Perfume - Relax In The City / Pick Me Up

A new single from the continually excellent Perfume girls is always cause for celebration, and this week saw their latest hit UK shores. And what's more, you get two for the price of one this time!

The first of the tracks - Relax In The City - is pretty gentle fare by Perfume's recent standards, though perhaps that could have been to expected from the title. Between playful, nursery rhyme-like melodies, the track feels pretty interchangeable with a Kyary Pamyu Pamyu album cut - charming, certainly, but you came here for the all-out party bangers, didn't you?

It's on Pick Me Up that we get to the real meat of the package here though - it's by far and away the better of the two songs, flipping between delicately rural acoustic elements and a chorus that fizzes away like a firework mainlining on Pro Plus. The song feels like a natural continuation on from the likes of Spending All My Time, and already feels like a future live-favourite. Top marks on this one, girls.

The double A-side single also comes backed with the track Toumei Ningen (Invisible Man) thrown in for good measure - the song seeing the Perfume girls taking up a sleeker synth sound before exploding into the hi-energy EDM-fest that comprised much of their Level 3 album; arpeggiated synth lines practically dripping off a mix of layered, sultry harmonies. Definitely not among their best tracks, but competent nonetheless.

Relax In The City / Pick Me Up is available on UK iTunes now via Universal J. The tracks are also available to stream on Spotify.

Claris ~Single Best 1st~ (Yup, Claris' best tracks are finally available in the UK!)

To give you a general idea of how much I love Claris, I used to check iTunes/Amazon every other day or so to see if SME Records had finally uploaded their other albums. For quite some time, their Party Time album has been available, but many of their best tracks - including their iconic OP themes for Madoka Magica and Oreimo - had been glaringly absent.

But no longer. Swiftly following its Japanese release, the duo's Greatest Hits compilation has been added to UK iTunes. Rejoice!

Why does this matter? Four years ago, Claris broke through with a swift one-two of singles, 'Irony' and 'Connect' - from Oreimo and Madoka Magica, respectively - seeing them land a duo of Top 10 hits. The two tracks offer up something of a template for the two sides of the coin that represent Claris' sound - Irony opting for a deliciously whistful, glossy futuristic dance-pop sheen, whilst Connect plays to a more organic blend of strings, acoustic guitar and piano.

Bringing the two together is an incredible command of melody and clarity - some of the best I've ever heard on OP themes. Whilst the current trend seems to be for feisty pop-rocker stormers, Claris take a prettier, bubblier approach - the perfect match to the brightly coloured aesthetic of shows like Madoka.

With the band's members remaining a mystery, hidden behind constructed personas - an extra dimension is added to the band's feel and tone; a kind of blank slate projectionism similar in vein to Hatsune Miku and her vocaloid pals. We have their voices, and a vague artistic impression, but beyond that, Claris can become anything we want them to be - a pretty, enchating mystery in line with Madoka and her magical girl chums.

Offering a third take on the Claris aesthetic, there's also the Supercell-penned Naisho No Hanashi (Secret Conversation), which served as an ED theme for Shaft's Nisemonogatari. Opting for a more straight-up rock vibe, it falls neatly in line with Supercell's other famed Monogatari composition Kimi no Shiranai Monogatari (The Story You Don't Know).

Three elements, then - three disparate sounds brought together with a perfect sense of melody. Through the virtue of being a Greatest Hits, Claris' 'Best' collection has a lot to recommend it - although if you're looking for the veritable cream of the crop, I'd start off with Irony, Connect, Reunion and Click - here, the duo reach their deliriously catchy peak.

I've had the album as my commute listening for around the past month now (partly because I've been trying to save money and avoid downloading too much else) - and it still doesn't feel like it'll get old anytime soon. If there's anything better than walking out the door in the morning with Connect blasting on your headphones, I'm yet to find it.

Claris ~Single Best 1st~ is available on UK iTunes now, via SME Records.

Eir Aoi - Lapis Lazuli

Continuing her first-rate run of form, the excellent Eir Aoi has released her latest single Lapis Lazuli in the UK. Those following The Heroic Legend of Arslan will recognise the track as the anime's ED theme, and it's rollicking, anthemic feel certainly fits the high fantasy themes of the series.

With four singles released over the space of the past twelve months, we imagine the singer's hotly anticipated fourth studio album can't be far off now. Personally, we still rate 2014's Ignite (from Sword Art Online) as the best of the bunch, born out by the fact the track is still hanging round the Top 5 most downloaded J-Pop tunes on UK iTunes.

