The Japanese House: International Showcase Fund (SXSW)
There is an old and brilliant adage that music can transport you to another world. And if this is true, then the work of The Japanese House, the mastermind of twenty-one year old artist Amber Bain, is like diving into a deep, cavernous ocean; one that’s awash with the pain and growth of displaced relationships, the emotion that comes from moving solitarily through transcendent experiences in life, and the clarity of understanding that can come afterward. It is a macrocosm of incredible depth and nuance. But before diving further into Amber’s expansive territory, let’s rewind for a second.
Despite the fact her upcoming EP ‘Swim Against the Tide’, The Japanese House’s third release thus far, is released 11 November, Amber’s story is one that’s been rooted in the experiential essence of life long before now. The name comes from a family holiday to Cornwall where, when Amber was eight years old, she developed a crush on the girl next door. Amber wore her hair up inside a hat for the duration of the holiday, leading to her crush thinking Amber was a boy. By the end of the week, the girl had written Amber love letters. Like so many of her songs, when Amber started writing music she had been thinking of a moment that could be captured and bottled for emotional posterity. As a result, the name of the house she’d been staying in – “The Pole House’, but renamed “The Japanese House” by Amber’s mother – stuck.
In the years since then, The Japanese House has released two EPs of resplendently calming yet emotionally shattering pop. On a track like “Still”, her debut single released a little over a year ago, she captures the fragility that lays within directing your heart, and someone else’s, into the unknown. Written after the end of Amber’s first relationship when she was seventeen, the track illustrates the amorphous and ever-changing mess between commitment and loss, as she explains that the pair continued to feel connected even after breaking up. “We went on holiday together afterwards as we’d already booked tickets. I still really loved them”, she says. It’s a powerful release of a song and one with an intricate nuance that far outweighs the work not just of an artist of Amber’s age and experience, but the compellingly emotive and iconic works of yore. Listening to it, you get the sense that she’s the next in a great lineage of artists.
Perhaps this brilliance comes down to two things. First, Amber’s immense talent, which has seen her write and produce all of her tracks (with co-production by George, from Dirty Hit labelmates The 1975), act as what is essentially the creative director for The Japanese House aesthetic, having travelled to the likes of Los Angeles, Morocco and Iceland to take photos for all three of her EPs. But second, that she refuses to be shackled into writing and performing toward convention. Instead of ticking cultural tick boxes, Amber focuses on eternal themes. And it’s through this approach that The Japanese House’s discography is one that captures moments in time that will be impressively universal in their meaning for the rest of time. This is work that has an infinite quality.
This route into moulding out a body of work that defies time could be inspired by one of Amber’s earliest influences. She was taught to play guitar as a child by her father – on a right-handed guitar, despite being left-handed – who was in a band of his own. From here, she became entrenched in the timeless art of acts like The Beatles, Frankie Vallie and the Four Seasons, and perhaps most importantly, Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys. The work of these artists gives some insight into the layered melodic process of Amber’s work, which is replete with the lilts of other enduring artists that can stand the test of time – from the aforementioned and onward.
It’s within the layered vocals, which cover the music of The Japanese House in an emotionally textured blanket, that a dichotomy is created. With so many voices covering the track, the duality of a feeling like heartbreak, where one experiences loss but also a desire to look inside themselves and move forward, has been captured so perfectly. And after her last two EPs ‘Pools to Bathe In’ and ‘Clean’, it’s this latest release ‘Swim Against the Tide’ that sits at the pinnacle of this approach.
Made up of four tracks which were all written at various points throughout Amber’s life, ‘Swim Against the Tide’ is an impressive body of work. Lead single “Face Like Thunder” presents Amber’s production at her most sunlit, with a record that – despite its seemingly negative subject matter, explained away with lyrics like “I kiss the floor, curled up in a ball / there’s nothing coming out of my mouth, so I said nothing at all” – sounds as clear and refreshing as emerging from one of those cooling pools of water that are omnipresent in The Japanese House’s imagery. It’s in a track like this that the dualism Amber’s work is built upon is perhaps at its most present. At once poignantly sad and contemplative, but also surfacing with what sounds like deep breaths of opportunity.
The EP, which was recorded in London and Los Angeles, tackles a smorgasbord of subject matter and sound. On “Good side in”, Amber exercises her talent with some classic and flowered playing on the guitar, a sound which has been relatively unheard on her previous work. The closing track “Leon” is inspired by the film of the same name. I got obsessed with how, in the original script, Natalie Portman and Leon are meant to have sex”, Amber explains. “I didn’t know if that was right or wrong and I couldn’t decide. I felt like the boundaries between right and wrong were really blurred. No one knows how old she is.”
“The song is about her when she’s older. Leon is dead. She’s found another guy and doesn’t really give a shit about him. She has a child, but her life is really boring.”
It’s on the EP’s title track though – Amber’s favourite – that all the interconnected stories that make up both her music and the life experiences that inform it meet. “Swim Against the Tide”, Amber says, is about “losing someone in a number of ways – literally losing them, and having someone fading through your life, then coming back. It’s about them literally being a presence in your head”. Ultimately, it is about “the pain of falling for someone, and how the feeling of losing someone, loving them, and them dying are all kind of the same feelings.”
So, back then, to that vast ocean that The Japanese House resides within. It is an immersive, vast expanse. Amber’s career will continue to grow, building from the tour slots she’s already played with the 1975, the monumental play counts for her previous releases, and the support she’s received from music scene luminaries such as Zane Lowe. And as Amber navigates that expanse, going deeper and deeper, so too will her audience, as they embark on a journey of self-discovery together. It is the world of The Japanese House, a creation of Amber Bain, and it is waiting for you to dive in.