I’ll say this straight out as one who was a teenager in the eighties: I never fancied pop music. In fact, I had to do a bit of soul searching to justify buying an Alan Parsons Project album in the later half of the decade. My journey through music has brought me to all kinds of styles, but no matter what, the typical poppy, top 40 hit sound has never thrilled me. In fact, there have been times when I felt a physical revulsion toward certain songs. But an interesting thing has happened over the last ten years. Through my explorations of progressive rock, I have found a lot of modern bands that make use of eighties pop influences and turn them into something more sophisticated. Take for example Joost Maglev. His two solo albums not only show a lot of eighties pop influence blended into his take on progressive rock, but a strong influence from GACKT, his favourite Japanese artist.
Interestingly, during a Twitter comment exchange with Joost, he revealed to me that he once enjoyed listening to GARNET CROW, a Japanese pop band that existed from 1999 to 2013. It was I who threw the name into the ring. GARNET CROW was a band I first discovered back in 1999 while checking out indie band releases. GARNET CROW captured my interest because amidst all the heavy alt., groove rock, punk, melodic metal, melodic alternative, and ska bands I heard, GARNET CROW were an acoustic based band. I snatched up their EP and watched for when they’d release something new.
The next I heard form them was the very pop-sounding Mysterious Eyes single. I have to admit that with the electric guitar, piano, and drums, not to mention the catchy vocal melodies, I liked the song. But the programmed drum beat in the song was a warning sign. When I picked up their debut album a year later, it was caught between enjoying the beautiful vocal melodies and harmonies and the piano and guitar parts of the music, and feeling uncomfortable with the typical pop music sounds and programmed beats. In the end, however, the good outweighed the bad, and I stuck by the band, buying most of their single releases and every album from their debut through to their seventh.
My opinion of GARNET CROW’s music was that they were a pop act that sometimes pushed the piano, guitar (acoustic and electric), and organ to the front, but often relying on programmed digital beats and rhythms to give their music a dance feel. There were several club remixes of songs but most of them were atrocious in my opinion.
In 2009, I let my interest in GARNET CROW die. I felt the songs I really liked were down to one or two an album and that the band’s pop sound was taking over. A couple of years ago, my interest became revived and I bought their last three albums, but I passed them off as being too poppy.
But my brief exchange with Joost drew my back to the GARNET CROW CD drawer, and I decided to listen again. This was seven weeks ago. Since then I have been listening solely to GARNET CROW.
After refreshing my memory with all the songs I still liked, I began listening carefully to the albums and singles. Not long back, I watched Rick Beato talk about the top pop songs on Spotify and as a producer, he had a lot of fine words to say for songs that were given the best mixing treatment, even if their music was simple. Rick, with his breakdowns of classic Genesis songs, his praise for Van Halen, his constant desire to hear good music played by musicians all got me thinking about music from a different perspective. And so, as I listened more to GARNET CROW, I heard the guitars, piano, organs, and even the drums better. I heard the vocal melodies and the chorus and harmonized melodies. Also, with ten years of prog-listening experience behind me now, I felt I could pick out some of the complexities in the music better. I heard the key changes, the unexpected changes in the music, the subtleties in the drumming, the attention to detail in the guitar solos. Though no one would call GARNET CROW a prog band or pop prog crossover band, these musicians have the unmistakable talent for creating songs that go beyond the standard pop fare.
Composer and vocalist, Nakamura Yuri, was raised with music at home, mostly classical, and learned to play classical piano. Lyricist and keyboard player, AZUKI Nana, can write cute and sweet relationship lyrics, but she also writes about deep things. Inspired by books and film, some have said that Nana’s lyrics have a religious quality to them, filled with meaning. Then there’s the talented Okamoto Hitoshi on guitars. Hitoshi knows how to play stylish rock guitar solos in a pop environment. However, as I listen more intently, I am hearing GARNET CROW’s rock side more and more, and Hitoshi’s guitar is obviously at the crux of the matter. At last, we have Furui Hirohito, a professional arranger who is said to be in demand. He plays keyboards and arranges the songs that Yuri composes.
After having created several playlists of favourites songs old and new, I have been currently listening to all the songs I don’t remember, and I’m still discovering more great songs! I can’t believe that there were albums I passed off as too poppy because hearing them now, it’s apparent that most of these songs have great attention to detail and lots of them have little detours in the music that sound very much like a modern prog band. In fact, I am now of the opinion that GARNET CROW sound like an advanced prog band who decided to make albums of 3- to 5-minute songs with incredible melodies and little touches of progginess cropping up here and there to remind listeners that this is not your standard pop act.
Most of GARNET CROW’s 34 singles were used as anime themes or other TV program themes, so many of the singles have that more radio friendly pop/rock feel, keeping in mind that Japanese pop music is still quite diverse and rock bands and guitar players are still admired and respected. But it’s a lot of the album tracks and B-sides that I find most enjoyable to hear.
Special word must go out to vocalist Yuri for her unique vocal style. She basically uses four different singing styles: a low, heavy voice that’s more than a breathy whisper, a medium low voice with good strength behind it, a more usual Japanese female pop voice that’s rather high in tone compared to western singers, and an ethereal, high, possibly falsetto, voice that she easily moves in and out of. More so on the older recordings, Yuri’s vocal tracks were often more than a few. There were usually two lead vocal tracks, vocals for background chorus that were often used more like an instrument, and sometimes these wonderfully high vocal melodies that were reminiscent of a coloratura soprano. (To all coloratura sopranos out there, I do mean reminiscent and not that Yuri actually has that remarkable talent.)
What would any new comer to GARNET CROW think? It really depends what your background is. Listening to some songs, I imagine Rick Beato having a lot of enthusiastic words of praise for the music and instruments. I think Joost Maglev should listen again as I’m sure he has the right experience and background to pick out what makes the music special. Serious fans of prog might raise an eyebrow here and there but will be sure to label this band as a pop, pop/rock band. And fans of rock or hard rock might find moments in some songs that will appeal to them, though I believe the pop music emphasis would deter them from checking out the band further, unless they found that they actually liked the music as I do.
For the curious, here are links to a few songs.
Timeless Sleep from 2002
Rusty Rail from 2006
Kimi no omoi kaita atsumeru Heaven from 2005
Nostalgia from 2013
Hyakunen no Kodoku from 2008
Many of GARNET CROW’s songs were used for the anime Detective Konan.
A couple more favourites.
Eiyu (Hero) from 2011
Maizy from 2013
For a video discussing the band’s discography and career trajectory, please watch the Music Is A Journey video here.
Music is a Journey 