2021 music summary

Hello. My name is deswide. I'm an internet DJ who likes Japanese electronic music and the like, particularly Hardcore genres such as Hardtek, J-Core, Lolicore and others, but also stuff like Jungle, Tekno and Footwork.

In this silly entry I'll share some songs that caught my attention this year, that I used the most on my DJ sets or that I just liked in general. There's no rule to it other than them being released this year. There's no order to this, so I'll just add them as they come to my mind.
Please bear in mind that I might not be the best at words, and that I lack a lot of knowledge regarding music and genres, so the commentary about each song might sound dumb, nonsensical or pretentious, sorry beforehand.
With that out of the way, let's start.

Mothtek - Ugliness (fleeting love)

A quite recent song, flowing mostly on the Psytribe genre, but going into Frenchcore around the middle. The buildup to the Frenchcore drop is anticipating, and the kick of it is nice. To end the song it comes back to Psytribe with an added melody that leaves a good taste to it. A serious song that as soon as it released I wanted to use on a set, which I managed to do.
About the artist, Mothtek, he's definitely one of my favorite Hardtek/Frenchcore producers this year, releasing a couple of songs on compilations, all of them very nice. I'm always looking forward to his music.

Moetek - Semee

Released earlier this year on Moetek's "New Spiral", this song brings a very good Tribecore kick at 200 BPM, infused with sampling of one of my favorite shows lately "Adachi to Shimamura".
The song itself is pretty hard and intense, whenever you think it's gonna end it hits you with harder kicks, turning into a neverending and intense song. The sample during the whole song showcases Adachi talking about Shimamura constantly, with some dialogue between them, plus the intro having Yashiro's breathing through her space suit to start with some nice familiarity.
Could include this track on a mix earlier this year, along with some other Yuri-themed songs.
About Moetek, also one of my favorite artists lately, always bringing very energetic and sample-driven Hardtek, Tribecore and of course, Yuritribe.

pencil - 697

Initially released on Soundcloud with no download and later on breakchild's album "good luck 胡桃 chan", pencil comes with a Tekno/Tribe track that focuses on heavy sampling of "beatmania IIDX" tracks (I have to apologize here, because of my lack of knowledge in the game and its music, I don't know what song it is). The kick is slightly dirty and punchy compared to other Tekno/Tribe tracks I focused on this year, and the constant pumping sound of the sampling make it a refreshing listen. The introduction of a harder kick around 1:50 for a small breakdown in the same section does for a nice serious development for the rest of the song. Overall a very energetic and fun tune that I enjoyed being able to play before it was released on Bandcamp, on a full Tekno set. For this I'm very grateful to pencil.

tropical interface & Supire - Agenda

Supire is one of those artists that excels in all areas and genres he goes through when making music, always bringing new sounds and landscapes with each different song. Aside from being a personal motivation and inspiration for many different reasons, Supire is one of the most talented musicians I've gotten to know these last years.
For this, Agenda, in collaboration with tropical inteface, is the song by him I choose to share here. Despite having followed Supire for a while now, I think the first time I heard the song I was the most speechless I've been in a while, mostly because I just didn't understand what was going on in the song. As I have no idea of the IDM genre in a deep manner, the song stuck me as pure chaos with a sound design I had never heard before. Still an unreleased song, I would nevertheless have no idea how or where to use it on a set, so it's a song I come back to just to appreciate and try to understand better.

Bandersnatch & Lolitatek - Akashic Records

This is easily one of my favorite songs of the year, and "Friendly Fire Vol. 1" is definitely my favorite release of the year 2021. This was decided as soon as I could hear all the songs in the album, each of them leaving me with a completely different impression of each other. The flow of it is simply magic and beautiful, the whole sensation of the album is one of a short but serious journey with a clear end. Sadly I love the entire album too much, making it hard to choose a favorite, but Akashic Records is definitely out there on the top for me.
The song sets the mood pretty early on it, with a quiet intro that goes quickly into the bass characteristic of Tekno and Tribe songs. It constantly develops in its own sampling, always building up to something else, and slowly adding new elements, particularly the breaks that start around 1:40 before of what I would consider the main part of the song. Around 2:15, harder, dirtier kicks are heard, reminding me of Mental tracks, once again making its way to a bigger, more impressive part of the song. I think this is the moment where you know something else is coming, something else WILL happen on the song. 3:10 is where I knew this song was something out of this world, as simple as a BPM switch can be, all the reasons listed before, the perfect buildup and atmosphere, makes the song hit as hard as it can. We slow down back to the range of 160 BPM, with a dirtier kick, and introducing more beautiful and calming sampling, ending with a small section of Drum'n'Bass, that makes me only want more and more, wishing for the song to be longer.
I cannot express how much I love this album, and as I mentioned a while back when it released, it made me sure that 無責任レコーズ, with a series of releases under their arm, is one of the most important labels in the current Japanese scene.

