New YMCK full-length album, DVD... recipe book?

And we're back! Now that Canada won Gold at the WJHC, I can continue writing about denpa and crazy Japanese music in general. Hope everyone had a decent holiday break? I mostly spent mine grinding for levels in Persona 4 and fighting a new enemy in my very own house... BED BUGS. These sneaky bastards are hard to get rid of and sure love sucking on my blood, but I think I'm starting to get the best of them.

We start 2009 with some leftover YMCK news from 2008 that I completely missed out on, somehow. It seems just like last week I wrote about their two cover albums, so I apologize for missing this one. PerfumeCity user jigenbakuda was nice enough to point me in the direction of a brand new YMCK full-length album and DVD which both come out on January 21st 2009. Hardcore fans will supersize the combo and go for the full collector's meal which includes a ... recipe book?

Yes, a recipe book, because cooking in the main theme behind the group's fourth original album. Pretty brilliant if you ask me. The official website does not state if the DVD contains live segments, but it most probably does. Here's the tracklist for the album... you'll notice all the songs have something to do with cooking:

1. おもちゃの兵隊のマーチ
2. カレーだよ！
3. サラダ・シャバダバ
4. 三ツ星シェフの歌
5. グルメなアイツ
6. ふわふわ卵のオムライス
7. 帰り道、晩ご飯。
8. ワン！ダフル・チョコレート
9. バンバンクッキング

In related YMCK news, they will be playing many concerts around the world in the coming weeks, just take a look at the Denpa Watchlist to your right for the details. One event that deserves further discussion is the upcoming 「ファミ詣」 (famimode) event with its all-star chiptune lineup and Famicom Battle (the fuck? are they playing some Battletoads?)

POWERPLAY are going to Japan all the way from Sweden, no doubt on the invitation of YMCK who played many Swedish shows themselves. Then there's also the eclectic duo KPLECRAFT, mostly known for their multiple contributions to the Namco Idolm@ster Famison series, but also the 2006 BlipFest performance. Here's a great recent interview with kuske, who makes some very interesting comments about the state of the chiptune scene in Japan.

Two new YMCK cover albums out now

Yesterday saw the release of two new mini-albums from YMCK, a quirky Japanese Chiptune trio which has already performed outside of Japan multiple times. Though they feature intricate 8bit compositions and silky smooth female vocals, both minialbums are sort of side projects until their next full length album. The first is the appropriately titled 「-songs before 8bit-」 compilation of 9 classic Japanese pop tunes remixed using their own software plugin. I'm not gonna lie and pretend I know any of them; but a quick Youtube lookup reveals that they indeed went for rockin' picks. Essentially, this is the same deal as Momo-i gave us with her two Famison albums, except you replace anime themes with classic Japanese folk songs.

The other one is a split CD with De De Mouse, which is totally awesome. I thought splits were limited to the punk/hardcore scene, now they're invading 8bit JPop. I guess De De Mouse is pretty far from textbook denpa, but his totally weird songs and videos sure get my attention. Look at this crazy motherfucker go! This is another cover album, but given De De Mouse's style, the overall feeling should be substantially different from 「-songs before 8bit-」. Whereas Midori does all of the singing on the YMCK songs, DDM has different vocalists for all three of his contributions, including the gorgeous moumoonのYUKAさん on 「ルージュの伝言」.

Good news, everyone! You can listen to short samples from all of both album's songs on Natalie.mu's Power Push, which also features an extensive 4 page interview for your perusal. Are you hungry for more YMCK? Check out their fantastic retro music videos on their myspace account.

YMCK live performance in Washington, DC

Heads up to all of our Washington, DC readers! Japanese chiptune band YMCK will be performing for FREE at the 2008 Japan! Culture + Hyper Culture event in Washington on Sunday, February 10 2008 at 6PM. I plan on writing a YMCK band profile in the near future, but until then I wanted to pass the word about this specific event.

Sadly, I won't be able to attend even though Washington's not extremely far from here. Not only will I be missing out on some killer 8-bit tunes performed live; the whole 2 week event sounds too good to be true. To add insult to injury, I have a bit of a love story with the city itself. Seeing Ovechkin play to his home crowd is a must, plus I know a couple of restaurants that I definitely need to re-visit ASAP! Why couldn't this event happen this summer instead? Would have been such a great road trip...

If anyone is planning on going, please drop me a line! I would love to put up your pictures for all to see.