KU-TYU-BUNKAI feat. Antenna Girl – Lumina Star July 29, 2014

Track Listing

1. Antenna Girl
2. Pittanko
3. Lumina Star
4. STEP BY STEP
5. HIGH TOUCH ME
6. Girigiri Music
7. WARP
8. MUSIC MONSTER
9. YATTA!!
10. Strobe
11. Antenna Girl (Hachioji-P remix)

1. Antenna Girl

So the album opens up with the promotional song for this release.  I know looking at the title of the album this was a collaborative album (though I kind of expected to see POCO singing) but he’s the arranger.  Which means we’re left with Antenna Girl who I don’t know who she really is besides this moniker.  Anyways to the song, if you like POCO’s last mini-album the sound of it will easily make you feel right at home.  Also he”s been dabbling a bit in the VOCALOID world so it explains the cutesy technopop as well.  AG’s vocals are under auto-tune/vocoder so it’s a another thing that could pull or push people away.  It’s a pretty catchy technopop track for sure and the arrangement is great!

2. Pittanko

Our next track has a little more of a futuristic tone to it and I quite enjoy the sound of the song.  AG comes in and kind of goes like ~beep beep beep beep~.  That was a little long-winded.  At least she comes in and sings and her voice is pretty computerized sounding but I think it works with POCO’s arrangement.  It’s still another good arrangement but the vocals aren’t totally the most exciting.

3. Lumina Star

We move into the title track and Lumina Star and this one is a little more electro than the previous track which is pretty cool since we get to hear more of POCO’s skills and it sounds really strong.  Antenna Girl’s voice is still kind of monotone through this song and her voice has a slight nasal feel (like MEG).  It’s a nice track though and I think it’s one of the better songs despite the vocals not being the most memorable.

4. STEP BY STEP

So the next two tracks were actually digital single released by KU-TYU, but this was when POCO was dabbling in the VOCALOID side of music so those songs were sung by none other than Miku Hatsune.  On the album, the vocals were switched to Antenna Girl which brings a little more life at least.  You can tell it was meant for the VOCALOIDs because this song is pretty technopop and as much natural sound AG brings, she’s still heavily under auto-tune and such.  I am starting to feel like the songs are kind of meshing into one another so I’m starting to zone a bit here.

5. HIGH TOUCH ME

The other digital release to me has a more stronger presence through POCO’s arrangement so the deeper synths seem more interesting and electro.  Of course AG’s vocals remain the same as they did in “STEP BY STEP” so it’s not much of an upgrade.  It’s really more of the same to be honest, so this song kind of just flies by.

6. Girigiri Music

At least it seems like the album is moving in a different direction finally.  I mean it’s still pretty much glossy electronic music, but it seems that POCO has a more grittier sound for this song and honestly, I found it pretty catchy and almost something he carried over from “COCOLO COLOR” for sure.  To be honest, I wished this was a song sung only by him rather than having AG taking over.  Still I do pretty much enjoy this song and is one of the best here.

7. WARP

Seems we’re getting cool songs now, WARP is definitely a club track and has a rather quick arrangement but has a lot of interesting tricks behind it.  I really love the darker chords from this one and AG sounds pretty good in this song even though she doesn’t have as many lines as she should.  Unfortunately there’s a POCO version of this song on his main site and it’s loads better than this…but regardless a good song on the album.

8. MUSIC MONSTER

I wonder why we’re getting these cooler songs now…MUSIC MONSTER is more of the same from the previous two tracks which is pretty cool and funny enough I can totally hear AG under a lot of what made me like KU-TYU a lot!  It’s a good bopper for sure and there’s some good moments found here.

9. YATTA!!

So I wasn’t expecting for AG to open the track having a spell cheer to open the song.  It’s definitely a poppy song here and Antenna Girl sounds quite bubbly and full of happiness.  It’s an interesting song and manages to stick out from the album by having such a bright and cute atmosphere.  Though AG can be too cute for me here sadly.

10. Strobe

So we return to the glossy technopop for Strobe which is technically the last song here.  It’s a pretty straightforward electropop song which doesn’t do much for me and once again I feel like AG is too monotone here.  There really isn’t much said about this song because it just melts into the album a bit too much.

11. Antenna Girl (Hachioji-P remix)

So the album actually closes off with a remix of the leading track!  I’ve definitely heard of the remixer before so I was wondering what he’d do with this song.  I was kind of hoping it was redone to make it more different from the original.  I mean the flurry of synths is nice, but like “Strobe” it melts in the album a bit too much for me to make much of an impression.

Tracks Recommended

• Girigiri Music
• Antenna Girl
• MUSIC MONSTER

Song of Avoidance

• Strobe

Wow, I didn’t realize KU-TYU-BUNKAI (using kanji now, so it might be Kuchuu Bunkai now) released an album in 2012!  Though I wasn’t expecting this.  I know he tampered in the VOCALOID era for sure, but I kind of didn’t see this Antenna Girl to be his kind of gal singer (reminds me of supercell).  Lumina Star was an OK album, you can tell that POCO worked on this from the arrangements, but half the time, I wanted to hear him more than her.  She just doesn’t sound enthusiastic here and some of the arrangements sounded like one another.  This would be the last time we see of POCO until 2014 when returns with a new single which I’ll review when it comes out ^_^