr Sonic’). The first song released from the project was G.A.D (‘Galactic Android Dancer’), and right from the start it’s clear that the melting pot of 5 genius musicians effortlessly formed the song, with every member getting their own moment to shine throughout. A debut so bold that witnessing it unfold live is something I know I’ll still be talking about years from now.

Not only that, but I’m so happy that for the song’s music video, they recorded a fully live performance of the song! It’s always so fun hearing the small discrepancies between studio and live versions, even down to the difference in delivery of individual lyrics, as well as hearing my favourite parts performed in the moment too!

As for why I love Seiichi Nagai’s music so much? I’ll be writing extensively about it sometime in the future…….

8. nhomme- ‘Isshu No Kaon I’

I love this song because of the contrast between it and its music video (which is easily one of the most unforgettable music videos I’ve ever seen). A blunt, ever-cycling guitar loop making its presence known in the right audio channel whilst instruments burst and sputter in close vicinity. Tension, entropy, claustrophobia, and the emotion of witnessing it all are what come to mind as I experience these sounds, with only a semblance of resistance arising when the shouting kicks in and we hear a cohesive melody desperately pulled together, like a last-ditch effort against the mechanical withering we’ve witnessed for the past 2 minutes. Not only is it beautiful to hear and picture, but becomes irresistible to replay.

Compared to the video, which is calmly conducted and tranquilly presented. Of course overlaps are felt in the pacing and lighting of the video, but overall I find it so therapeutic to watch while the audio is much more torrential. I also think the video itself deserves so much praise for doing something different: I love to see innovations in music videos that go beyond just lip-syncing, and this is an endeavour I’ve never seen done before.

I am absolutely privileged to own a cassette copy of  ‘Isshu No Kaon’. Owning a small piece of this music video feels so incredibly special, and I will forever cherish this video as a beacon of the potential of music videos!

7. Chinese Hoodie- ‘Thunder Girl’ 

Witnessing happiness makes me happy, and ‘Thunder Girl’ has happiness in abundance. Simple lyrics elevated to joyous heights thanks to their tongue-in-cheek message and the chemistry of the band members themselves! I’ll be writing about it at greater length in a future article!

6. Ultra- ‘Knight’ 

The single jacket isn’t for everyone, as it even made me wince upon first look with the notion of a keyhole existing behind one’s neck, but I think that impression perfectly encapsulates the daunting nature of the song itself. The crashes of the instruments before the first verse masterfully and unsettlingly spark with heavy weight, evoking the very nature of metallic clashes and intimidation, setting the stage for the grand chorus and its tremendous inflection: “I don’t want to think about anything”. Hearing it the first time sounds triumphant, but by the end of the song it feels imbued with sorrow, as if broken down by the continuous controlled chaos it’s been resisting all along.

5. Penguin no Yuuutsu- ‘OCD’ 

I love the world of Penguin no Yuuutsu. The heavily introspective and mood-reflective songs all emphasise a different aspect of Tana thoughts, and she defines a song titled ‘OCD’ so masterfully, commanding huge levels of respect for her ability to understand, reflect on, express, and translate her mind into sound.  Weaving between paces and moodscapes, ducking behind the cover of refrains and peeking out on choruses: Tana perfectly places every sound in its right place, and Ryushiro Ogushi voices his guitar exactly as needed to convey the blurry, shy nature of the song. I could never tire of exploring the settings that Tana captures in her work!

4. Sachiko Aoyama- ‘Hi no Tori’ 

When I first saw that Inio Asano collaborated with Sachiko Aoyama to draw the cover for her single ‘Harbor View’, I was over the moon because I’d long suspected them to be fans of each other’s art when I noticed they were mutual followers on Twitter last year; He went on to draw the jackets for all of her releases this year! Solanin is one of my favourite manga, and stories in general, ever, and with how close NEGOTO are to my heart, I’ve loved every single one of Sachiko Aoyama’s songs since she went solo.

Of all the songs from her new EP ‘Esper’, ‘Hi no Tori’ is easily my favourite because of how much it stands out from the rest on the release. The mysticism of a phoenix is evoked right from the beginning with the looming synths mimicking the swaying of an elegant blaze. Aoyama’s singing immediately seizes attention through her lyric of syllable repetition with “yan-yan-yan-yan”, and navigates the precarious verses into a shimmering chorus where her voice soars. Even with over a decade of music featuring her singing, I know every future release of hers will showcase an entirely new side to her voice.

3. Shiho Mochizuki- ‘Obakachan’ 

For the past 7 months, this has been THE definitive uplifting song for me! A short blurb isn’t enough to do this song justice, but a future article, currently in the works, might be able to.

2. Layla- ‘Wonderland’ 

I love the excitement of listening to a new band for the first time, and it was in the midst of this excitement after discovering Layla that ‘Wonderland’ was released. It was so fun to witness a new song release from a band I’d already determined to be one of my favourite discoveries in recent memory, and there’s an endless number of details in the video to notice upon multiple rewatches. Creating an entire song focusing on the optimism that accompanies escapism is such a fun development in Layla’s discography, and I’ll always love almost shouting my favourite lyric from the song: “LET’S AIM FOR WON-DER-LAND!!”.

I interviewed Layla earlier this year and we spoke about this video alongside their other music, which you can read here!

1. Uchudan- ‘FU-RE-FU-RE’ 

Packing so many imaginative twists and turns into a single song, both audibly and visually, is a feat I can’t help but fully respect and utterly adore. This is the song I’ve listened to the most this year, and for good reason: it’s a sound that’s defined so many of my memories since I first heard it, and I’m nowhere near done exploring every crevice of its soundscape.

I kept this part short because I’m currently writing a more in-depth post about it, to be published soon! I hate to be annoying by being vague, but it’ll be worth waiting for!

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I wouldn’t call this list comprehensive, as there’s still so much I want to say about them all, but for now I’m happy with it being a brief summary of the main songs I’ve loved from this year! I hope it’s been fun to read, and please feel free to send me a message if you enjoyed any on the list as I always love to have conversations about music!

-Mustafa