i dont have any bandcamp friday recommendations rn cuz ive just not been listening to a ton of new stuff but i have been obsessively listening to Collage's debut album, Memento Mori. They're the Taiwanese rock duo that created the credits theme for Nine Sols1 and I've been pretty floored by how phenomenal the album is.
Per Wikipedia:
Collage is a Taiwanese band that released their first album in 2021, with two members: lead singer Natsuko Lariyod, who is of mixed Hakka and Amis ancestry, and Hunter Wang, who is of Minnan descent. Rather than use Taiwanese Mandarin, the band focuses on producing music using Taiwanese, Japanese, Amis, and English. They incorporate indigenous people's music into their compositions.
I wish their music was available on Bandcamp or something but it's only on streaming, I haven't found it for purchase anywhere. Their entire debut album is on YouTube, including some new singles, and the album is also up on JPS (iykyk).
If I think of anything else to recommend for Bandcamp friday I will but rn I'm like laser focused on putting in as many listens to this album as I can, it's completely captured me.
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How I found out about them and also don't listen to this if you plan on beating the game!! You'll thank me later!!
I am Taiwanese mixed Hakka and Minnan descent.
Despite best efforts from the government (education syllabus involving plays and poems and exposure to music), everything is slowly fading away. The next generation doesn't know how to speak Taiwanese or Hakka anymore (heck, I myself never learnt how). I don't blame them--K-pop and Japanese and Hong Kong culture is an absolute dominating force and so much easier to absorb--but it is a big pity to see it all go.
Please give this band a listen. Even if it's just passing click, there's so many notes of nostalgia that I can hear in the second song. A great deal of it may sound very familiar if you've listened to older Japanese songs, but that's simple--there's so much crossover in music over our cultures, it's not surprising to identify all these commonalities.