It’s summer! Here’s some songs that are keeping me going during the long days:

Hachikō is Fujii Kaze’s latest single and the first single off his upcoming album, Prema. It’s an upbeat tune borrowing the story of that Hachikō, who has a statue at Shibuya Station.

I think of it as a joyful story about missed connections and reconnecting with a loved one. “Where did you go, Hachiko? This time I’ll never let you go. We don’t need to rush, take it slow. This time I’ll never let you go.”

rendez-vous is a collab between dawgss and Aile The Shota—two acts I’d never heard of before—that was brought to me (and by extension, you) courtesy of the Youtube algorithm. I usually don’t like poppy, boy-band songs like this but I can’t deny how catchy this tune is.

Despite the upbeat tempo, this is actually a song about getting dumped. The singer reminisces about the time they spent together and wonders if the other person still remembers the time they spent together.

Propose by natori is another song by an artist I don’t normally listen to but it’s also incredibly catchy. The tempo is incredibly fast and the singer doesn’t even give much space to process what he’s saying. The natural rhythm of the song and the rhythmic singing style is incredibly fun to listen to.

This is a song about someone that’s head over heels for someone, being incredibly vulnerable in their head about whether they’re enough and how afraid they are of rejection. Through this lens, the rhythmic, yet unrelenting recital almost feels like a manic stream of consciousness as the singer tries to sort out how they feel.

I am incredibly familiar with yama and TORIHADA might be one of their best songs yet. It’s the lead single for their 2025 album ; semicolon, which is a strong contender for my album of the year so far. There’s nothing fancy happening here—this song is simply a bop.

This song is about choosing love: the singer falls deeply in love at first sight and all they want is to become closer to the other person. It’s very intimate and vulnerable, even somewhat assertive: “All I want is you, my skin tingles as we fall into the night—into a world of just the two of us.”

chelmico’s music is just plain fun and I just wanna dance with you — period is no exception. This is the perfect song for a laid back rooftop party in the middle of July.

All the other songs were kinda deep despite their upbeat demeanors but listen, this song is exactly what it says it is on the tin: “I just wanna dance with you — period. I don’t wanna do anything annoying. I don’t want to think about it. Don’t make me say it, you know it.”