In Focus?

This is what the list should all be about. I've never heard a Japanese interpretation of dream pop and it was great. My personal rating: 4/5 My rating relative to the list: 4/5 Should this have been included on the original list? Yes.

In Focus is the sixth album of Shugo Tokumaru. He creates chamber pop of an eclectic kind. He played also every instrument (and there are a lot) on the album and produced it himself. On several songs the results in every bit of space filled by a sound. It gets messy and I lose focus. Maybe that explains the title. Other songs allow some space and then it works and songs like "Ord Gate" are fantastic. In the end there is a lot of hit and miss on an album that could have been great.

I thought I was going to dislike this because I thought it was going to be jazz, but it was really quite jolly. I’d rather be surprised it isn’t jazz than ambushed by a stealth jazz.

Quirky, unique and interesting listen.

This was fun! And amazing that this is mostly a 1 person work.

Rating: 7/10 Best songs: Circle, Gamma

This was a lovely surprise. It started a little bit folky and I thought this might be a little bit bland but then it went into all sorts of exciting polyrhythms and electronic influences and for at least the first 2/3 of the album, you never knew what to expect next. It was a little bit like Cornelius. You could probably feel the same Beach Boys influences and the excitement of experimentation that you get from an album like Fantasma or Point, but it had its own very gentle funkiness that isn't in his albums which actually added to the experience and made it not derivative. An unexpected gem of an album in this process and one that I'll definitely be coming back to.

I’ve never heard of Shugo Tokumaru before, but this album cover looks pretty cool. Even with reading some of the reviews for this album, I’m not entirely sure what to expect, but I’m always down to branch out and listen to something different. I thought this album was fine. The overall sound was really interesting, and I liked how well the album conveyed joy, even though I didn’t understand a single word of the lyrics. The arrangements were really beautiful, and even though I got a pretty good gist of the album from the first track, I never really knew what was coming next. The song structures were really interesting too, creating plenty of surprises within the songs themselves. At times though, there were elements to the music that I found grating or annoying. Sometimes, the songs would go from joy to some sort of drugged out whimsy that was really unpleasant to listen to. Overall though, this album was interesting, and I enjoyed listening to an album from a non-English speaking country.

This was good overall, but there were a few tracks in there that seemed like a bad fit for the album. Would have been a strong 4 or a weak 5 it had been cut down a bit.

I don't know what to think of this album. I doubt Shugo Tokumaru had a clear vision because In Focus? was so scrambled. I think the most common throughline is this Beatles/Monkees mid-sixties sound, which is generally enjoyable. But then I hear electronic or Celtic sounds or god knows what else. I don't think my opinion would increase if I understood Japanese. I guess In Focus? kept me interested, which isn't nothing!

Eclectic, if nothing else

Feels like a long lost Japanes video game. Thank you for sharing this one 4

This is nice, very light and breezy. 4 stars.

Best Song: Katachi. This had an explosive, immersive sound that wasn't as strongly present in the rest of the album. Worst Song: Tightrope. My hatred of ballads transcends language and genre. Overall: Fun and creative. I'm glad that this was submitted as an album, even if it wasn't my favourite. This overall tone was a bit too light for me, but the brightness managed to be infectious enough to win me over more often than not. One album for which I really wish I could give a rating of 3.5 stars.

This one has been in my collection for 10 years. Are you Josh, by the way?? Original review: Tokumaru Shugo is like an overjoyed kindergarten teacher, except instead of a kindergarten, it's his studio. And we're all his students. Some of us will learn great things from this music, and others who already know the joy of life will just take this time to dance and play.

Whimsical, yet displaying enormous talent. Fantastic production. I have no clue what he's singing about, given I know practically zero Japanese, but his voice is nice enough to be an instrument in the mix, so I legit don't care. This is exactly the sort of thing that needs to be in the list.

Chillin like a villain

Made me smile, playful, silly in places but with some interesting tangents

I liked this a lot. Eclectic and clearly heartfelt despite the language barrier. While a lot of influences are on display it is a unique sound.