Japanese/British quartet Re:O have honed a fascinating and diverse sound that fuses a wide range of sounds, from dark pop and J-Pop to rock and metal, and they describe as “dark, energetic and intricate.”
The Re:O story begins when vocalist Rio Suyama was living in her homeland of Japan in 2020. She went in search of bandmates after her previous band split up, partly due to the Covid situation and partly because it was hard to find people with the same musical passion and tastes. She began learning to create music through tutorials on YouTube and, in her words: “At first, the music I was writing was really horrible, to me it just wasn’t something I was proud of or something I wanted to listen to but I continued to write and improve my composing and producing skills.”
Rio initially released two songs under the project name RIØ, which she tells us “were really simplistic and reflect where I was on my production journey at the time.” Her music writing ability improved and, later in 2020, she released Sorrow’s Silhouette, which she was much happier with, telling us: “It was a much more intricate composition with more layered synths and drums working together with the melodies to portray the dark ambience and contrast my vocals.” That was followed by the release of GUILD, which garnered radio play played on international stations like BBC Radio 1.
Rio moved to the UK in 2022 to have more live venues to perform in and take her music to the next level. As she explains: “I wanted to take this from a solo project and form a band to push my creative ability further by adding different instrumentation in live performances using acoustic drums, bass and guitar to add to the already existing dark pop style I found myself composing. I managed to play some shows and start recording an EP at the end of 2022 but, due to creative differences and commitments outside of music, the lineup I had at this time fell apart.”
Rio met bassist James Wright at the studio where she’d recorded her initial EP. Fast forward to 2023, they teamed up to form Re:O with guitarist Jon Roberts and drummer Jay Stevens. And the quartet has swiftly honed a sound that fuses everything from J-Pop to Metal.
As Rio tells us: “We have discussed this a lot as a band. It is very hard to categorise our music as one music genre. I am a Synth junkie, so I like listening to EDM, Drum and Bass, Industrial Techno and electronic music but at the same time I like heavy music like industrial rock and metal, metalcore, rock and alternative metal. I am influenced by various music, so the music naturally has all the elements I am influenced by.
“I would say our music is like pop goes industrial metal. But honestly, we have no idea. Some of our fans have described us as ‘Japancore’ at a few of our shows, stating it’s a blend of industrial metal, J-Pop, dark pop and metalcore. If you have any idea what genre we are, let us know, because we don’t have a clue, but honestly, we like it that way. We like that it’s not categorised into a single box.”
Our latest taste of this is their new single The Haunted, which was released on Friday and portrays a heavier edge to the Re:O sound. The track opens up with a dark intro of chunky guitars under a funky little synth lick. Laid-back vocals come in over stabbing guitars and build towards a big singalong chorus “Is this all that I’m worth, My cold blood soaked Earth, Is there nothing more that I deserve, All I ever wanted, Was a place that I could call my own, To belong, To feel guarded, I am the haunted.” A second chorus gives way to guitars and a pulsing synth then driving drums, before the pace drops to set up a final blast of the chorus.
On the track, Rio told us: “Every time we release a new song, I am always nervous to show our fans what we’ve been working on, but in a good way! It’s terrifying not knowing how it’ll be received, but knowing that I love what I’m about to show them. It’s simultaneously the worst part of writing music and the best part. I am looking forward to hearing what people think about this song as this has more metal elements and the darker side of our music compared to our previous songs. It got darker and heavier, a lot like Ronin when we released it, but goes further.” Check it out in the lyric video here:
The Haunted is the third single released this year, following on from Stains On My Soul and Ronin. The former has more of a synthpop feel with mellow verses building into big catchy choruses supported by chunky guitars and synths. While Ronin opens up with cool synths that are joined by stabbing guitars and synths. Rio’s vocals are supported by a bassline then guitars and synths as it builds in intensity towards a big chorus. Check it out in the lyric video here:
As alluded to, the Re:O sound encompasses a wide range of influences, as Rio says: “There’s no particular musicians or bands I aim to be like or that have a singular influence on me but my favourite artists at the minute are Nine Inch nails, REZZ, Bad Omens, Spiritbox and Grimes.”
And on what inspires them to write music, she explains: “We write music that we would put on our own playlist. Be that some blood-pumping metal or some of the more poppier and tamer songs like GUILD, we just write what sounds good to us and would make us crank up the volume if the song started playing on our playlists.
“When it comes to lyrical content, we pick a variety of themes, mainly from experiences we’ve had, including struggles with mental health, traumatic events or sometimes just topics we want to raise awareness of. For example, The Haunted is, at its core, about depression, feeling isolated and self-blame. The song stems from how a few of us in the band have experienced chronic depression and, even though you may feel like you’re getting better, it still lingers and haunts you and affects everything you do, how you feel and your relationships with others. It explores these themes and aims to tell those experiencing this that they’re not alone and hopefully give them some strength to keep going and create a better future for themselves whilst providing some support for them through our music as music has done for us.”
There’s plenty more to come from Re:O, including two more singles to be released in early to mid-2025. They’ll also be heading into the studio to record more tracks and hope to get a few slots on festivals for next year. You can see Re:O before then as they play the Macbeth in Hoxton, London next Friday (29 November), Dalton’s in Brighton on 21 December and The Fleece in Bristol on 26 January. Tickets for all their gigs are available here.
And Rio adds: “Thank you to everyone that’s joining us on this journey, everyone that listens to our music, everyone that’s come to our shows and supports us by buying our merch. It truly means everything to us and we can’t thank you enough.”
You can follow Re:O on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and check out their music on Spotify, Bandcamp, Apple Music, Soundcloud and YouTube.
Listen to Re:O and more new music on our Spotify playlists GigRadar Rock and GigRadar Electro
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