zot!k - DOG GOD

A fairly recent song by zot!k, released on 無責任レコーズ's "Sampling Feast Fair", that brings fairly familiar and both modern and old sounds in one track. The track starts as your usual Hardtek/J-Tek track, introducing with not fear the punchy constant bass, developing on the cut-and-repeat sampling of voices of anime characters, to follow with quotes and the like. The song starts quickly gaining energy, to peak, at first, at 2:00, with a rave-ish buildup that goes into a softer kick, but supported with a great deal of amen and breaks, that rapidly develops into Gabber dirty kicks and Frenchcore ones. The song then goes into a sweet break, a moment of peace after the chaotic sounds that surely made you dance, to start slowly get you into a different place, a sweet, emotional melody shyly appears, with beautiful vocals, and a synth that flies you to heaven. Surely this is a song to listen to in a live environment, on an euphoric moment, where you know a set will change from strong Hardtek to emotional, beautiful J-Core. Despite not having watched the sample source, Dog Days, I can say I was moved the first time I listened to the song, and made me appreciate it immensely. This is definitely one of the beauties of JAYCORE, where even not being sure of the source of the sampling or melodies, you can be moved like no other time, to dance and feel happy about such good songs.

Laser Imouto - ILLYAHOLIC

Even though it's already 2021 (and almost 2022), I still think LASER IMOUTO's return to J-CORE is one of the best things to happen to the genre and scene. All of his releases so far have been amazing, and him just being here is a huge game changer for the Western side of the genre.
About the song, it has a nice sound that has you at the edge of your seat, constantly introducing the sample of anison, but cutting it in the middle to hit you with cute Illya's voices and some very nice and surprising kicks in the middle of the song, which took me by complete surprise the first time I heard the song. The ability of this song to maintain you interested and entertained into waiting for the entirety of the anime song sampling until the end, while pumping the bass and melody, is really good, making it a really well done and fun song to listen and dance to.

Null Specification - Kimi no Tonari de

Yes. More "Adachi to Shimamura" sampling.
To everyone's surprise (or at least mine), Null Specification appeared out of nowhere with what I would consider the best JAYCORE track of 2021. Yes, this was their very first song on Soundcloud that I caught a glimpse of, and it has been replayed over and over again on different sets and events. It is without any doubt an amazing and very emotional song.
The song presents a series of samples of, once again, "Adachi to Shimamura", showing both character in different messy dialogue and cute reaction sounds, while slowly introducing the ending theme of the anime with a slight and subtle acid bassline, until the intro to the ending starts, mixed once again with Adachi's voice sampling. The ending comes up in full force with a simple but great backing melody. The first chorus comes into play with a small break before it, and with the backing melody sounding more as a main part of it when it comes into play. Until here the song is already amazing, but definitely the most impeccable and beautiful part of it is the buildup to the second chorus, with precise selected sampling with Adachi's "I WON'T RUN!", forming a perfect climax for the second main part of the song. The tune ends in a peaceful manner, once again bringing the subtle acid bassline, and going into nothingness again.
I can't say enough how emotionally impactful this song is whenever I hear it in set, seriously an amazing song.

Lazh & Emmy - Kaleidostick

Some more "Prisma Illya" sampling with Lazhward's collaboration with his own J-Tribe/J-Tek alias, Emmy, who also made an amazing appearance earlier this year on "Friendly Fire Vol. 1".
This time they both present a pretty straight-forward Tribecore track, which progresses through itself with great sampling work and kicks, adding, at the start, the characteristic fun sounds of a more "happy" sound of Tribecore, which I mainly hear on Komperes Records works (excuse the ignorance on more Tribecore). Around 2:35 the sound takes a small turn with a cheeky sped up (which I suspect is a very common part of Lazhward's music) to go into a more stoic pacing on the song, hardening the kick and adding some breaks here and there. Here it is, though, the big change of the song, introducing through this Tribal buildup, the main sampling of the song, with a theme from Illya's show, accompanied this time with more J-Tek styled bass, compared to the Tribe side in the first half of the song. After the first chorus and a guitar solo, the final attack of the song is accompanied with great synths melodies that reminds of spy47's tracks, closing the song on a marvelous manner.
Personally, like with zot!k - DOG GOD, this change in genre and atmosphere throughout the song is extremely well done, going from a more serious rave-like tone to an euphoric one.

