Fans of live dance acts with a stadium-sized sound have been fairly hard done-by of late. Sure Orbital are back on tour and Basement Jaxx keep on firing out the carnival beats, but what about something totally fresh and inspired?
The Japanese Popstars are three lads from Derry, Northern Ireland, who have pooled their considerable collective skills into a thundering live experience and are fast becoming the heirs to the uber-rave band throne. Think The Chemical Brothers but fizzing with the raw excitement of youth, or a more blistering, punked-up Underworld.
‘We Just Are’ is their debut album, out on the consistently good Gung Ho Records, and it has already caused some seismic shockwaves. Tracks like ‘Face Melter’ and ‘Sample Whore’ are straight-up speaker assaulting techno monsters, yet the band can also tweak at our more emotive musical desires as the melodies of ‘BCTT’ and ‘The Smile’ quickly prove.
Every track benefits from an infusion of pure purpose – to make a huge throng of people dance, and keep on dancing. They manage this no matter the tempo or the severity of the drum programming, which often builds and drops with all the punch and intricacy of drum and bass. Each track on this album is more than fit and capable of a successful stadium workout, and the range of styles they achieve this with shows great promise.
If you get the chance to hear the screaming electronica of ‘Rise of Ulysses’ performed live you’ll witness the energy and ambition that the Japanese Popstars are all about. Mental, uproarious dance music at it’s best. In fact, a new live version of the album has just been released, giving a taste of the joyous madness of their recent festival appearances from Glastonbury in the UK to Fuji Rocks in Japan.
Meanwhile Decky, Gary, and Gareth are reportedly working on a second album that by all rights should send them into the stratosphere. ‘We Just Are’ is the sound of a new generation of electronic crowd-rockers firmly setting out their stall, and as such its impossible not to sit up and take notice.
