brkfstblend - self-titled
When you hear the jangling of the first chords on brkfstblend’s debut album, you’d be forgiven for thinking this might be another version of modern city pop. It’s not just the echo of Tatsuro Yamashita’s opening chords on Sparkle, the band’s members are all well versed in these sounds. Brkfstblend consists of three members: Keity (ex-bassist for Lucky Tapes), Tetsushi Kasuya (ex-drummer for Yogee New Waves), and singer-songwriter Michael Kaneko on vocals. Their roots are deep in 60’s/70’s soul, rock, and AOR, so it’s not surprising that brkfstblend kind of sounds like city pop.
However, the Tokyo-based band has made a conscious decision to sing entirely in English and not worry about the Japanese music market. That would be crazy if it were 1980 and your success was driven by physical sales in the world’s 2nd largest music market, but it’s a totally viable path in the streaming era. This intentionally makes brkfstblend much more accessible to international audiences than their former bands, which incidentally, sound even more Japanese now. Given that their roots lie in Western music, that suits the music they prefer to write and play, with stacks of references to their heroes, from Neil Diamond and Marvin Gaye to Lenny Kravitz and Oasis.
Naturally, it happens to suit the songs on this album. Brkfstblend is a lot rougher than romantic city pop. Where Japanese people tend to be reserved and coy about their emotions and lifestyles, brkfstblend is basically on a massive bender. Almost all the songs on the album involve drinking, partying, and chasing girls. The album even starts off at “2am”, drunk on tequila and gin, bragging that they can still get it on after 11 drinks deep. On “Ladyland”, they even explicitly state “have another drink cause I just DGAF”. On “City Habits”, they’re on two dollar whiskeys spreading their love all around the place (now that’s a charming image). It’s almost like an FU to those romantic ideals of Japanese music, you can’t imagine that a normal Japanese lyricist would be so bold.
And of course, if you’re going to go that hard, it’s going to be messy. There are no happy endings to be found here, just getting wasted and feeling like trash the next day. Then you do it all over again. You’d think these guys would know better at their age, but perhaps it’s all they know, and they’re desperately hanging onto it. Maybe it’s a product of big city living, whether it’s Tokyo or New York, life is pretty fast and this is how you get by, drowning in silk and Hennessy. Give these guys an A for sticking to themes.
It might seem a little empty and shallow, but that’s kind of the point. This is the lifestyle, for better or worse. The album even gets weird in places, with instrumentals and spaced out psychedelic sections, which totally fits in with how drinking late into the night leads to random tangents and introspection. The consistent theme also makes it interesting in that the one cover song they chose, Al Green’s classic “Let’s Stay Together”, sounds less romantic and more desperate when performed in the context of the whole album - here you’re not sure that Kaneko is confidently promising forever, rather he might be trying to hold on to something he might have wrecked with this kind of fast living.
True to its concept and genesis as an idea born from a drinking session, brkfstblend is a slick riff made by guys who know how to make you move, the sound is warm, the grooves are smooth and funky. It’s a seductive formula, but when you wake up the next day, you wonder if there’s more to it than this. Going forward, let’s hope they’re able to expand and explore other ideas and themes, otherwise they might burn out pretty fast. But hey, if you take the advice and get loaded, you’ll at least have a great time dancing to it. If it feels good (real good), do it.