Intro Bonito
Intro Bonito is the debut mixtape by the British indie pop band Kero Kero Bonito, self-released in 2013.[1] The project blends glitch pop, chiptune, and bubblegum elements with bilingual lyrics in English and Japanese, establishing the band's quirky, video game-inspired sound.[2] Originally uploaded to Bandcamp, it garnered attention in underground hyperpop circles and propelled Kero Kero Bonito from obscurity to prominence within the PC Music collective and broader electronic music scene.[1] Featuring tracks like "Sick Beat," "My Party," and "Flamingo," the mixtape's playful production and Sarah Bonito's versatile vocals marked a foundational influence on hyperpop aesthetics.[3] Subsequent reissues, including a 2014 version on Double Denim Records and a 2023 physical edition by Polyvinyl, underscore its enduring cult appeal.[4]Background
Band Formation and Early Influences
Kero Kero Bonito formed in London in 2011 when producers Gus Lobban and Jamie Bulled, who had attended school together in the south London suburbs, began collaborating on electronic music experiments.[5] Seeking a vocalist to incorporate bilingual English-Japanese elements, they discovered Sarah Midori Perry—later known as Sarah Bonito—through YouTube searches for her amateur rapping videos, which showcased her fluency in both languages stemming from her upbringing in Japan before moving to the UK at age 13.[6] Perry, then an art student with prior informal experience in a Japanese girl group but no professional singing background, joined as lead vocalist, solidifying the trio's lineup without initial label support.[7] The band's early sound emerged from Lobban and Bulled's interest in chiptune and electronic production, influenced by 8-bit video game soundtracks and Japanese pop aesthetics, including hip-hop acts like HALCALI.[8] This fusion prioritized playful sampling of J-pop elements with glitchy, nostalgic synths, reflecting a grassroots online project rather than conventional band structures.[9] Perry's bilingual delivery added a layer of cultural hybridity, drawing from idol music's energetic simplicity while Lobban handled primary production under experimental guises.[10] By 2013, self-produced tracks such as "Kero Kero Bonito" generated initial online buzz through viral sharing on platforms like YouTube, emphasizing digital distribution over traditional promotion and amassing meme-like attention without major industry involvement.[8] This momentum directly informed the mixtape Intro Bonito, released independently on Bandcamp on September 30, 2013, as a culmination of their bedroom-recorded origins.[2]Mixtape Development
Intro Bonito was developed in 2013 as a DIY endeavor by Kero Kero Bonito, compiling tracks produced primarily by Gus Lobban and Jamie Bulled alongside vocalist Sarah Midori Perry. The production emphasized glitch pop aesthetics, incorporating video game sound effects, sampled elements like air horns and chiptune-inspired beats, and a raw, bedroom-made approach typical of early underground electronic acts.[11][12] Lobban and Bulled handled the instrumental construction, drawing from hyperpop precursors to craft short, energetic tracks averaging under three minutes, designed with immediate hooks to evoke playful, adolescent vibes through layered synths and abrupt transitions. Perry contributed bilingual lyrics in English and Japanese, often improvised over the beats to maintain a spontaneous, unpolished feel reflective of the band's nascent collaboration.[13][14] The project faced technical constraints inherent to low-budget setups, relying on accessible digital audio workstations without professional studio resources, which contributed to its distinctive lo-fi glitches and sample-heavy texture. Tracks were iteratively refined based on informal sharing, culminating in an initial Bandcamp upload around mid-2013, before the finalized self-release on September 30, 2013.[15][3] Despite its approximate 30-minute runtime qualifying as full-length, the band framed it as a "mixtape" to position it as an unrefined introduction to their sound, aggregating pre-existing demos rather than a conceptually cohesive album. This choice underscored their view of it as exploratory groundwork amid limited resources and evolving influences from J-pop, hip-hop, and electronic experimentation.[13][12]Musical Style and Composition
Genre and Production Elements
The sound of Intro Bonito centers on chiptune synthesizers and samples drawn from video game soundtracks, augmented by air horns and bitcrushed digital effects to produce a hyperactive, lo-fi glitch pop style that prioritizes raw, nostalgic 8-bit aesthetics over polished electronic dance music conventions.[16][15] Producers Gus Lobban and Jamie Bulled layered these elements to create sparse yet frenetic beats, incorporating MIDI-infused tones and video game-derived compositions for a skeletal, sample-heavy framework.[9] Vocalist Sarah Midori Perry's contributions feature rapid-fire rapping in a bilingual mix of English and Japanese, delivered over Lobban and Bulled's beats in tracks typically spanning 2 to 3 minutes, such as "Sick Beat" at 2:59 and "Homework" at 2:17, to ensure concise, high-energy bursts.[17][15][3] This structure emphasizes punchy interplay between vocals and instrumentation, with Japanese phrases adding rhythmic and cultural texture to the electronic base.[17] Compared to the subsequent album Bonito Generation (2016), which adopted cleaner synth-driven production, Intro Bonito maintains a deliberately unpolished, minimalistic edge rooted in chiptune limitations and digital artifacts for an evocation of retro-futurist playfulness.[18][19][20] The mixtape's production thus reflects early experimentation with bitpop and glitch elements, favoring evocative simplicity over expansive layering.[16][3]Themes and Lyrics