Hayakore Tatsumi - Thousandth Sky (END of SUMMER Mix)

Yet another excellent J-CORE track from this year, this time by already well-known artist on the scene Hayakore Tatsumi, one of the many aliases of J-CORE veteran TamolarM. In this alias, he produces fast-paced tracks over 190 BPM, inspired by the old school sounds of 00's J-CORE, which definitely shows in both his sampling choices and sound in the songs.
This time he presents an alternative version of his song "Thousandth Sky", an excellent song sampling the already known by everyone "Tori no Uta", opening song of the visual novel "Air". This song is very straight forward in a duality of high energy presented by the instrumental by Hayakore and the original song sung by Lia, with a constant pace that leaves nothing but amazing feels of nostalgia. The main difference of the first version and "END of SUMMER Mix" is the lack of a heavier kick on the latter, making it a little easier on the ears and the mixing, while also, in my personal opinion, bringing more out of the amazing melodies presented on the song.
This is definitely one of the J-CORE anthems of 2021.

適当猫 - Feeling of Nostalgia

Up and coming Japanese artist 適当猫 presents his first album released on the very known Lost Frog Productions label, with different flavors of hard otaku music infused with Precure sampling, such as Hardtek, Lolicore, Breakcore and Footcore. This latter genre is the one of the present song, and as the title suggests, it's a slightly dark song that starts with a common Footwork/Juke opening along with the sample, building momentum to drop in the breaks very early in the song, with amazing amen and sample chopping, developing itself as the sample progresses and becomes more majestic. As expected, some distorted kicks come into the song too to follow the non-stopping amen breaks that only get heavier and heavier until the end of the song, that ends while coming back to the calmer start, and finishing with calm after the chaotic trip that it takes you on.

Aki - NIGHT RUNNING (Set Me Free Remix)

2021, in my opinion, was definitely one of the best years for Aki's music in both the Funkot and J-CORE areas, but his recent J-CORE songs have left a huge impression on me, and not knowing him and his music well before this makes me think he's definitely one of the best producers lately, with huge potential for the years to come, making me thing he will leave a big impact musically.
In this case, Aki presents a remix of popular "Brand New Animal's" ending song "NIGHT RUNNING", in a very stoic and calm J-CORE manner, following very well the flow and vibe of the original song. The lack of heavy melodies and synths on the first part of the song before the chorus builds up a great tension and atmosphere, to drop into the first break with some rave pianos and a completely unexpected reference to Alice Deejay's anthem "Better Off Alone" melody, that sent me into heaven and completely surprised me the first time I listened to the track. With this amazing buildup the drop comes on with part of the chorus, into amazing synth melodies and back into the chorus, keeping an intense and energetic passion. The song seriously never stops developing and bringing new elements, now going into a powerful 303 bassline, to bring the vocals back while keeping the acid going and going. The song goes into a break once again, with the subtle vocals preparing you for something even more unexpected when the song tranforms into a completely different vibe with some Synthwave action. I want to say this is the highlight of the song, but the whole song itself is an amazing work.

ELECTR - Suction

ELECTR's debut album came big with his lovely style of Lolicore, presenting this song with cracked and noisy amen style, with a base song that some of us have heard infinite times due to its popularity among Virtual Youtubers.
There's not much to say about this song aside from the heaviness of its chorus with insane distorted breaks, going into small rests with some D'n'B sections, but going back to crazy breaks again and again. A very fun song overall.

MAID TWIST - Don't Judge Da Master

MAID TWIST comes back with his amazing Breakbeat/Jungle Rave style with a track released on newest "Sampling Fair Feast" compilation, with a powerful track of fast-paced and bass-heavy Jungle track, or "Power Beats" as named on the Soundcloud tag. The melody of the sampling (unknown to me, sadly), comes at the start and the middle of the song, leaving a space in the middle for the fast paced breaks and a snippet here and there of the samples. Just as one of his old tracks "TWISTER 140", "Don't Judge Da Master" presents a highlight on its sudden change of BPM peace, doing an inverse move compared to the older song, going from high BPM to a slower, Bassline-styled part of the track, with some cheeky hardbass donks near the end of this section, to go back slowly, increasing the pitch of the sample, to the high beat per minute action. Certainly a track that leaves a big impression, and would be amazing to hear on a club environment.

merumeru - kunekune bassline

merumeru brings a brand new style different from his usual with this track, generally releasing Hardtek/J-Tek sounds and the like, this time being a Bassline song (as the title suggests). Well, that's what the title says, but in reality the song has a bunch of other stuff in it, specifically during the intro and the outro. The songs starts in a pretty dark manner, with deep beats and some breaks here and there, with downer sampling of "Urasekai Picninc" and slowly introducing the melody and vocals of its ending theme. Getting closer to the chorus we get into the actual song, with heavy bassline action and pumping energy, making its own way into keeping that same dark-ish ambience, with some glitchy sounds along with samples. Near the end of the main dish of the song it takes a small break with, this time, cutesy dialogue between two characters, and unexpectedly dropping into a faster BPM to close the song in merumeru's usual and already well known style. Overall a very fun song that I want to see played on those kind of genre-switch sets.

