milet -- Fly High

 

A little over a year ago, I covered a milet song for the first time via her "inside you" which she'd also performed on the special COVID-influenced 2020 Kohaku Utagassen. She does have a distinctive voice which makes her one that can be easily recognizable in pop music. It also sounded rather familiar when compared to other singers and I was wondering which singers. I finally thought milet's vocals rather blended the timbre of Alanis Morissette and the soar of Adele, but that's just my opinion.

Near the end of the year, milet showed up on comedian Sanma Akashiya's（明石家さんま）year-end special where she basically broke down in adorable embarrassment and hilarity after boasting that she could peel a hard-boiled egg lickety-split on an Olympic level and then failing miserably. Apparently, the egg never got the memo.

However, that's OK since her day job as a singer-songwriter is serving her much better. Strangely enough, since I've mentioned the Olympics, her "Fly High" (written and composed by her with TomoLow also helping out with the melody) has been selected as NHK's official song for the upcoming Winter Games in Beijing starting next week, although for some reason, it's been labeled as "The Winter Sports Theme Song" for the first time instead. 

For me, it doesn't quite reach the levels of the truly blood-pumping "Atsukunare"（熱くなれ）by Maki Ohguro（大黒摩季）for the 1996 Games in Atlanta, but "Fly High" has that appropriately Olympic-level inspiration within milet's vocals and arrangement. Also, I think that there is also a bit of "Lion King" flowing through its veins. Indeed, milet not only sang this on the Akashiya special but this was her contribution on her 2nd appearance on the Kohaku almost a month ago. It will be a track on her 2nd full album "visions" which will be released on February 2nd next week.

Ah, I did find her folly with the egg peeling. According to the poor lass, she'd actually practiced with six eggs beforehand.

milet -- inside you

 

I first heard about indies pop singer-songwriter milet (pronounced mirei) a few weeks ago when she appeared on an episode of "Uta Kon"（うたコン）, and when I first heard her song "inside you", I didn't quite take notice of it then. Most likely, and admittedly it's a lame reason, it was because I was probably starting to nod off in the living room since I tend to do that nowadays after dinner. Yes, you may call me J-Canuck oji-chan.

However on New Year's Eve, I watched the Kohaku Utagassen where she appeared second on the Red Team lineup, and it was there that she stood out. With the Kohaku, especially over the past number of years, I've been accustomed to hearing and seeing a group of singers in the enka and aidoru genres so when someone or some band comes out that doesn't fit into either of those categories, my eyes and ears can perk up. Last year, my senses did gain interest because of King Gnu's performance at the 2019 Kohaku.

Well, with this somewhat logistically different Kohaku a few nights ago, there was milet up on a special stage among the thoroughly empty seats singing her 2019 EP's title track "inside you", and I think it was that setting that helped set the mood for the song, a ballad about a relationship in some trouble. If it had been a normal Kohaku, then she probably would have been singing on the regular massive stage at NHK Hall in front of the audience, but having her high up in the stands provided a more dramatic viewpoint for her performance and also some more interesting camera angles.

But let's not just praise the producers for the show. milet's vocals also stood out (especially in the refrain) for their combination of jagged and velvety nature as contrary as that may sound. In fact, although she may not sound as raw, maybe there's a bit of Ottawa-born Alanis Morisette (yes, haha, I mentioned "jagged" in the previous sentence and Alanis did have her "Jagged Little Pill") in there. According to the J-Wiki article on her, she's enjoyed the music of Sigur Rós and Björk, along with BOOM BOOM SATELLITES and ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION on the Japan side of things. If I can throw in one more Canadian reference, milet did study in the Great White North during her teenage years.

The "inside you" EP was released as her debut in March 2019 with milet behind the lyrics and the music was a collaborative effort between her and Toru from the rock band ONE OK ROCK. It reached No. 1 on the digital downloads and No. 16 on the Oricon CD charts. "inside you" was also used as the opening theme for the 2019 Fuji-TV drama "Scandal Senmon Bengoshi QUEEN"（スキャンダル専門弁護士 QUEEN...Queen: The Scandal Lawyer）.