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Featuring vocalist Yuki Chikudate and guitarist James Hanna, plus a revolving door lineup of musicians, American shoegazers Asobi Seksu burst onto the New York indie rock scene in the early aughts with their reverb-laden, guitar-oriented sound. Combining their J-Pop influences with their love for alternative rock champions such as My Bloody Valentine and Yo La Tengo, Chikudate and Hanna teamed up with bassist Glenn Waldman and drummer Keith Hopkin for their eponymous studio debut, released independently in 2002 and re-released in 2004 via Friendly Fire Recordings. The album received heavy airplay on college radio and the songs “Sooner” and “Walk on the Moon” were featured on the 2006 South Korean indie film In Between Days. That same year, Asobi Seksu returned with the Chris Zane-produced Citrus, which would later peak at Number 21 on the UK Independent Albums chart after getting its European release via One Little Indian in 2007. A collection of acoustic versions of their earlier work titled Rewolf came out in 2009 and so did the group’s third studio effort Hush. Switching their shoegaze-inflected sound for a quieter, more pared-down approach, the LP climbed to Number 34 on Billboard’s Heatseekers Albums chart and was met with rave reviews. Preceded by the single “Trails,” Fluorescence saw the light in 2011 and would be the band’s last full-length before going on an indefinite hiatus in 2013.
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