Nanashi's Masterpiece Review #1: Fujifabric 'FAB FOX'
Introduction
Hello. Starting with this post, I would like to begin reviewing albums as part of my personal masterpiece commentary series! This is my first attempt, and while I feel a bit nervous, I hope you will read it with a light heart.
The very first album I chose is 'FAB FOX' by Fujifabric! I don't think many people would choose Fujifabric as their very first pick when deciding to start an album review series, but I chose them.
When it comes to Fujifabric, 'Wakamono no Subete' is undoubtedly their most well-known song. It has been covered by various artists and is frequently played on television these days. However, I feel that the true essence of Fujifabric lies in 'FAB FOX'. I hope to convey that to you. Let's get started!
'FAB FOX' Basic Information
・Release: November 9, 2005
・Label: Toshiba EMI
・Second major full-length album
・The last album before drummer Fumi Adachi's departure
(Since his departure, Fujifabric has operated as a 4-piece band plus a support drummer)
・Contains 12 tracks
('Akaneiro no Yuuhi' was released as a recording during their indie era.
'Ginga' is included as an album version)
Ginga, Niji, and Akaneiro no Yuuhi were released as advance singles
Overall Album Commentary
The reason I chose this album first is that it holds the strongest sentimental value for me among all Fujifabric albums, and I believe it allows you to fully experience Masahiko Shimura's worldview. In terms of direction, it is similar to the next album, 'TEENAGER', but I feel it excels in the balance between 'songs that are weird but incredibly cool', 'perverted songs', and 'straightforward songs', as well as in its ability to evoke a sense of the seasons.
'Songs that are weird but incredibly cool' include 'Mononoke Hakaranda' and 'Ginga', while 'perverted songs' include 'Kuchibiru no Sore'. Straightforward songs include 'Niji' and 'Birthday'. 'Songs that evoke a sense of the seasons' include 'Mizuame to Ame' and 'Akaneiro no Yuuhi'. I think there are different ways to interpret each of them.
I believe one of Fujifabric's strengths is how they provide listeners with a rich variety of interpretations of the flow of seasons and time, and this album is where that richness is fully expressed. I think there are more ups and downs here than in 'TEENAGER'. In that respect, I feel this album is superior. In interviews, the members have also described it as an 'interesting album' and said things like 'we do whatever we want to do'.
Individual Song Commentary
・Mononoke Hakaranda
Compared to other albums from the Shimura era, this is a rather difficult song to get into, and this album begins with the kind of 'wimpy rock' unique to Masahiko Shimura. Don't try to understand it. Just listen with your body. I believe this song had a high performance rate at live shows (they even played it at the Tokyo Garden Theater in 2024).
I love the kind of songs Shimura makes that sound like 'a student who is good at studying breaking out of their shell at night and going wild', and this song hits the mark perfectly.
And by having this song play first, the feeling of 'coming to leave the listener dumbfounded, and then watching that with a smirk' feels truly Fujifabric-esque and perverted.
・Ginga
Sorry for introducing another perverted song. But please forgive me, as this is my favorite Fujifabric song!
When I was in junior high, I introduced this song to a friend, and they told me, 'I stopped listening as soon as the intro ended and the singing started.' The backing track is incredibly cool, but the lyrics make no sense. This is the Fujifabric style, and I think there are people who won't like it. In fact, my friend didn't like it.
Recently (as of 2025), it is ranked in the top 20 on Apple Music, so I think its popularity might be waning a little, but on YouTube, it has racked up 7 million views. This is the next highest view count after 'Wakamono no Subete' and 'Akakiiro no Mokusei'. Maybe it's because it has a certain level of mass appeal. At this point, I don't really know why it's so popular.
However, around 2016, there were quite a few bands making songs you could dance to, and bands that were basically saying 'you guys were definitely influenced by Fujifabric' were making wimpy songs. That might be why 'Ginga' is surprisingly well-received. (Fujifabric themselves were influenced by Tamio Okuda and Unicorn.)
By the way, for one year after their major debut, Fujifabric released four consecutive singles based on the seasons. They are commonly called the 'Four Seasons Discs', and this song is the last of them, intended to represent winter. I don't get it at all.
・Birthday
Masahiko Shimura apparently wanted to be a professional baseball player when he was young and was a boy obsessed with baseball. The turning point was seeing a Tamio Okuda concert when he was in his third year of junior high. From there, he aspired to be a professional musician. This is a birthday song written by Masahiko Shimura, who approached music stoically and single-mindedly without hiding his desire to sell records and become famous. That is precisely why lyrics like 'If I had two bodies, I could have done something even more amazing—am I a narcissist for thinking that?' and 'I'm looking at a reality that is quite different from the person I wanted to be in the past—is that a common story?' resonate so much.
For me personally, this is a song with deep sentimental value; it is one of the first three songs I learned by Fujifabric. I've been listening to this song for 16 years since I was in the first grade of elementary school, and the weight of birthdays has changed year by year. I'm no longer at an age where I can be superficially happy just because it's my birthday. Of course, I still have family and friends who celebrate it, but the feeling that we've become adults, each carrying our own secrets and responsibilities, inevitably follows.
Even so, as long as it exists as a song, music will neither run nor hide. That's why I always feel like this song is watching over me, and it gives me a little boost of motivation. It's a song that affirms me a little precisely because it's my birthday.
・Akaneiro no Yuuhi
'FAB FOX' ends with this great masterpiece. This is a song Masahiko Shimura wrote when he graduated from high school and moved to Tokyo, and it is the only song on the album produced during his indie era. As a characteristic of Fujifabric, there are songs with confusing worldviews and songs that straightforwardly pour out emotions, and this song is the latter. And among the latter, it is also a song that Shimura and the members cherished very much. Since Shimura's death, they have rarely performed this song live. (I was lucky enough to see them perform it at the Tokyo Garden Theater on August 4, 2024, and well, I cried like an idiot.)
I cite the fact that this song is packed with scenery that anyone can easily imagine as a reason why it is particularly excellent. Of course, Japan is vast, so I imagine you might imagine sunsets in various landscapes, but since I grew up in the countryside, I inevitably imagine the sunset when the 5 o'clock chime rings and I'm walking home from a friend's house, or the sunset while walking down a country road on the way home from school, and I feel melancholic.
But I think everyone, no matter where they are, has moments where they look at the sunset and reflect on their own life. The scenery we've seen and the experiences we've had are different, but the fact that anyone can look at a sunset and feel melancholic is the same. I think this song is a masterpiece recognized by everyone precisely because it sings about this universality straightforwardly without trying to disguise it in a strange way.
Conclusion
It ended up being unusually long for a first attempt, but I actually cut a lot out. I originally intended to do it in two parts, but I gave up because it was too much work to write. There were many other songs I wanted to introduce (like 'Sunny Morning', 'Niji', 'Maria to Amazones', 'Kuchibiru no Sore'!), so please listen to them yourself. I would be happy if even one more person thinks about listening to 'FAB FOX' because of this note. See you in the next article.