Victor Japan Vinyl & CDs

Review: Tokyo's DJ Notoya turns his ear to the Victor archives for this latest deep dive into overlooked 80s grooves, following the cult acclaim of his Tokyo 1980s mix CD: a street-level selection of Japanese disco, boogie and modern soul, of course immediately precipitative of international traction. This LP is the second to follow up that first, released in 2018, and scopes out the modern Invitation label (a new city pop sublabel of Victor Japan), studding a sleek strew of low-key gems from the past decade's obscurer corners. The artwork by Hiroshi Nagai resembles a digital needlepoint piece (a great contradiction), and the music is as city-slicking as it can get, with Naomi Akimoto's opener 'Bewitched' leaving us without a second guess as to the quality of what is to come.