Album Review: Mika Nakashima - Joker

Joker is Japanese singer Mika Nakashima’s 9th studio album. A huge milestone. An even bigger milestone considering that it was released during the 18th year of Mika’s solo career.

I was first introduced to Mika Nakashima via the live-action movie adaptation of the manga Nana, in which Mika played the titular character. Well. One of them. I always forget that Nana has two characters named Nana, who are both lead characters in the story.

HENNYWAY.

Despite the HUGE success of Mika’s single from the Nana movie “Glamorous Sky”, I was never really able to get into Mika’s music. The Nana movie also had another single, “Endless Story” from Yuna Ito, who also starred in the Nana movie, and I much preferred that song and Yuna as a singer. I was invested, but her career went nowhere, and the material always paled in comparison to the heights reached on “Endless Story”. Thus continuing my trend of falling for flops. I still fuck with “Endless Story” though. But Mika? I just couldn’t get into her.

I decided to take a plunge with Joker. Because a lot can change about a person and their music in a few years. Except when it comes to Mika Nakashima. This bitch is in stasis.

Mika Nakashima has never really had a sound. And none of the writers and producers that she’s worked with has seemed to try and create one for her. Mika’s music is a cross between the standard fare that burns up the Oricon charts, with odd songs here and there from popular producers of a moment who may have garnered a hit or two via those popular songs they did for that one person that one time. Pretty standard for a Japanese music release, or any release anywhere for that matter. Except at some point artists start to carve out a sound and a lane for themselves over time. Not Mika though. Almost two decades into her career at the point Joker had released, and she’s still floundering between non-sounds, and sounds that would absolutely work better with somebody else.

‘This would actually have made a good album in the hands of Kumi Koda’ is a thought I had several times as I listened to Joker. Not just because some of the songs sound Kumi Koda-esque and the some-what jukebox approach to the album is one Kumi has adopted a lot throughout her discography, but Kumi has a voice and an energy which would be able to really convey each of the songs as the writers intended. Mika’s inability to match the energy of the music and sell each song is what lets so many of the songs on Joker down. The songs themselves are not bad. There’s no one moment on this album I can recall where I found a song to be anything close to bad. But the majority of the songs here just feel mis-matched in Mika’s hands. The music could be at a 7 or above, yet Mika is at a 3. It also doesn’t help that Mika only has one gear. She’s only able to sing in one way and give one type of energy, which would be fine if the material catered to this and was able to supplement this. But none of the material on Joker really does.

I’m not saying that I always need a singer to be doing the most on songs. I listen to many artists who give nothing. But if you’re not going to give the song the energy it requires, then sing different types of songs that complement the giving of nothing. This is where Namie’s A&R worked for that salary. Mika needs an A&R that will do the same for her, and producers who genuinely want to build a sound for Mika and push her.

Mika is from that Ayumi Hamasaki school of singing, where she does this forced vibrato thing with her voice, which I feel is derived from Enka. But Enka singers made that shit work and it was a staple of the sound. Here it just sounds weird in the context of a sound where standard pop vibrato would work better. Mika’s voice is honestly one reason why I tend to not listen to much of her music. There’s so little texture or power to it. Back during the Nana days when “Glamorous Sky” was fucking up the charts and was EVERYWHERE, I was always more about Yuna Ito’s “Endless Story” because I felt she had a much better voice which sold the song.

Mika’s voice is an acquired taste. But even a not so great voice can work if the material suits it. And an issue with Joker, and one I feel is prevalent throughout Mika’s discography, is that she keeps sticking to the same sounds, despite most of them not being a good fit for not only her voice, but her singing style. A stark contrast to somebody like Kumi Koda, who has a voice which works with a wider range of sounds, but is too often wasted on shitty material.

