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Jan 19, 2022 By Mark Redfern

Japanese Breakfast (aka Michelle Zauner) released a new album, Jubilee, last year via Dead Oceans (it was our #1 album of 2021). Last night she was the musical guest on The Late Late Show with James Corden, where performed the album’s “Slide Tackle” with a horn section. She was also interviewed by Corden about being nominated for two Grammys and playing Coachella this year. Watch the performance and interview below.

Japanese Breakfast was on the cover of our last print issue (buy a copy directly from us here). Read our cover story interview here.

Stream Jubilee here. Read our rave review of the album here.

When Jubilee was announced Zauner shared its first single, “Be Sweet” (which was #1 on our Songs of the Week), and would later go on to perform it on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. Then she shared a self-directed video for the album’s second single “Posing in Bondage,” which was also #1 on our Songs of the Week list. Then she shared its third single, “Savage Good Boy,” via a self-directed video in which she co-starred with actor Michael Imperioli of The Sopranos. “Savage Good Boy” was #2 on our Songs of the Week list. When the album was released, epic album closer “Posing For Cars,” was again #1 on our Songs of the Week list. Then she performed three songs from the album on CBS This Morning and was interviewed on the show. Then she performed “Paprika” on Jimmy Kimmel Live!.

In a previous press release, Zauner had this to say about her new album: “I’ve never wanted to rest on any laurels. I wanted to push it as far as it could go, inviting more people in and pushing myself as a composer, a producer, an arranger.”

Zauner’s previous album, Soft Sounds From Another Planet, came out in July 2017 on Dead Oceans and was one of our Top 100 Albums of 2017.

Read our 2017 interview with Japanese Breakfast on Soft Sounds From Another Planet.

In April 2021, Zauner put out her debut memoir, Crying In H Mart, on Knopf. The book debuted at #2 on The New York Times’ Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers List. Crying in H Mart is partly about the death of Zauner’s mother to cancer and how the two bonded over Korean food. It has since been announced that the book is being adapted into a feature film by MGM’s Orion Pictures. Japanese Breakfast is also doing the music for the film, which will be produced by Stacey Sher and Jason Kim. Read our review of Crying In H Mart.

Also, last September Japanese Breakfast’s soundtrack for the video game Sable was released, the same date the game was due out. In June a trailer for the game was released that featured part of a new Japanese Breakfast song, “Better the Mask.”

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