Some thoughts on “BLUE WIND”, the new mini-album from The Grateful a MogAAAz.
Release Date: February 15th 2022
Serial Number: QACW-1055
Format: CD/Digital
Tracklist
1. Intelligence mixer
2. Night Tripper ・ Yeah!!
3. BLUE WIND
4. ROCK ME ALONE
5. Kimi to ōtobai
6. TEENAGE LOST
Buy: HMV (JP), Tower Records (JP), Disk Union (JP), Amazon (JP), CDJapan (EN)
Stream: All the usual places
The number of groups that I follow closely these days seems to be getting smaller and smaller, for various reasons such as older ones breaking up, newer acts not really catching my ear as well and what have you. That does however mean that I have a lot more time for other things, as well as to focus more of my attention onto the groups that I actually am still very much into. My heyday (and arguably the scene’s too) might have been and gone but I think becoming a bit more focused is actually a good thing if I’m honest.
That is, assuming the groups that you like are regularly putting out new music/content/etc. Well, while The Grateful a MogAAAz are certainly no slouches when it comes to putting out various forms of content, I would say that the musical release department has been a bit light as far as this very impatient fan is concerned. Of course a bunch of live video is great and I would even argue that their music translates much better in such a space, but man have I been wanting something that’s just that little bit easier to throw into a playlist ya know?
Well my wait is over with the release of “BLUE WIND”, the new mini-album from The Grateful a MogAAAz which features pretty much every song of theirs that I had hoped it would so we’re already off to a great start there. There’s a couple that I was a bit less familiar with too though so that was going to hopefully offer up a new twist or two even if I already had a rough idea of what I was getting myself into here. If you haven’t checked out MogAAAz before now then read on and let’s see if I can convince you to give them a try.
Much like with many releases from GPR groups, “BLUE WIND” and the tracks that comprise it feature a pretty healthy dose of nostalgia in how they sound. Think Garage Rock from the 80s, mixed with a bit of Rockabilly and of course the more Pop-leaning Idol influences to give the tracks even more of a catchy element, as if the instrumentals weren’t already doing that in pretty much every instance here anyway. You’ve got your more somber, emotionally raw songs like “ROCK ME ALONE” and “TEENAGE LOST” juxtaposed against the more fun, energetic sounding “Night Tripper ・ Yeah!!” and “Intelligence mixer” so definitely a lot of variety in tone and personality on this one.
For me personally I was most looking forward to finally getting tracks like “Kimi to ōtobai” and “Night Tripper ・ Yeah!!”, reimaginings of classic tracks by PUFFY and Bo Gumbos respectively, on CD after a long impatient wait but “ROCK ME ALONE” and title track “BLUE WIND” really ended up vying for a lot of my attention too which was great. Honestly there wasn’t a single track here that I didn’t play repeatedly for days on end when this CD came out and for me that’s usually the mark of some pretty great music if I literally can’t bring myself to turn it off because I’m enjoying it so much.
The Grateful a MogAAAz perhaps don’t get quite as much attention as say Melon Batake a go go do and both groups do draw from a similar pool of influences given the shared management and production aspect. That being said they do both have their own unique styles to them and while MogAAAz aren’t putting out new music quite as often when they do it’s pretty much always great, catchy Rock numbers and I can certainly get behind more of that being a thing in this EDM and Screamo dominated scene that we find ourselves in currently.
Obviously Melon Batake are the main bread winners for GPR currently but MogAAAz are on that slow build up to having more opportunities and such and of course sharing several members with Melon Batake probably presents its own challenges too, but a lot of hard work and dedication on the part of everyone involved does go a long way and if things keep going the way that they have been so far I would expect that we’ll be hearing a lot more of The Grateful a MogAAAz in the hopefully not too distant future here.
