Plum - Realms of the Unreal CD

Urban Sleep (2014)

The singer from Plum sent me this CD.  I had met him in Tokyp while he was playing with the new band he's in, 2 Sick Worry.  He gave me the Plum full length album at the show I saw 2 Sick Worry play and I reviewed that a few months ago.  He followed that up by sending me this CD version of Realms of the Unreal that was only released in Chile.  It has all four songs that are also on a cassette of the same name, but also includes a pile of extra tracks.

We start out a little scary with "Sickage," a song that's essentially a lot of angry screaming, which as you may know by now, really isn't my thing.  Luckily the album takes an immediate turn into the sort of high energy and catchy pop that I was hoping to hear.  Because of the vocals, I tend to compare Plum to fellow Japanese band Navel a bit, but there's something about Plum that sets them part.  I think it's a sweetness in the songs that just draws you in to the hooks and jangly guitar work.

Aside from "Sickage," every song on this release is a bouncy pop gem.  If you like fast, catchy, 90's style pop punk with high pitched vocals and tons of energy, it's definitely worth trying to track down.  I know that I'm really happy to be able to have this CD in my collection.  2 Sick Worry is starting to work on getting some music out into the world and I'm really excited to hear more from them.

Plum - Realms of the Unreal (There's only 1 song up on Bandcamp, but it's a good one):

https://plumlife.bandcamp.com/album/realms-of-the-unreal

Plum - Secret Night Charm CD

Spring Leaf (2014)

One of the best nights I've ever had in my life was at the Waterslide/PopKid show at a club called What's Up in Uguisudani.  I met many wonderful people and saw four very excellent bands play.  One of the bands was called 2 Sick Worry.  They were quite great, but they don't have any records out yet.  However the singer from 2 Sick Worry gave me this Plum CD as it was the band he had been in previously.  No surprise, this is great too.

Immediately I'm drawn to make comparisons to Navel because of the excellent, high pitch vocals.  Nice and melodic, in the liner notes they are listed as 'chirps' and I can see where that would come in as a description.  Musically, they stray away from Navel's more traditional pop punk sound and have more in common with bands like The Scaries or Delay.  Jangly, treble heavy guitars belting out big hooks.

When I was in Tokyo I really felt like I was interacting with the music scene that I should have been in all along.  Even though I've been listening to a lot of Japanese bands over the past twenty years or so, there was another new one every time I turned around.  I didn't see Plum play and I didn't see this record at any of the record stores I went to, but out of the kindness of someone's heart it was given to me, just because it was thought that I might like it.  That's the kind of scene I want to be part of.  Secret Night Charm is a killer record and I can't wait to hear from 2 Sick Worry.  As good as Plum were, 2 Sick Worry was even better when I saw them play.

Plum - Secret Night Charm (only three of the CDs thirteen songs are up on Bandcamp):

https://plumlife.bandcamp.com/album/secret-night-charm