Search - Puffy AmiYumi :: Splurge

Puffy celebrates ten years of making great rock music

J. Williams | New York, NY | 07/25/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I'll start by stating the obvious: this is a great rock album. You expected something different?



Now for the details.



Immediate superstars in Japan from their 1996 debut megahit "True Asia", Puffy made sort of an awkward jump across the Pacific in 2001. Initially taking on an indie band persona with their "Rolling Debut Revue" tour and their college-rock heavy albums Spike and An Illustrated History, they later morphed into the kid-friendly cartoon characters of "Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi" in the hopes of increasing their audience. It's a move that looks more and more like a mistake in hindsight. Maybe a result of their split attention between Japan and the US, "Puffy-mania" in their home country has dwindled with time. With Splurge, they seek to reinvent themselves once again, re-establishing their indie street cred in the States while perhaps forging a new bond with their homegrown fans in Japan.



For the truly uninitiated, Puffy (as they are still known in Japan) are Yumi Yoshimura and Ami Onuki. In 1995, they were two regular twentysomething girls from different parts of Japan answering the same newspaper ad looking for the next Japanese superstar. Tamio Okuda, Japanese rock star and all-around musical genius, would serve as their songwriter and mentor for their initial chart forays before slipping back into his own solo career. It was these early albums and corresponding tours that captured so much of the public's attention in Japan - the unique combination of Okuda's Japanese rock and roll compositions combined with the girls' charisma, rawness and unique fashion sense drew a broad audience that gave the entire music industry a serious kick in the pants. It's not too far out of bounds to compare their effect on Japanese pop music to that of Nirvana or the Sex Pistols in the west. They were like nothing anyone had ever seen or heard before.



Now in their thirties, Ami and Yumi have slowly taken more control over their own musical destinies while hedging against the almost inevitable calming of Japanese Puffy-mania. Splurge is a culmination of their ten years making music, an anniversary album combining both Japanese and American compositions from a variety of well-known songwriters and musicians (including Jon Spencer, Dexter Holland, Andy Sturmer, Butch Walker and the return of Tamio Okuda). The US release features more English lyrics than they've ever sung before, some of which were written by Puffy themselves. Stylistically, Splurge is as varied as the names involved would suggest - though Puffy's vocals and harmonies always manage to tie everything together.



Beginning with Butch Walker's "Call Me What You Like (if you like rock and roll)", the album starts off with a rebellious tribute to rock music from the 1970's through today - sampling Def Leppard and the Offspring, and with a riff that pays homage to The Knack's "My Sharona". When the girls sing "we ain't no harajuku girls" in an obvious dig at Gwen Stefani, they're making a statement on both their music and their status as Japanese icons - or at least western stereotypes of the styles they helped create.



Progressing through indie rock, neo-punk, folk-rock and retro 50's and 60's beach rock, about the only genre absent from their usual repertoire is disco. Yes, disco. While ostensibly a rock act, Puffy has always been about fun as much as anything, and some of their most famous and popular songs could have easily sprung from the drum machine of K.C. and the Sunshine Band. "Electric Beach Fever", "Tokyo Nights", and even their original hit "True Asia" were obvious nods to the disco era. Perhaps they've dropped this bit in an effort to court the more serious western crowd, but Splurge is wall-to-wall guitars in one form or another. Don't misunderstand - Puffy's trademark up-tempo party tracks still take a bow in "Nice Buddy", "Beginnings" and "Tokyo I'm On My Way", but there's nary a drum machine to be heard, and synthesized strings are reserved for the 1950's-inspired slow-dance "Missing You Baby".



Highlights are almost too many to mention, but new fans in America will probably immediately take to the aforementioned "Call Me What You Like" as well as the second Butch Walker composition, the powerful cover of Marvelous 3's wail against corporate rock "Radio Tokyo". Both Ami and Yumi have solo songs on this album (something they haven't done in a while), Yumi's "Cameland" being a slow, traditional-sounding Japanese folk song and Ami's "Security Blanket" a punky but heartfelt dedication to her three-year-old daughter (with surprisingly poetic English lyrics written by her). Both are among the best songs this year, let alone on this album, and both show a depth to Puffy that is both new and a little surprising. These aren't college kids anymore - this is a 33-year old new mom and a 31-year old divorcee singing about real life (and death).



Really, though, with the weak-point exceptions of Dexter Holland's "Tokyo I'm On My Way" and Jon Spencer's "Go Baby Power Now" (both of which sound like bad imitations of their composers' real bands as interpreted by the PowerPuff Girls on speed), this album just doesn't quit. It's as immediately fun, catchy and listenable as any of their past albums, but with more nuance and experience behind the singing and the songwriting. While they may have been musical novices when Puffy was formed, at this stage of their careers, these girls know exactly what they're doing. And if Japan no longer cares, that's their loss. Puffy is everything we've forgotten pop music could be in this country, and *if only* they could break through here as they did in Japan years before. Our music industry could use a good swift kick in the pants."

Another Puffy Pop Gem

Jack | Maine | 08/05/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Another solid pop music mini-masterpiece! These girls cannot make a bad album. Sure, they have recorded some twinky tunes, but when they nail it, they really nail it. Every Puffy album has at least 4 classic pop tunes on them, and this one is no exception. The monster on this album is "Call Me What You Like". The song starts off with the Boomtown Rats "I Don't Like Mondays" piano roll with Def Leppard's "Rock Of Ages" count-off and then goes into a Knack-y beat with a "We Got The Beat" guitar line. 25 years ago this song would have been on your radio day and night. That's the true charm of Puffy. They borrow (or, as in CMWYL,lift) pop elements from the 50's on up and turn them into something fresh. Other highlights on Splurge are "Nice Buddy", "Etude", "The Story", and "Mole-like". While I don't think this album is as good, or rocks as hard, as "Nice", it is still on a par with "Spike" and "Jet". 10 years on, and they haven't slipped. NOTE: For anyone interested, the Japanese version of the album has Japanese versions of "Call It What You Like" and "Go Baby Power Now", neither of which sounded as good to my American ears as the English versions. There is also a cover of Green Day's "Basket Case", which sounds exactly like what you would expect: Green Day meets Puffy! Each of these songs would have been a nicer addition to the US release than either of the remixes, though."