pinkifungus
I bought this album twice, one time by the Ghostly International page, and the next day, they made a sale on Bandcamp due to the Bandcamp friday, so I didn't want to miss the oportunity to have this on my bandcamp collection, specially when I can get different audio formats, so I bought it AGAIN, so yeah I really love this album
Favorite track: Only You.
deathdefying
the SHINBANGUMI movie and album are the pinnacle of budget filmmaking creativity and storytelling. and obviously the 80s Japan-America hybrid vhs aesthetic is just perfect. BUY THIS AND THEN WATCH THE DAMN THING
Favorite track: Take Me Back (Owakare No Jikan).
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Purchasable with gift card
Download available in 24-bit/96kHz.
$10USD or more
Limited edition VHS tape release for *SHINBANGUMI*, which follows his 2025 performances at Coachella and the airing of *SHINBANGUMI* on [adult swim]
The film combines all the music videos from the album into one cohesive story that builds upon the world Cameron Lew has been creating across his various releases.
*2 UNIT PER CUSTOMER LIMIT
Includes unlimited streaming of SHINBANGUMI
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Download available in 24-bit/96kHz.
ships out within 3 days
Purchasable with gift card
$30USDor more
VHS Tape
Limited edition VHS tape release for *SHINBANGUMI*, which follows his 2025 performances at Coachella and the airing of *SHINBANGUMI* on [adult swim]
The film combines all the music videos from the album into one cohesive story that builds upon the world Cameron Lew has been creating across his various releases.
Includes unlimited streaming of SHINBANGUMI
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Download available in 24-bit/96kHz.
Sold Out
Black Vinyl
Record/Vinyl + Digital Album
Includes unlimited streaming of SHINBANGUMI
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Download available in 24-bit/96kHz.
Sold Out
Cloud Vinyl
Record/Vinyl + Digital Album
Cloud Vinyl Includes “Ginger Root Plaza” Pop-out Paper Building!
Includes unlimited streaming of SHINBANGUMI
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Download available in 24-bit/96kHz.
Sold Out
CD
Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album
Includes unlimited streaming of SHINBANGUMI
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Download available in 24-bit/96kHz.
Sold Out
Cassette
Cassette + Digital Album
Includes unlimited streaming of SHINBANGUMI
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Step inside the world of Ginger Root. Cameron Lew makes it easy to do so; every considered detail is his own manifestation, written, designed, and executed as an all-encompassing diorama of sound and sight. A multi-instrumentalist, producer, songwriter, and visual artist from Southern California, Lew has crafted his project steadily since 2017, inviting a fervent and growing legion of fans into storylines drawn across mediums: captivating albums with accompanying films and globe-spanning tours. The Ginger Root sound — handmade yet immaculately polished synth-pop, alt-disco, boogie, and soul — takes shape through Lew's lens as an Asian-American growing up enamored by 1970s and '80s music, specifically the creative and cultural dialogue between Japanese City Pop and its Western counterparts from French Pop to Philly Soul to Ram-era McCartney. He spins his retro-minded influences and proliferates savvily in the present, synthesizing a songwriter's wit, an editor's eye, and a producer’s resource into something singular and modern. SHINBANGUMI, his long-awaited third LP, and Ghostly International debut set for physical release in 2024 with a visual album component, translates roughly to a new season of a show. It finds Lew more poised, idiosyncratic, and intentional than ever in a new chapter of life, unlocking "exactly what Ginger Root should sound and feel like," he says. "In terms of instrumentation and musicality, it's the first time that I felt very confident and comfortable with what everything should be comprised of. On the more personal side, I'm coming out of the last four years of writing, touring, and living as a different person; SHINBANGUMI is a platform to showcase my new self."
In parallel with the songs and his real-life artist story, unfolding across the sequential music video series, Lew resumes the conceptual narrative from his 2022 EP Nisemono, which follows Ginger Root as a newly-fired music supervisor in 1987 starting his own media conglomerate, Ginger Root Productions. "If you watch music videos one through eight, you'll be presented with a story that’s comparable to a traditional movie; something I've always wanted to do.” Splitting sessions between locations in Japan and back in Orange County, Lew paid extra attention to SHINBANGUMI’s track arrangement, tapping his close circle for input, including members of his live band and his longtime video collaborator, David Gutel. He sees the album’s arc in multiple acts, mapping the chronological listen with "just the right amount of like front-end punch and then letting you breathe, then sending you even faster in the middle section, and so on…I wanted to grab you by the collar in a good way and then not let you go until the last song."
"No Problems" acts as the opening title sequence and a bridge to new terrain, with its singable basslines, swaggering guitar riffs, and clever keyboard hooks calling back to past fan favorites now with expanded scope. "All the sonic logos of Ginger Root are in this song," Lew says. "Better Than Monday" pokes fun at our universal dread of the week’s reset and plays with expectations, starting in a crunchy lo-fi space before blasting into hi-fi splendor, a super-charged, bass-bending stomp that rides out on his reprise, "It's the waitin' that you do (whatcha doin?)."
What makes Ginger Root special is the project's ability to weave influence beyond pastiche into a bigger picture, exploring that rarified pop pleasure center where referential meets refreshing. "There Was A Time" honors the homespun melody-making of his favorite solo Beatle (early ‘70s Paul). Thinking about the song's utility within the overall sequence, like a scene break, Lew sought to write a lighter pop song. It doubles as the sweet wind-up for "All Night," a four-on-the-floor burner, a Ginger Root club cut albeit still with live instrumentation, inspired by his friend's seemingly endless night out in Paris. "This was my one attempt at writing a track that you can bump all night, but being the introvert that I am, I couldn't write it about me."
With "Only You," Lew delivers his first straightforward take on the oft-cited genre: "I wanted to sit down and be in the mindset of, if I were to write a true City Pop song, what would I want it to sound like?” The result is an anthem brimming with deep bass disco grooves, shimmering synth glissandos, and a howling outro from the school of Prince and Chaka Khan. Meanwhile, the infectious and uncharacteristically guitar-driven "Giddy Up" stems from Lew’s love for The B-52s and Devo. Unpacking the message, he adds, "It could be a relationship with something, a passion, a project or whatever. If you want to do it, you gotta giddy up, buckle in, pull your boots up, and go for it." For "Kaze," recorded on a dusty drum kit in a karaoke bar in the middle of Tokyo's Asakusa district, he evokes the Tin Pan Alley sound of a hero, Harry Hosono (Yellow Magic Orchestra).
Lew considers "Show 10" the spiritual heart of the record, the track that reminded him why he keeps Ginger Root going. Towards the end of his last album season, Lew recalls one night when tour fatigue was setting in, feeling like he didn't want to play the same set again: “I remember walking out into the crowd and seeing all the people who had high hopes for this show. I was like, man, you know, I've got to give it 10. I've got to show people my best." And with SHINBANGUMI, he has.
Imaginal Disk quickly became one of my favorite albums of all time despite being my first exposure to Magdalena Bay. There are no misses here, just some of the best psychedelic pop music I've ever heard, one after the other. Simply amazing <3 croonsy
The Melbourne artist and her band make a stellar first impression with a buoyant debut combining folk, funk, soul and indie rock. Bandcamp New & Notable Apr 3, 2025
If indie pop went on a date with grunge, it would sound like London band Flowers' contribution to Slumberland's singles series. Bandcamp New & Notable Oct 8, 2020
