Shiina Ringo will participate in Tomita Lab's new album

Update: Inserted the tracklist and other tidbits revealed through Natalie.mu.

Continuing with the collaborations that have marked most of the last years in Ringo's career, there is news of yet another project.

This time, producer Tomita Keiichi, known as Tomita Lab, requested her participation in his upcoming 4th studio album: Joyous. It was revealed that Ringo will lend her voice to 3 different tracks, and also her lyricist skills in one of them, "Yasashii Tetsugaku".

Joyous will have the participation of 3 other vocalists: Yuko Hara (Southern All-Stars' pianist), Yokoyama Ken (Crazy Ken Band) and Sakaiyuu. The album will have two editions: first-press and normal-press. The first-press will come with 2 CDs, the second of which will contain instrumental versions of the songs from the first CD (8 tracks in total). The first CD will have 10 tracks.

Title: Joyous
Release Date: 23.10.2013
01 - やさしい哲学 feat. 椎名林檎 (Yasashii Tetsugaku)
03 - 都会の夜 わたしの街 feat. 原 由子, 横山 剣, 椎名林檎, さかいゆう (Tokai no Yoru, Watashi no Machi)
09 - この世は不思議 feat. 原 由子, 横山剣, 椎名林檎, さかいゆう(Kono Yo wa Fushigi)

Bonus Disc:
02 - やさしい哲学 -Instrumental-
04 - 都会の夜 わたしの街 -Instrumental-
08 - この世は不思議 -Instrumental-

For a bit of related trivia, Tomita Lab arranged Yumi Matsutoya's cover of "Kaede", in the Sweets for my Spitz covers compilation album. Ringo participated in that album with a cover of "Spica".

There is room for speculation too: is this a new path for Ringo? Considering how Kameda has been producing most of her releases since a long time, is she trying to work with different people now? Maybe Tomita Lab?

She has done a awful lot of collaborating in this year already and, after Jihen's break-up, I think that means a lot. Let's see how it goes after the 15th anniversary shows in November.