Tambourine wo Narasu no da!!!

I wasn't sure how I felt about Sambomaster's new single "Subete no Yoru to Subete no Asa ni Tambourine wo Narasu no da" when I first heard it a few days ago. For one, it's probably the furthest they've ventured into straight-up pop music, and I've always enjoyed their more rockin' songs instead of the light-funk they've occasionally ventured into. Today, while driving home from a nice day with a nice girl, the song's melody popped into my head, and it was then that I realized that I indeed did like it. My brain kept telling me "no", but my bobbing head and tapping foot told me "yes!"

The first b-side, "Ano Kane wo Narasu no ha Anata", is a cover of some singer named Akiko Wada. I have no clue what her original sounds like, but this one is an unabashed soul tune with some rather excessive horns backing singer Yamaguchi's crooning.

The second b-side "Hanarenai Futari" is a typically rockin' song, along the lines of "Utagoe Yo Okore" or any other number of reliably nice Sambomaster songs.

These three songs clustered together onto one CD are an almost tailor-made display of Sambomaster's increasingly contradictory and schizophrenic style. So far, their motown-punk hasn't failed them though, so I'm interested in seeing where they take it from here.