Full of effusive praise from cultural tastemakers and rock legends alike, listeners are prepared to hang on to and affix to the edge their seats and have their collective musical minds blown even before we hear a single stratospherically intensive beat from YOYOKA, the Japanese born drum sensation making her stylistic whirlwind of an official debut with the cleverly titled For Teen.
Arriving at this exciting, fortuitous moment was clearly part of her DNA from the get-go, as she started drumming at age two, was performing at four, playing with her parents in their band Kaneaiyoka around six, when she also released her first indie CD. All that set the stage for 2018, when at age eight she gained international notoriety for an online video in which she covered Led Zeppelin’s “Good Times Bad Times,” which became her Vimeo entry for the 2018 Hit Like a Girl Contest. She earned quick praise from Dave Grohl, Ian Paice and most significantly, Robert Plant, who was no doubt moved to hear that one of her main influences was John Bonham.
While the video was accumulating 3.3M views on YouTube, the young musician appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres show twice and became the youngest drummer ever selected as one of the World’s Top 500 Drummers by Drummerworld. In her home country, she was chosen as the youngest ever in NewsWeek Japan’s 100 Japanese People the World Respects. Now living with her family in Los Angeles, YOYOKA has also assimilated into the American music scene quite well, performing with the likes of Cyndi Lauper, Fall Out Boy and Jack Black while receiving further jaw drops/kudos from the likes of Tom Morello, Chad Smith, Narada Michael Walden, Bootsy Collins and Anderson.Paak. Beyond that, she’s been signing endorsement deals since age eight and in 2024 landed a contract with renowned drum manufacturer Ludwig.
Now that we’ve prepared listeners with her packed bio of achievements and the praise of the music legends who know greatness when they see it, there’s the question, well, how is For Teen? At 14 songs and 50 minutes of original, very diverse material – most co-written by YOYOKA - it’s an incredible showcase for all she can do in a multitude of genres. That’s either an amazing coup in an industry that loves to pigeonhole artists for commerce’s sake, or a unique public display of a young, vibrant and ridiculously talented artist trying to figure out her lane moving forward.
One of the great challenges of being a multi-talented, highly adaptable prodigy in a world of conformity is that everyone in every genre wants to claim you as their own. So while For Teen offers a feast for the ears, it’s also a wide open palette from which he can choose a few approaches moving forward. Especially for drum aficionados who appreciate fiery, intricate musicianship, it’s a great, highly passionate rollercoaster-y listen, but because it bounces from vibe to vibe from track to track, there might be a tendency for fans of the different styles she plays to choose what they’d like her to be moving forward.
IMHO, and that’s all I claim to offer here, I would love to see a full album of jazz/rock fusion barnburners like the opening track “Origin,” a trippy instrumental that soars, booms and explodes throughout, capturing our immediate attention. YOYOKA takes that high octane fire an even higher extreme on the equally bustling “Sky Blue,” which features the blistering guitar of Yukihide “YT” Takiyama (who also tackles “keys and chorus”) and the aptly titled hard rock vocal romp “Bang Away,” which features young singer Cali Three (“The Singing Cyber”) and the infinite blessings of fellow teen rock god prodigy Roman Morello, who rages against the machine as impactfully as his iconic dad Tom Morello.
My second choice for a full length YOYOKA project would be one showcasing her deeper (alternately cool and fast/furious) jazz chops, as she does on one of For Teen’s great instrumental highlights “Changes” with nimble pianist Ai Furusato. Their later hypnotic, heavily jazz-funky jam “Sparkling – Duo Version shows that YOYOKA could have a future in trad jazz if she so wished.
Much of the rest of the repertoire on For Teen allows us to experience just how intuitive the drummer is, and how magnificently adaptable her playing is to her ever-shifting surroundings. That she and industry royalty like four time Grammy winning mega-producer Narada Michael Walden hooked up on a fun, funky autobiographical anthem (“YOYO”) opens all roads for her in the pop/R&B world, and her drum fills on the jam are of course a great highlight.
Elsewhere, YOYOKA keeps the groove hoppin’ behind younger emerging pop talents like Josephiue Peppink, co-writer and lead singer of the pop/dance romp “Time Travel”; J-Pop vocalist Shido, on the edgy, punky-pop tune “Home Bestie”; soulful 16-year-old pop singer Leon Vincent, emoting powerfully on the easy grooving pop rocker “Never Say Goodbye”; torchy retro-soul singer Tulani, bringing her full power to uplifting contemporary R&B anthem “Shooting Star”; and sultry voiced L.A. singer/songwriter Rachel West, who joins with YOYOKA on the lilting closing ballad. The way the tracking goes, it’s as if the drummer took Walden’s foundational blessing and engaged with some of her top young contemporaries whose stars are also on the rise. Shooting stars/That’s what you are indeed!
In addition to introducing us to a formidable new drum talent – who more than delivers on the promise of the nonstop praise - this continuously amazing, multi-faceted album lays a foundation for the multiple paths YOYOKA can take as her career progresses. Hopefully, she’ll find a way to do it all, making pop/R&B fans out of jazz and rock fans and vice versa.
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