96-glass - Get Your Money Up (and Take A Daily Dose Of Polcore)

Approaching the end I want to share possibly my favorite "chaotic" song this year with 96-glass' Polcore track released on Splitterkor Rekords, sampling also another of my favorite songs this year "Itadaki Babel" from multimedia franchise "Denonbu". The track is a chaotic rampage of Speedcore and Breakcore, with silly Polish pornographic and dirty samples, screams, farts and innumerable men screaming KURWA. One of the highlights of this track for me is the constant jump between the groove of the original song and the comedic chaos that Polcore tracks always bring, and specially the use of blastbeating chopped amens instead of kicks in some speedcore sections, making for an absolutely euphoric and mosh-pit worthy track.

LOLISTYLE GABBERS - T.Y.W.

I don't want to say that adding this song is kind of cheating, but it kind of is. Originally a track released back in 2012, T.Y.W. was remastered to be released on LOLISTYLE GABBERS' best of album "10 YEARS OF LSG", ending the album the album the same way they ended multiple of their amazing sets on URL and Twitch parties/events this year.
T.Y.W. remixes the Livetune's classic Vocaloid song "Tell Your World", turning it into an oldschool, fast-paced J-CORE track, adding synth melodies and effects into it, in an LSG style that everyone is probably already familiar with. More than just the great track itself, it marks a turning point for LSG's decade anniversary into being one of the biggest and most influential names in J-CORE and JAYCORE, inspiring and motivating lots of artists, DJs and fans across the whole globe. Definitely another anthem this year.

aphextwinsucks - hidamari sketch is the best anime ever (bonus track)

[LF164MP3] aphextwinsucks - lights, camera, amen! : aphextwinsucks : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

The title says it all. This is a bonus track on aphextwinsucks' debut album, included exclusively on the cassette version of it released as a collaboration by MAD BREAKS and Lost Frog Productions, and of course, remixes one of the endings by Marble of (the best anime ever) "Hidamari Sketch". The track is very simple in itself, adding breakbeats onto the original track, but in a way that it pays perfect rendition to it, bringing out the feeling of warmness that constantly surrounds Hidamari Sketch. The chopping and arrangement of the breaks is very precise to the original track, and brings out full potential of it.
I hope you bought the cassette to listen to this track because it's a really good one.

Tektheist - Ark

Personally I think this is the perfect track to not just end with this list of songs, but also ending just about any set that sets a serious but also emotional mood/ambience that also deals into Hardtek/Frenchcore sounds.
The track starts with a piano intro that sets the room immediately for what the song is going to be,  quickly introducing the -tek bassy kicks with beautiful sample guitars along the way. The song goes into constant breaks, making them the "check points" for the next phase of the song,  always adding new elements, like distorted kicks after the firs one. Soon after the second break the song adds quick subtle breakbeats, growing and growing in tension and from time to time teasing with excellent one-shot big, distorted kicks. With one last piano break, the song prepares itself to throw you into its main attraction, dealing filtered kicks until the true actions drops. Not only this part is mainly Frenchcore, it also adds very well blended amen and the kicks only grow distortion-wise, constantly interrupting with a dirtier one until the energy starts to decay to take you into the outro. I did say the climax of the song was its main attraction, but in reality this IDM-ish outro is the reason why I think this is a perfect song to end a set, continuing with the piano and, once again, teasing with distorted kicks,  but also keeping a very serious, stoic and beautiful tone.
This is definitely one of the songs I loved the most this year, as it's very unique in its atmosphere and development, and because of the work Tektheist put on it and on the compilation it was released on.

Closing words

Well, here we are at the end. This closes my list of memorable songs released on 2021. Of course I think there are many missing, and because I only got this idea from Irresponsibly Records' advent calendar, I started writing it really late, so most of the songs fresh in my memory are songs from the later half of the year. Hopefully next year I will start saving songs and the like as soon as 2022 starts.
This list is not only a resume of songs I loved this year, but also of songs that could accompanied me during this journey that was one of my most active years in my life, constantly listening and thinking about music, making mixes, talking with friends, getting to know people and even reaching goals and doing things that I would have never imagined I would be able to do, thanks to artists and friends that surround me. In a way, this is a "thank you" letter to music and musicians that I love.

I sincerely hope we can meet and work together again this 2022.
Thank you.
deswide