Nujabes: The Timeless Pioneer of Lofi

     When we scroll short videos online, or enjoy our time in a beautiful café, we were often accompanied by a type of music that has a distinct "relaxing" vibe to it, with soothing beats and catchy melodies, they are called Lofi. What most of us don't know is that, this style was started by a record shop owner that liked music in Tokyo, and his name is Nujabes. Often hailed as the pioneer of Lofi HipHop and Lofi Jazz, Nujabes's unique fusion of melancholy melodies,  soft hiphop beats, and soulful samples from other pieces of music captivated listeners all over the world. Despite his early death, his influence in contemporary still remains significantly today.

    Nujabes's passion for music began at an early age, but because of his family condition, he wasn't able to pursue his dream career of being a DJ producer right away. With out conventional training and music school education, Nujabes developed his musical skill through self-explore and experiments. His love for music led him to open two vinyl record stores in Tokyo's Shibuya district, these two stores not only provided him with an extensive library of samples but also became cultural hubs for underground hip-hop and jazz enthusiasts.  It was then he met many up-and-coming artists that he would eventually work with. His stage name "Nujabes" represented his music style very well, it is his real name Sebajun spelled backwards, taking familiar elements of traditional music and rearrange them into something new and unique. Perfectly demonstrated in the way he seamlessly blended old school hiphop and classical Jazz Music.

    Nujabes's music works are characterized by their rich, atmospheric sound scapes, built upon jazz samples, smooth bass lines, and laid back percussions. His musics are usually slow and catchy, giving it a dreamlike quality that takes listeners to another dimension, at least that's how I felt. The creamy smooth instrumental back ground is then accompanied by hard hitting rhythms and aggressive word play by various Hiphop artists, creating a sense of contrast that "just works". For me, listening to his music always felt curing, I resonate with the contrast fell in the track very much. During my commute on crowded buses and MRTs, Nujabes's music felt like a portrait of my own situation. Under the aggressive and fast paced rapping, the instruments are just flowing without a care in the world, just like me quietly standing on the noisy bus. The music is gentle but at the same time profoundly moving.

    My personal favorite album of his is "Modal Soul", not only does the cover art look super cool like a upside down horizon, the opening song "Feather" lured me into it the moment I pressed play for the first time. Started with a simple melody of the piano, and then a low fidelity( Haha you see, Lofi!) beat just lying on top of the chords, the perfectly melancholy sound is the perfect antidepressant for the Monday morning. The album was filled with complexly mixed yet simple sounding samples, as if Nujabes is a super skilled bartender that mixes dozens kinds of drinks to create the perfect cocktail. It is very rare for an entire album to not have a single bad song, and Modal Soul is an example of it, I could always listen to the whole album start to finish in one sitting.

    Another of my favorite work of his is the soundtrack of the 2004 anime show "Samurai Champloo". It is by far the most unique anime soundtrack that I've ever heard. He used musics from Edo period and mixed them with modern Hiphop to create quirky atmosphere that the show was also famous for. Songs like "Arurian Dance" and "Shiki No Uta" all became modern classics for the Lofi community. Despite his pass in 2010, the love for his music never faded even the slightest, thanks to the Internet and pandemic, his works were brought back to the spotlight for their melancholy feel that people felt during Covid. And I think that's the magic for his music, they feel like an echo of a person's own loneliness and sadness.