The lyrics of Intro Bonito predominantly explore adolescent experiences such as academic pressures, social gatherings, and petty rivalries, presented through a lens of detached, ironic detachment that underscores the banality of everyday youthful frustrations. In "Sick Beat," for instance, the verses depict struggles with homework and school demands, portraying them as burdensome obstacles amid boasts of gaming prowess and personal agency, which conveys a sense of rebellion against rote obligations without delving into profound psychological insight.[21][22] Similarly, "My Party" fixates on the logistics of hosting an event—invitations, sound systems, and snacks—as a vehicle for trivial social dynamics, employing non-sequiturs like exaggerated claims of the "biggest" setups to highlight the absurdity of seeking validation through superficial festivities.[23] These motifs prioritize relatable, surface-level absurdities over introspective depth, aligning with the mixtape's overall evocation of nostalgic, carefree juvenilia rather than mature emotional processing.[24] Vocalist Sarah Midori Perry's bilingual approach, blending English and Japanese, stems from her Japanese-British background and aims to infuse authenticity into the childish, playful tone, yet this stylistic choice has drawn observations of limiting emotional conveyance to whimsical declarations rather than nuanced sentiment. Japanese phrases in tracks like "Sick Beat" add rhythmic flair and cultural specificity, reflecting Perry's heritage, but the rapid-fire delivery often prioritizes phonetic quirkiness over substantive bilingual narrative.[25][26] Critics have noted this as contributing to a nursery-rhyme simplicity in the wordplay, which entertains through brevity but sidesteps the layered introspection common in more earnest pop expressions.[27] Unlike subsequent hyperpop developments that frequently incorporate identity-based or sociopolitical undertones, Intro Bonito eschews overt messaging in favor of apolitical, personal vignettes—focusing on individual quirks like pet debates in "Cat vs. Dog" or beat-driven escapism—thereby emphasizing causal immediacies of teen life, such as immediate sensory pleasures and minor disputes, unburdened by broader ideological framing.[28] This restraint preserves the material's charm as unpretentious juvenalia, grounded in empirical observations of routine adolescent causality rather than abstracted advocacy.Release and Promotion
Initial Self-Release
Intro Bonito was self-released digitally by Kero Kero Bonito on September 30, 2013, offered as a free download and stream exclusively via Bandcamp, with no physical formats produced at the time to prioritize accessibility for online audiences in experimental and chiptune-adjacent communities.[29] This independent distribution model enabled direct reach to niche listeners without intermediary gatekeepers, aligning with the band's early DIY ethos. Promotion centered on low-cost, grassroots tactics, including uploading music videos to YouTube—such as for the track "Homework," which preceded the full mixtape—and leveraging social media shares to disseminate content organically within glitch pop and proto-hyperpop networks.[30] Absent any paid marketing campaigns, the strategy capitalized on word-of-mouth diffusion among online enthusiasts, facilitating initial buzz through platforms like SoundCloud and forums dedicated to electronic and J-pop-infused indie sounds.[1] Early performance metrics reflected swift uptake in underground circles, with the free model driving quick downloads and streams that established a foundational fanbase while the band maintained full self-funding to preserve artistic autonomy ahead of potential label partnerships.[1] This traction underscored the mixtape's resonance in specialized digital spaces, setting parameters for its evolution from indie experiment to broader recognition without compromising initial control.[2]Subsequent Reissues and Distribution
In 2014, Kero Kero Bonito reissued Intro Bonito digitally through Double Denim Records on August 25, marking a revised version for broader online distribution beyond the initial self-release.[31][29] This edition featured minor adjustments to tracks and artwork, facilitating access via platforms like Spotify under Double Denim's licensing.[32] The mixtape received its first physical analog pressing in 2023 via Polyvinyl Record Company, released on vinyl, CD, and cassette on April 28.[1][4] The vinyl edition, pressed on hot pink-colored LP, included a printed innersleeve with handwritten lyrics by vocalist Sarah Midori Perry and bundled a digital download of the core tracks.[1] Accompanying this reissue were 13 previously unreleased digital bonus tracks, comprising demos, alternate versions, and outtakes such as "Bonito Shopping," "Fans (Are So Cool)," and "Flamingo," which extended the project's archival appeal to collectors without altering the original mixtape sequence on physical formats.[1][3] Distribution expanded globally through Polyvinyl's network and streaming services, with the 2014 digital version sustaining availability on Spotify and similar platforms, though the work's reach remained confined to indie and niche audiences rather than achieving widespread commercial crossover.[32][33]Track Listing
Original Mixtape Tracks
The original Intro Bonito mixtape, self-released in 2013, comprises nine tracks with a combined runtime of approximately 18 minutes, prioritizing concise compositions averaging under three minutes each to facilitate looping and immediate replay value in a digital mixtape format.[16] All tracks were written by Kero Kero Bonito's core members—Gus Lobban on production and instrumentation, Sarah Midori Perry on vocals and lyrics, and Jamie Bulled on additional production and arrangement.[26][34] Notable among these is "Cat vs. Dog," an English-language adaptation of a prior Japanese vocal track, highlighting the band's bilingual approach to early material.[3]| No. | Title | Duration |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bonito Intro | 0:50 |
| 2 | Intro Bonito | 2:45 |
| 3 | Sick Beat | 2:59 |
| 4 | My Party | 2:47 |
| 5 | Cat vs. Dog | 0:58 |
| 6 | Kero Kero Bonito | 2:36 |
| 7 | Picture Scroll | 2:25 |
| 8 | Civilisation | 1:37 |
| 9 | Bonus Picture | 0:30 |