Asobi Seksu

It’s kind of weird that a band of dreamy j-pop peddlers like Asobi Seksu would play in Baton Rouge. But, whatever. Like Bill Murray sporting inside-out orange camo in Lost In Translation, it’s a little leftfield but fits just right. Led by slinky-voiced chanteuse Yuki and new-wave guitar slinger James Hanna, the Brooklyn quartet is popping corks for its third album, Citrus, which drips off the plate just as sweet as it sounds. The kicker is Yuki’s breathy Sunday school voice—singing in a mixture of English and Japanese—that rises up like a needle-fine focal point even when so much beauty swirls around it. “Some melodies flow better in Japanese, and that is the main reason why I started singing in Japanese,” she says. “And there are certain thoughts and phrases that I can’t translate into English. For example, I can only recite the times table in Japanese.” That probably makes them more interesting anyway. Asobi Seksu performs live at Spanish Moon on Dec. 5 with 2CV. thespanishmoon.com.