Not one to do things by halves, Kumi is gracing her fans with a triple A-side single for the summer. I initially thought 'Oh, here we go!'. One overly urban club joint which rips off about 4 popular US club bangers within the space of 4 minutes, one cutsey pop track which has Kumi screeching, and a ballad. But she's gone and blind-sighted us. Well, me at least. Because 3 splash is 3 tracks of pop, pop and more pop. So much sugar sweet pop that a bitch should be the face of e-ma and Glico with this shit right here.
Let's start with the only song I think is good. "Lick me ♥". I was surprised when I first heard this song because I expected it to be a forced club track, which throws too many R&B cliches into the mix, with Kumi talking about how she wants a man to taste the flavour of her ice cream and lick her body up and down like a lollipop. But in a complete twist, the song is a cute 'n' charming uptempo number, relatively free of smut and sex. "Lick me ♥" is a really nice song, accompanied with a really cute video to boot. Pop suits Kumi's voice more than the R&B tinged numbers, which is why vocally I think she shines brighter on them. I couldn't help but think that Ayaka would've done the song better though. It's the kind of song she'd pull off with ease and sound amazing on, chucking some grit into the slick pop proceedings in the process.
"Ecstasy" is just a dump of beats, electric guitars, filtered vocals and multi-tracked auto-tune. The song is a 3 minute and 20 second mess; sounding like a really bad version of Ayumi Hamasaki's "Rollin'". It's trash.
"Hashire!" has Kumi pushing the pedal on the funk. The song itself isn't bad. I give Kumi props for trying something new, but this isn't a style that really suits her. Kumi's voice is just too annoying on the chorus for the song not to grate. "Hashire!" comes off like Kumi is trying a bit too hard to push that funky rock chick vibe. She doesn't sell this song as well as "Lick me ♥", or even the doo-doo-fest that is "Ecstasy". Great production, hot music, just the wrong chick handling the vocals. But it is a okay song. It comes off better with the music video than it does on its own.
3 splash works on one hand because its sound is at least consistent across all three songs: adopting a rock-funk vibe fused with a lick of polished pop. But on the other, it doesn't. Because for each song on 3 splash, there are ladies in the Japanese music game who immediately come to mind as being able to do them better. And in the midst of that, I couldn't help think of Ayumi Hamasaki. Kumi seems to be on that 'let's try some rock and electro shit' tip that Ayumi was on with her Next level album, and she sold it no better than Ayu did. Also, as with Next level, 3 splash has short track interludes which have cool bits of music which would've made great full length songs. It's a shame the short outro that utilises "Lick me ♥"'s melody wasn't made into something more, as the sound is really nice.
3 splash is nice, and has a good summer sound, but it's not amazing. Not Kumi's strongest single release by a long shot.
Song highlights:
■ Lick me ♥ 🏆
■ 12:00AM (Outro)
I still think Ecstacy was the best song because it was more upbeat for me compared to Lick Me and Hashire.
ReplyDeleteI just wish it would come out tomorrow on my birthday.
Lick Me was the second best because it was cheerful yet, different. Reminded me of Koi no Mahou a bit.