Joker is such a tough album for me to even pick highlights from, because the songs I do like are based on the potential they would have if somebody else sang it. “A or B” and “Happy Life” both sound like songs that Ringo Sheena has done or would do. “Good Bye” is a cute disco inspired jaunt produced by Daisuke Imai, who is most known for his work with Beni over the course of four of her albums (Bitter & Sweet, Lovebox, Jewel & Fortune). But imagining Beni on it (“Good Bye” is Beni as fuck) is what makes me like it. “Desire” is a club jam for the normal difficulty Dance Dance Revolution gays, and it has a great sound. But imagining Meisa Kuroki on it is what makes me like it. “So What” is a trashy guitar number to whip a ponytail to. But imagining Ayumi Hamasaki on it is what makes me like it. ‘BITCH. Ayumi Hamasaki!? Imagining her on the song is what makes YOUR Ayu hating ass like it!?’. Yes. Contrary to what many of you long-standing readers and Ayu fans who love to stop by and drag me think, I do not hate Ayumi Hamasaki. I do, in fact, like some of her songs. “Wake Me Up” is one of those songs, and is the first song that came to mind when I first heard “So What”. Mika just doesn’t have the angst nor energy for it. “Justice” is another song that sounds like Ayu, and one Ayu would have sold far better. Sheep vibrato and all. “Yo ga Akeru Mae ni” and “Niji ga Detara Kimi ni Ai ni” are both nice songs. But I think of how much better they would have been in the hands of Ayaka (“Niji ga Detara Kimi ni Ai ni” really does sound like an Ayaka song) and then I just look into an imaginary camera and shrug.

“Domino” is the only song on this album that didn’t make me think of another artist who could do it better. Although the main reason I really like this song is because it sounds like something from the Final Fantasy XIII soundtrack, or just any soundtrack composed by Masashi Hamauzu. But credit where it is due, Mika sounds decent on it.

Judging Joker on the production alone is pretty easy, as it is for every Mika album. The production is tight. The arrangements are nice. There’s a richness to many of the songs, which I think is quite indicative of Sony Music releases. They promote their roster like shit, but they put up that money for good producers. As aforementioned. There is no song on this album that I could say sounds bad.

It was a real struggle for me to get into Joker and accept it on the merits of being Mika’s album, when so little of her comes through in the songs. Mika Nakashima has always been an artist whose music I’ve never really been able to connect with, for two reasons.

One. She doesn’t sing well - at least not consistently. And it’s difficult to tell whether there is a good voice in her somewhere, or if she’s able to make herself sound like there’s more of a voice in her than there actually is. There are moments on songs, such as “Justice” where Mika goes low and delivers this really nice and rich tone. Or moments on “Domino” where Mika sounds pretty. But these feel like accidents or a by-product of her just singing the song, as opposed to Mika knowing her voice; because despite how good Mika sounds in these moments, not enough of the material on Joker caters to these facets of Mika’s voice.

Two. Mika’s sound never evolves. Mika has been coasting on the same sounds more or less for her entire career. And whilst I commend odd deviations from it on Joker, the choices are truly…choices. If I were Mika’s A&R, I would never have put her in the studio with Daisuke Imai. His sound is not in Mika’s wheelhouse whatsoever. I get the feeling that Mika’s team don’t really have a clue what to do with her sound. So they just do the same thing every album, and allocate a couple of tracks per album for Mika to try something different. It’s tired and the formula isn’t working enough in Mika’s favour, because she is not growing as an artist. It would be one thing if Mika was at the very least giving great albums, or even good albums with a couple of genuinely great songs, but she isn’t.



Mika Nakashima is a pop star who values consistency in every sense. And I respect that. There’s a Mariah Carey style of branding when it comes to her album covers, her album titles and the uses of fonts and logos. But when it comes to the music, it’s not so much a case of consistency, as it is doing the same styles of songs over and over with little to no changes between them from year to year, and album to album. Mika’s star power is growing, as is her discography, but her music isn’t. I listen to Mika’s debut album and then listen to Joker. Two albums which are 20 years apart, and I’m just confused and how Mika doesn’t manage to sound better, has not managed to settle into a sound, is not trying anything new, and exhibits zero growth in any aspect of her approach to her music or her musicality.

The problem with Mika’s music is that it’s difficult to get a sense of her style, because she doesn’t really have one. Fans will chalk up types of songs that she’s done consistently as ‘a style’, but it’s not a style. It’s just…Mika doing the same thing over and over. And if you’re cool with this, and Mika giving nothing BUT this, then you’ll like Joker the same way you liked all of Mika’s other albums. But if you are a fan who has been craving something different from Mika or to at least try to show some form of evolution and a desire to really harness some form of artistry, then Joker is not that album. And at this point I wonder if Mika will ever deliver such an album.

There are pockets on Joker where Mika fits the song and sounds like she’s as close to being in her element as she’ll get. But it’s not enough. Especially for a ninth studio album 18 years into a career.

VERDICT: Arkham City bitch

Album highlights:
▪ ~Sai_Ren~
▪ Innocent
▪ Domino