It was hot today. It's summer. What should I expect? It's like I'm complaining about nothing. Still, it got to me. Not in terms of temperature, but in terms of everything else. It's not that it was hot. It was the way it was hot. Every movement caused skin that had adhered to my seat to stretch as if I were stripping off a bandaid. Sweat ran in rivulets under my clothes, streaming over me like I was taking a shower, only instead of washing away the grit that had clung to me I only grew saltier and grimier by the hour. The sun's radiation reflected off the sidewalks as if it was the light escaping from the Ark of the Covenant. I left dark, penetratingly damp thumbprints on everything I touched. My body's reaction was cartoonish and the depths of my displeasure were daunting. I don't mind it when it's hot. It's really all the minor discomforts that add up due to the heat that forms a mountain of misery. Writing this indoors and under an AC vent could not result in a greater appreciation for temperature-controlled environments. It's giving me the peace of mind and relaxed clarity of presence to punch out a few words of admiration for Hoshina Anniversary's Hisyochi. Coincidentally "Hisyochi" means "somewhere cool to relax during a hot summer" which is exactly where I am writing from, and I will go on record as it being superior in nearly every way to the sun seared alternatives I had braved earlier. Unlike many artists I write about, I actually recall where I first encountered Hoshina Anniversary- the Panty and Stocking soundtrack. How important is this fact to the overall arch of this short tome? It's a relatively minor detail; however, coming to this record from his soundtrack work definitely aids in my appreciation of his sense of detail and texture, as well as his versatility as a composer. The saucy and sassy nature of the project where I first encountered his work definitely left me with the impression that I should expect to hear something with a high degree of pep and polish. The polish is here, however, the pep has been pruned to no more than a kernel. But a strict preference for momentum is not the disposition that Hisyochi operates from, instead, we find the artist cracking open the strictures of dance music that pressure and coax us to move, rewiring them to prioritize a passage towards internal quietude- a balm for the fever of the day. Synths and smooth bass lines babble forth like cold water from a grated vent, spilling over your limbs and lifting your weight away from the grip of gravity, pressing you closer to heaven, high enough to lick the clouds, relieving the tension in your muscles that would usually hold it in perpetual exertion. Beats rotate like the blades of fans, surrounding you in a cooling cyclonic current of air, while leafy, shadow-hued atmospherics guard you from the signs of prying heat or perturbing flashes of solar death rays. Early tracks such as "Rakka 落花" and "Irahu いらふ 応ふ" established the perimeters of this aural shelter, while later numbers like "Roman 浪漫" and "Shonyudo 鍾乳洞" elaborate on previously inaugurated features with Caribbean flourishes, jazzy jaunts, and affective intensifications of psyche-rippling pulses and permutations. It kind of feels like eating a bowl of mochi ice cream with your soul- an ingestion of relief that frees your essent from the sticky clump of overheated flesh for which it is attached- allowing it to drift and savor sensation in a newly consummate state of elevated leisure.
