REVIEWS

Ballads 1 by Joji

My first review!!!! Woohoo!!!!!
I would say this is a very worthy album and artist to start this book with!!

Joji(George Miller), previously Filthy Frank, Pink Guy, etc, is a hip-hop artist from Osaka, Japan. He retired his YouTube characters over a year ago to pursue and set his full attention onto his professional music career. Joji's music would be primarily characterized as Lofi hip-hop, and he certainly stuck with that for much of this new album.

This album was a huge improvement from his first studio album, In Tongues. Now, In Tongues was not bad, but it did come across as lackluster at parts and didn't really achieve what it very well could have. This was changed with Ballads 1! Ballads has much more substance to it, and that includes the number of tracks on it.

Joji stuck with the sad boy vibe, and he pulled it off well. Many, if not most, of these songs dealt with love, the search for love, and heartbreak. Coupling this with the lofi vibe itself created a very sad tone, which he was almost undoubtedly going for.

Speaking of the lofi aspect, it was pulled together so much better on this album. The production quality was higher, but not too high, which is good because a defining factor of lofi is flawed production. These more mellowed out tracks were coupled with some more upbeat, high energy tracks, which were pulled off fantastically, especially Slow Dancing In the Dark.

The song Why Am I Still In LA is semi-lackluster in the beginning, but the distorted guitar that comes in midway through is very badass, for lack of a better word, and fun to hear!!!! I'd say it's definitely one of my favourite parts of the album, but that's just my pop punk influences inclining me towards it.

Slow Dancing In the Dark is objectively the most powerful track of the entire album. Joji delivers some absolutely fantastic vocals with true raw emotion!

I enjoy Can't Get Over You much more now than when I first heard it, and I can respect it now as just a nice little lofi song, not meant to be extremely intricate as a track.

Yeah Right is classic by now, I love it, and I'm really glad that he included it in the album. The sort of lazy tone matches what it is meant to be, even just from reading the name of the song, and it is also another relaxing, catchy tune to listen to.

The ending track, I'll See You In 40, is BEAUTIFUL!!! It's this sweet part-ukelele-driven piece with flutes that sounds like some sort of traditional Japanese music at the beginning, and it's overall such a nice tune to listen to. The ukelele at the end fades out extremely pleasantly, and it's probably one of the best possible ways that Joji could have ended the album.

I would say that I give this album, overall, a seven out of ten!

Favourite tracks: Attention, Slow Dancing In the Dark, Test Drive, Wanted U, Yeah Right, Why Am I Still In LA, I'll See You In 40

Least favourite: No Fun

That's all for now!!! I would GREATLY appreciate feedback and to hear your thoughts on my review, the album, and all the different songs!!!!

I'm new to this of course, and I'm really hoping that I did a decent job at least!!! Criticism is GREATLY appreciated as well!!!!!

Until next time,
Chief