King Gnu

When Daiki Tsuneta formed King Gnu, he was looking to blend daring Russian composer Igor Stravinsky with the incendiary Jimi Hendrix. Born out of Tsuneta’s solo project Srv.Vinci in 2017, King Gnu maintained most of the band’s swinging rhythmic abandon and experimental feel, but tilted in a more commercially acceptable and musically coherent direction with the addition of singer Iguchi Satoru. Built on a foundation of elephantine slop-funk, "Rendez-Vous Tokyo" revelled in the chaos of King Gnu's hometown and served as their debut album's title track. The band found a theme song in 2018's EDM-rocking "Flash!!!", a breakneck celebration of pleasure and velocity, while their 2019 album, Sympa, served up an unflinching look at depression ("Prayer X") and a quartet of sample-heavy interludes by drummer Yu Seki. Released in 2020, Ceremony topped Japanese charts with the help of "Hakujitsu (Bright Sun)”, a platinum single and anthemic source of karaoke delight. In fact, practically every song off Ceremony—including the rambunctious "Teenager Forever" and the pulverising "Hikoutei (Flying Boat)”—has also found its way onto the charts, proving Tsuneta's stated desire to dominate J-pop to be well within reach.