Well, here\u2019s a band I know pretty much nothing about! Based on the PR materials I was sent (six lines on a handwritten index card!), and whatever I could glean from their Bandcamp page, GUJI hail from Shanghai, China, and, in addition to the Chinese nationals in the group (Klaire (synth\/vocals), Alex (bass), and Stacy (drum machine)), the quartet also includes Chachy (aka Craig Englund), an American ex-pat who sings and plays guitar for Shangahi punk rockers Round Eye. And if you take the above instruments and try to imagine what some synth-punks far away from the epicenters of said genre in both space and time might do with them, you\u2019d\u2026maybe get pretty close to this weird reality!<\/p>\n
Which is not to say that GUJI is predictable, but that this is somewhat cracked, Devo-esque, synth-heavy, new(ish) wave pop. Since I\u2019ve been in a bit of a Devo mood lately (they were apparently the Nostradamus\u2019s of rock and roll), I\u2019ve been enjoying this oddball, lo-fi, cassette-only release.<\/p>\n
The cassette contains five songs that were recorded in 2022, during Shanghai\u2019s two-month summer lockdown. Knowing the backdrop for these tunes will certainly provide counterpoint to the ostensibly sunny, fun, \u201880s feel beneath which lurks a somewhat unsettling vibe that is hard to quantify. Then again, the label that put this out is called Godless America, so maybe I could quantify it if I worked at it.<\/p>\n
In any case, \u201cJudgement Day\u201d is a great new wave pop song that wouldn\u2019t be out of place at an early B-52\u2019s practice. I can\u2019t make out many of the lyrics\u2014and, yes, they sing in English\u2014but I get the feeling this judgement day isn\u2019t an entirely happy affair. There\u2019s maybe a touch of Blondie here, too, although with Clem Burke replaced by R2D2 on drums. <\/p>\n
\u201cI Like to Hang Out in China\u201d is the song most reminiscent of Devo, the title being repeated numerous times throughout the song as electronics burble and bleep. It seems to be an ode to both social control and intentional inscrutability. But I\u2019m really just guessing.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a little Kraftwerk in \u201cMy Mao Suit\u2019s\u201d motorik, and its martial rhythm fits this sarcastic take on the joys of having few choices. Klaire\u2019s deadpan vocals convey something that I imagine to be enforced satisfaction. Again, strange sounds blip and beep, vocals start to sound like children, and at one point I could swear that a digital rooster crows. <\/p>\n
Built on a stumbling rhythm, you can imagine \u201cBuild A Friend for Me\u201d being used to sell some kind of sinister sugar-coated breakfast cereal on Saturday mornings between The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle<\/i> and The Great Space Coaster<\/i>.<\/p>\n
\u201cSorry Day\u201d is a high point, a gem of a synth-pop song which starts with a buried, Thin Lizzy-like guitar lead, before conjuring your favorite 80s Breakfast Club scene. Klaire\u2019s airy vocals glide over the music in a way that might\u2019ve struck gold on the radio between Depeche Mode and the Eurythmics. <\/p>\n
Things end on a darker note with \u201cCereus,\u201d and I assume that Chachy is handling most of the vocals here. It\u2019s a pulsing, breathy tune that could well be about Night-blooming Cereus, a species of cactus, which might just sound something like this song.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
As I mentioned, this is lo-fo, and it would be pretty interesting to hear what these songs would sound like with big production. I\u2019m not gonna say something silly like, \u201cIt would ruin the charm!\u201d In fact, I think they\u2019d sound great. These are really good songs! It\u2019s also admittedly fascinating to me that GUJI come out of China. I can\u2019t name too many synth-wave bands from that country. In fact, this may be the only one! And an album recorded during a legendary lockdown, no less! In that regard, while there might be plenty of 80s references herein, the cognitive dissonance is all 2020s. Maybe GUJI couldn\u2019t have existed at any other time.<\/p>\n
If you\u2019re into de-evolution and want to check out something that\u2019s way off the beaten path, I\u2019d recommend giving GUJI a listen. But if you like physical media you\u2019d better hurry; only 100 of these tapes exist!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":97,"featured_media":34928,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[10915],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-46798","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-guji","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/97"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46798\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46798"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=46798"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=46798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}