Variety wasn't something the Oricon Charts delivered much over the course of 2013. With few exceptions, the biggest sellers were the same as they ever were — Johnny's boy bands such as Arashi, Kanjani 8 and Kis-My-FT2; AKB48 and their affiliated projects; and a variety of rock 'n' roll fossils. Not to say all these chart-topping acts sucked or didn't produce the odd gem, but using the upper echelons of Oricon as a guide wouldn't shed much light on musical innovation in this country. And considering how much CDs cost in Japan, this futile pursuit is rarely economically justified.
Yet there is an alternative — more and more Japanese artists released songs, EPs and albums through platforms such as SoundCloud and Bandcamp (not to mention dozens of music labels operating exclusively online). The Internet allowed for ideas that could make a major-label suit shiver, and some of the best music in Japan this year emerged from URLs instead of high-price studios — often for free. Here are my favorite ready-to-download Japanese albums of 2013.
The best of the bunch ... and it looms over most Japanese music released this year ... is May.e's debut album "Mattiola." It's a minimal album — the singer-songwriter uses only her (rich) voice, acoustic guitar and a rare drum. By using echo and vocal multi-tracking, though, she has created a hypnotic collection that seems staggering coming from one person. It's also emotionally rich, jumping between campfire laments ("Betsuzi") to playful jaunts ("Sugar Smell") to ecstasy ("Kataomori"). Nothing sounded as spellbinding as "Mattiola" — though last week May.e released her second album, "Shiseikatsu." Until I get a proper listen, though, I'm sticking with her debut.