The Otamatone is an electronic synthesizer shaped like an eighth note.
What is an otamatone? The otamatone is a cute Japanese synthesizer shaped like an eighth note with a face. You move your fingers along the stem to produce notes and squeeze the sides of the mouth to open it and add effects to the notes. Some people are ridiculously good at it.
There are tiny ones that are even cuter:
There are also many, many otamatone covers, and some of them are pretty great. Like this Gotye song that will be stuck in your head all day.
This classic 80s song and its excellent video by Ah-ha:
And, of course, the Imperial March.
They are a ton of fun to play with, even if, like me, you can't play anything that remotely resembles a song on it. You can get one that looks like Kirby or my personal favorite, Aggretsuko.
Previously: Of course there is a capybara café in Tokyo
