Sugar's Campaign -- City Pop

 

Well, let's see. I helped out my parents, lugged up a bag of rice and got some takeout for dinner later on. Considering that I was up late last night again browsing through YouTube, I'm not exactly displaying the peak of energy levels right now and none of us are purchasers of Red Bull. What's a guy to do?

One pick-me-up has been to blog about a pretty eclectic singer or band. And I did find one with Sugar's Campaign. Formed in 2011, the duo consists of musician Seiho Hayakawa（早川聖朋）and trackmaker Takuma "Avec Avec" Hosokawa（細川拓久真）who have come together according to their Speedstar Records profile to create some new-age City Pop. They have often invited vocalists to front their tunes, and their influences include Yasuyuki Okamura（岡村靖幸）, Toshinobu Kubota（久保田利伸）, Todd Rundgren, the kids' show "Ponkikies"（ポンキッキーズ）, and 1990s anime.

I even found a January 2015 "Japan Times" article about Sugar's Campaign (of which I could only get a mere portion because they want me to pay up a subscription fee...ah, nope) that stated that their purpose was to stretch City Pop (a few years before it exploded on YouTube internationally) to the extreme in the same way that Kyary Pamyu Pamyu（きゃりーぱみゅぱみゅ）has done with aidoru music. 

Indeed, that is intriguing and in 2019, Hayakawa and Hosokawa came out with a single called "City Pop". However, I'd say that it wasn't even a matter of stretching City Pop to its limits. It's really a wholly different animal or a mild gryphon, so to speak. I kinda heard it as an 80s-style synthpop ditty while a 2019 article on Otaquest described it as a peppy 2000s indie rock song. Whatever it ultimately is, "City Pop" is still plenty fun to hear and shimmy-worthy with guest vocalist Akio behind the mike.