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(More customer reviews)If I had to make a recommendation as to what two Ryuichi Sakamoto albums to purchase, they would have to be "1996" (a beautiful collection of his more recent work, in trio form no less) and the somewhat out-of-print "Soundbytes" (a U.S. compilation of his solo keyboard pieces from the '80s, otherwise available only via Japanese import.) "Soundbytes" portrays Sakamoto as a prophet of the state of electronica in 1994 (the album's release date), with his use of ambient and borrowed sound, unfamiliar textures and timbres, strong repetition and punctuated rhythm, and a certain "Futurist" concept in mind. "1996", meanwhile, relies on the other side of Sakamoto's musical personality that surfaces most readily in his movie soundtracks - beautiful melodies, nuanced chord and harmonic progression, both exaggerated and latent emotion - in an elegantly arranged piano/cello/violin trio that simply flows from track to track.
Most of these pieces are Sakamoto's best known work: the film score highlights. A couple are taken from the "Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence" and "The Last Emperor" scores - yet gain either an acoustic reinterpretation (in the former) or a more intimate, chamber music affect (in the latter). The others are from mostly independent features, whereupon he here saves us the trouble of searching desperately for their respective soundtracks.
Other pieces are reappropriated into the extremely well-executed solo work "Smoochy" (1997), introducing the listener to his latest foray in popular music. "Aoneko no Torso" yields a nicely restrained performance in the later album, yet listening to a pseudo-trip-hop "Bibo no Aozora," including Ryuichi on vocals and Arto Lindsay on the guitar, especially after hearing the trio version, was truly mind-blowing.
"1919" is a new piece that yields a certain paranoia and intensity, using repetition as the primary means of conveying emotion (a la "Soundbytes"). It was most impressive seeing him recently perform this piece on a MIDI-enabled Disklavier in Los Angeles, where he began playing "out of phase" with himself, a Steve Reich technique. And he also pulls out some old favorites (as he did "Replica" from "Cinemage" and "Tong Poo" from "BTTB"): the avant-garde-ish "M.A.Y. in the Backyard" and "A Tribute to NJP" (which, interestingly, was originally a piano/sax/clarinet trio and performed with a certain jazz/Impressionist repose) are from his "Illustrated Musical Encyclopedia" (1984). His intro piece, "A Day a Gorilla Gives a Banana", is to my knowledge first performed on "Media Bahn Live" (1986) - perhaps the most unaltered of all the pieces.
Long story short: good album.
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1996Featuring 16 Tracks Including High Heels (Main Theme), Rain (Last Emperor Soundtrack), Merry Christmas Mr. Lawremce, Before Long, Acceptance, and Others.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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