Japanese singer, songwriter, composer, and multi-instrumentalist Ichiko Aoba announces her new album, Luminescent Creatures, out 28th February 2025 via her imprint hermine, and shares its wondrously lucid lead single, ‘Luciférine.’ In conjunction, Ichiko announces a 2025 world tour, her biggest tour yet, which includes an exclusive London performance of the full album at The Barbican.
With ‘Luciférine,’ Ichiko introduces her central theory of Luminescent Creatures: bioluminescence, the light emitted by organisms such as deep-sea fishes. With fluttering textures lapping like the tide of the sea, twinkling pianos and sighing strings, in a productional glow, allowing Ichiko exquisite vocal to tiptoe through this fantastical, cinematic soundscape that channels the light and hope inside of all of us, it sounds heavenly. “Inside each of us,” she sings, “there is a place for our stars to sleep.” It conjures an image of creatures pouring off light like celestial bodies, lighting a path to close the distance between galaxies.
Ichiko has the power to bend space around her, pulling listeners from reality and surrounding them in the comforting fabric of her imagination. In recent years, she has tapped into the full breadth of her ability, marrying the classical guitar of her earlier work with lofty orchestral sweeps. Her previous album, 2020’s stunning Windswept Adan, was the soundtrack to an imaginary film about a girl who journeys from her home to the fantastical Adan Island.
For her anticipated follow-up, Luminescent Creatures, she opens an even wider portal into her mind, exploring the origin of life with dreamy musical vistas. “Luminescent Creatures was born from Windswept Adan,” Ichiko explains. “It began when I started wondering what happened after the protagonist of Windswept Adan disappeared along with the music of the island’s inhabitants. What would be left?”
The sea is immense and ancient, mirroring the harsh conditions that life sprang forth from—but it is also reminiscent, housing a deep record of fossils that once swam through its waters and recollections of how we’ve treated our planet. While visiting Japan’s Ryukyu Archipelago and conducting field research, Ichiko was enamored by the boundless beauty—and occasional terror—of the ocean. As she kept visiting the islands and talking with the local communities over months and years, it became something like an environmental survey. She started to notice the shape of coral reefs shifting over time, how they can be affected by the weather, and the way even remote locations can be battered by climate change. She’d go diving with only the breath in her lungs, submitting herself to the whims of the tides. “I feel unable to resist the pull of the ocean,” Ichiko says, “and know how easy it would be for my small body to be swallowed by the sea.” That contradiction, gentleness and power, instilled a sense of awe that is expressed in the soundscapes of Luminescent Creatures.
Ichiko has been making picturesque dioramas with only her voice and guitar since her debut at 19 years old. She is well known in Japan, having collaborated with artists like Haruomi Hosono, Cornelius, and the late Ryuichi Sakamoto. While Windswept Adan connected her with an international audience, the real driving force behind her ascent is her naturally captivating presence. Ichiko’s arresting solo performances are unassuming yet utterly transfixing. No matter where she performs, whether it’s an intimate venue, a festival like Big Ears, or Walt Disney Concert Hall, the entire room looks on in stunned silence, hanging on every breath. She sings in Japanese, but her delicate voice operates on an emotional frequency that pierces through language barriers and cultural divides.
Ichiko’s 2025 world tour in support of Luminescent Creatures will bring her back to the UK in March and April to play her biggest London headline show to date at The Barbican. Exclusive to London, Ichiko will perform the album for the first time ever out of Japan, joined by the London based 12 Ensemble. Tickets go on sale here this Friday at 10am local time.
Pre-order Luminescent Creatures
See Ichiko Aoba 2025 Tour Dates: here
