Search - Takako Minekawa :: Fun 9

There's a fascinating outsider sensibility that Japanese musicians can bring to the history of Western pop, as if they've browsed through a curio shop for a selection of objects from different eras, recombining familiar sounds and subtly skewing them. On Takako Minekawa's third full-length CD, Fun 9, her naive-sounding soprano voice floats atop the synthesized sounds and breakbeats characteristic of current electronic music, but references abound to lounge music and rock and pop styles from the '60s to the present. She also shares an offbeat lyrical style with other Japanese alternative-pop groups of the '90s who'd just as soon write songs about food or bugs or the weather than relationship clichés. Minekawa's combination of indie rock and electronica is reminiscent of Solex or the Pastels, but is closest in style to her Japanese compatriots like Pizzicato 5 or Cornelius. Cornelius collaborates with her for half the songs on this release. --Bob Bannister