The single comes backed with the similarly fiery Utsusemi Ultimate (The Ultimate Being) and the gentler mid-tempo Rindou No Hana (The Flowering Forest Road) - on both, Aoi's vocals remain at their impassioned best, delivering the kind of epic, apocalyptic scope I feel her songs always encapsulate so well. Music to go out and take on the world, if you will.

It's worth mentioning too that Eir Aoi will actually be performing in the UK for the first time ever at this year's Hyper Japan event - something of a coup for the show if we do say, as the show shifts to the larger O2 arena from its previous Earls Court venue. With a veritable host of other J-Pop acts on offer at the event, Hyper Japan is fast shaping up as *the* definitive event of the year for fans of Japanese Music. Basically, don't miss it!

Lapis Lazuli is available to download on iTunes now, via SME Records.

Mashiro Ayano - Vanilla Sky (Gunslinger Stratos OP)

Following hot on the heels of her fantastic Fate Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works OP theme Ideal White, singer Mashiro Ayano is riding high on the back of this season's Gunslinger Stratos, with the OP theme Vanilla Sky getting an official UK release.

While I don't think the track is as good as Ideal White, I'll always offer praise for an act actually being able to get an OP theme out in the UK while the show is still airing in Japan. This is how it should be, instead of fans being forced to listen to rubbish, sped-up streams on YouTube or Soundcloud.

Packing the same punchy pop-rock pulse as Ideal White did, Mashiro Ayano's latest effort is typical action OP fodder - a heady blend of beats, guitars and euphoric strings combining to deliver the kind of giddy energy fans of the likes of Eir Aoi will lap up.

The track comes backed with b-sides Turn To You, Gentou and the instrumental version of Vanilla Sky. I'd argue that the b-sides actually have somewhat more charm to them than the lead track, dressing themselves up in sparklingly retro-synths. Turn To You in particular sounds like it could have accompanied a Gundam OP back in the mid 90s.

Vanilla Sky is available to download on iTunes now, via Ariola Japan. (It's also worth checking out Ariola Japan's entire repertoire on Amazon, via this handy link)

Blast From The Past - Monster Rancher (CBBC)

Everyone remembers watching Pokemon, Digimon and Yu-Gi-Oh on CITV. For a generation of young Brits, it was the first experience with anime in any shape or form. But let's not forget that, believe it or not, there was actually a time when the BBC showed anime too, in the form of Monster Rancher.

Broadcast from 2001 to 2002 if I remember correctly, the above villain (Gali) ended up lingering in my memory long after the show itself had evaporated from my mind. For years on years, I racked my brains desperately trying to recall the name of the above character - with only a firm imprint on my mind of a 'villain with the face of a sun' to remember the show by. Finally, late last year, I remembered.

For some reason, good ol' Gali had really left an impression on the pre-teen version of myself. I'd just started secondary school, and on coming into school one day, we were tasked to draw a rendition of Caliban as part of our studies of Shakespeare's The Tempest. Having just sat down to an episode of Monster Rancher that morning whilst scoffing down my cornflakes, I promptly drew my Caliban as a Gali-inspired monstrosity.

Shakespeare and Monster Rancher - such natural bedfellow, of course.

Incidentally, I love that you can still see remnants of the show in the BBC's programming schedules as part of their BBC Genome archive project. Anyone for a spot of Tweenies and Playdays?

Sadly, the show - like Digimon - is now long out of print in the UK, with all that remains being a 2002 three-episode VHS.

nano - Rock On.

Imagine my surprise earlier this week when I checked iTunes and saw this pop up. January is typically a pretty dead period for new music, with the UK's charts invariably bloated with the biggest hits of the previous year following the Xmas blow-out.

But lo and behold, January 28th, and the new album from angular pop-rock type nano is up there. Rejoice! Most will know nano for the incredible OP theme to Arpeggio of Blue Steel, and said track is present here, alongside the singles Born To Be and Infinity=Zero. Personally, I don't think there's anything that quite comes close to matching early standouts Now Or Never and No Pain, No Game, but it makes for a solid record nonetheless, with the singer's characteristic androgynous vocals front and centre.

I've always likened nano to Enter Shikari or Amaranthe, but in truth the sound is wider reaching - matching the punchy guitar/synths combo to a more melodic course. The blend of Japanese and English lyrics is excellently done too - which is more than be said for many OP themes that attempt to do likewise.

But yeah, it goes without saying: Victor Entertainment - cheers for putting this out officially in the UK! And for anyone that hasn't heard Savior of Song yet? Boy have you been missing out...