March 1, 2017
Track Listing
CD + DVD/CD+ PHOTO BOOK
- predawn
- Don’t give it up
- predawn (Instrumental)
- Don’t give it up (Instrumental)
CD
- predawn
- Don’t give it up
- predawn -Extended Mix-
- predawn (Instrumental)
- Don’t give it up (Instrumental)
Review
Normally when you hear the combination of Tokyo Girls’ Style and dance music, it is when there is a b-side on one of their singles containing a remix of one of their older songs. Or when the group does collaboration albums with other producers.
Starting from their 20th single, Shinkai, they adopted a more dancefloor-friendly sound. The trend continued through to their 21st single, Millefeuille and for their 22nd single, predawn, they dive head first into full EDM pop. If you are familiar with acts like Major Lazer or the Chainsmokers, you should know what type of sound to expect here.
predawn is outside of Tokyo Girls’ Style’s box. It isn’t a full-on peak-hour dance floor type of song. It tends to stick somewhere in a more relaxed BPM range that one would expect to hear from an opening set early in the evening. This tempo makes for a rather smooth transition for the group into an entirely different genre. Surprisingly TGS doesn’t sound out of place performing over this type of music.
The other track on this single Don’t give it up starts sounding like one of the more traditional mid-tempo pop songs Tokyo Girls’ Style has done in the past. That gradually changes until the song builds to a high-energy, uplifting dance track. While not as immediately enticing as predawn, Don’t give it up is another example of TGS reaching out of its comfort zone.
Ultimately, this single could be considered a turning point for Tokyo Girls’ Style. These two songs are probably the farthest they have gone away from their trademark sound. And that is not necessarily a bad thing. I would not mind if they continued in this direction for future singles. If not, going back to the well of what has worked for them in the past will do too.
