Ongaku Cafe (The 2000s): YMCK – Family Genesis (January 2008)

YMCK’s goal is to make 8bit music popular and the use of combining the music with beautiful vocals is unique and fun. I happen to find chiptune and most importantly YMCK’s music rather enjoyable. But again, it all comes down to your preference.

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GROUP: YMCK

ALBUM: FAMILY GENESIS

LABEL: avex trax

CATALOG #: AVCD-23459

DURATION: 48:49

RELEASED ON January 16, 2008

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1. Prologue
2. 錆びた扉の第8天国
3. プレアデス
4. Starlight
5. 何方(いずかた)の笛
6. Carving the Rock
7. Future Emotion
8. Rain
9. System Reboot
10. Floor 99
11. Major Swing
12. 8番目の虹
13. 時代遅れの空
14. Final ~Welcome to the 8bit world~

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The following was reviewed back in January 2008

8-bit music. Chiptune.

I guess the best way to describe 8-bit music or chiptune as video game music. Or music that you probably remember from the old school days of your Nintendo Entertainment System or Sega Master System.

My first taste of chiptune music is through a friend’s event in New York City where musicians would take their modified gameboys and play music through them.

Nevertheless, I was interested to learning more about chiptunes and have heard a few artists from Japan take on 8bit music.

In Japan, there is a chiptune trio that has been amazing fans of the genre through their performances Internationally and that is the group YMCK. (literally the same thing as cyan, yellow, magenta and black but in this case, yellow being first).

YMCK features Yokemura Takeshi (music, lyrics and arrangement), Kurihara Midori (vocals and music) and Nakamura Tomoyuki (movie/onscreen music video presentations and music).

The group has performed at a number of international music festivals around the world. Sweden, Netherlands, New York, Thailand, Korea and Taiwan, and the group also has distribution in the United States, Thailand, and South Korea.

The music is clearly 8bit, no use of any instruments but musical software or hardware that utilize 8bit chips. But what makes them different from other chiptune performers is the addition of the vocalist Kurihara Midori, giving it almost a shibuya-kei feel of their music sans the chanson and actually instruments and replaced with chiptune.

There are often special effects used for the vocals but what you hear from CYMK, is what I pretty much expect to hear live.

Their third album “FAMILY GENESIS” is actually a pretty cool album and truthfully, very difficult for me to review each track. There are no dark tracks, most of the music is happy and fun. Also, the majority of them are fast songs that feature a good blend of chiptune utilizing Kurihara’s angelic vocals.

But for me and having seen some of their live performances online, it was not difficult for me to envision how these songs would play out live. Because their music goes along seamlessly with video (used in the background) and for the events that the group has performed at, it just makes the whole performance enjoyable, especially for the old school video game fans.

The group is lively, fun and they managed to capture the balance between vocals and chiptune very well. Trust me, I’ve heard many try to balance the two and often, just doesn’t work for me. In the case of YMCK and their music, it works out fine.

There are a total of 14 tracks with some tracks on the average of 4 minutes to some tracks under a minute long. But it all comes down to the person’s acceptance of chiptune. You either love it or hate it.

The CD insert features pixel art reminiscent of the 8bit NES days and the lyrics for each track.

I can tell you that back in the NES days, there was always a fascination with certain tunes such as the music for Super Mario, Zelda, River City Ransom, etc. Just like any music, 8bit music at the time had a way of bringing emotion and a lot of us grew up during that time and humming the music.

Not long ago, my friends would play the same music via electric guitar and bass, while I would use online software to do my own remixes of 8bit video game favorites. So, I guess for some of us who find the music nostalgic, I guess the memories of playing those games will always be dear to our hearts.

YMCK’s goal is to make 8bit music popular and the use of combining the music with beautiful vocals is unique and fun. I happen to find chiptune and most importantly YMCK’s music rather enjoyable. But again, it all comes down to your preference.

But if you have an interest in the music, I highly recommend you to check out YMCK’s music. You might get hooked!

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