"Suffocation Diary" - New Single and Music Video from Hakushi Hasegawa
- The Night Temple
- 1 day ago
- 3 min read
Hakushi Hasegawa (they/them) has more to drop on the way to releasing their newest record, "Honest Feeling Album" (素直な気持ちアルバム), which will be out August 28th via Brainfeeder. The new video for “Suffocation Diary” (窒息日記 ) has just dropped - the followup to "The Owner of Sweetness" (蜜の主), a heartfelt and adorable video that served as the announcement for this latest album.
"Suffocation Diary" takes a detour from the pulsing, bombastic pop of "The Owner of Sweetness" - this tune is a little cuter and a little more carefree, even if both share the same adorable vocals by Hakushi. "Suffocation Diary" also features a number of shout-outs - SOPHIE, Arca, Mykki Blanco, and Hudson Mohawke are all namedropped on the track. Hakushi considers themself a "pickpocket," taking bits and pieces of each artist's signature sound to create the Hakushi Hasegawa that stands proudly today.
Hasegawa shared what inspired this latest track:
“Within the album - and indeed, among my own works - the lyrics of this song are arguably the most aggressive. In this era of 'legitimacy,' it feels as though people naively believe that through the appropriate learning and the discovery of abundance, anyone can move on to the next stage clean-cut and unscathed. In reality, that is wrong. When we try to incorporate something different into ourselves - especially into areas related to life itself - we suffocate under a desire for negation, violent impulses, rebellion against authority, or even a 'physiological' sense of revulsion. In my view, the glorification of the archive itself stems from an escape from this suffocation… um, it’s trendy. It’s just too extreme. And what’s more, it’s an extreme that harms others. The fact that I reveal my love for many things - or my places of escape - in the first half is a cowardly tactic that combines payback with daydreaming.ese songs about a love that was slowly slipping away. Intergalactic heartbreak songs with otherworldly synths and haunting memories picking apart every word they said…”
Filmmaker Kotaro Saito directed the track's official music video - the video focuses around carnivorous plants, displayed in custom-made metal planters, kettles, and other vessels. The story hinges around this unique image, with CherryRadishPlants providing plant supervision and artist Yumi Nakamura providing the plants themselves.
Watch “Suffocation Diary” HERE
On "Honest Feeling Album," Hasegawa adds a newly formed backing band - HaHa and The Hairpins - trading their usual style of solitary musical experimentation for a fuller, more dynamic ensemble sound. The result is an album that feels simultaneously expansive, inventive, but still intensely personal, with each track flowing seamlessly into the next.
Hasegawa's style bounces from genre to genre, between big band jazz, effervescent J-pop, industrial abrasion, bossa nova, and delicate electropop, yet the constant stylistic shifts blend and always feel purposeful. They mirror the emotional volatility at the heart of the album, the intimate heart behind these wild tracks. Pieces like "Boss Moire" capture this spirit perfectly, pairing stream-of-consciousness lyricism with a freeform, creative musical palette.
Other collaborators include Mito Tsukino, tofubeats, Accorinrin of Otoboke Beaver, and Lee Lang- rather than functioning as conventional guest appearances, each collaboration subtly reshapes the album, creating an unexpected listening experience that never settles into a single identity or sound.
Illustrated by acclaimed manga artist George Asakura, the cover artwork depicts someone cooking okonomiyaki, an everyday image that provides a fitting visual counterpart to a record with extraordinary emotional complexity.
Following 2024's "Mahōgakkō (The Magic School)," Hasegawa has emerged with a work that feels less interested in escapism than in embracing contradiction. "Honest Feeling Album" is adventurous without becoming self-indulgent, emotionally raw without losing its sense of play, and ultimately confirms Hasegawa as one of contemporary experimental pop's most singular and compelling voices.
HAKUSHI HASEGAWA ONLINE