RFI: Yellow Magic Orchestra

City pop in a non vaporwave, irony free way has definitely been making some kind of small comeback among Japanese musicians and producers it seems.

Toki Asako's new record Pink for instance is pretty upfront about it, using producer Tomi Yo who is regarded a a big City Pop stan.

Okay I always try to resist mentioning mine and my friends little radio show and sounding like a shill but I've caved in, mainly because we do play a lot of late 70s early 80s stuff of this stripe and the inevitability of a YMO connection is at the running joke stage, particularly Hosono.

It seems the more we keep digging the more great stuff we find that they've had a hand in somehow, be it mentoring, producing, releasing, guesting, it's madness and unending.

Kate NV's album "Binasu" has that Hosono-produced Miharu Koshi vibe all over it (did I already mention this upthread. If so - sorry).

The YMO-produced rabbithole can be a great one to fall into. For me the Akiko Yano albums that had YMO - or iterations of - playing with Sakamoto producing are the top example of how wonderful this stuff can be.
Hosono-produced stuff can go from shiny, glorious synth/sample based pop to fairly standard commercial production. As the '90s loomed the guys seemed to fall in love with cheesy "rave" sonics and lost much of their charm. I like the glitchy "clicks-n-cuts" approach of HASYMO and the Hosono/Takahashi collabs of the early '00s but - again - they seem to have gotten stuck in this sound, or at least Sakamoto has, for the last 10 years or so.

more ppl need to hear binasu

I will confess I am struggling a bit with Hosono's singing voice. Assuming I'm alone on this one?

it took me a while but now i love his weird voice

There's a ... a...."Sesame Street" quality to his voice that I find comforting.

Kate NV's album "Binasu" has that Hosono-produced Miharu Koshi vibe all over it (did I already mention this upthread. If so - sorry).

frogbs mentioned it earlier:
RFI: Yellow Magic Orchestra

and i fucking love that album. it's one of my favorites of 2016 in retrospect

Oh yeah! Thanks frogbs - I discovered "Binasu" through that post!

me too! i have found very little about NV elsewhere. i have no clue who she is but whatever she releases next is my most anticipated release

Never had a problem with Harry's voice, it took me a long time to get used with Yukihiro's excessive Bowie/Ferry/Sylvian style though.

Oh man, this thread has got me looping Hosono's 'Pleocene' over and over, it's truly the best thing ever.

Recent Kate NV interview. there's a cool solo live set up on YT as well - just her and a couple of instruments doing "Binasu" stuff. And she's gorgeous.

http://thequietus.com/articles/19916-nv-glintshake-kate-shilonosova-interview

Actually meant to post this recent interview. Other link is a year old.

http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/a-glimpse-of-alternative-russia-through-the-music-of-kate-nv

Binasu is the only time I've gotten the Hosono vibe from an album that he wasn't directly or indirectly involved with. It's such an odd thing to replicate - all of Hosono's work feels surreal and strange to me, even when he's not trying to be. He's kind of on another planet.

Never heard Hiroshi Sato before, kind of amazing there are YMO-related albums I haven't heard yet given my decade-plus obsession with tracking everything down. So much good stuff there. Glad Akiko Yano was mentioned b/c her stuff is seriously amazing, even outside the YMO-collab period. She can really sing too. This song - so freakin great. Plus that has got to be one of the best album covers ever.

https://youtu.be/-MK9V7S3XuQ?t=12m

I have dug around for YMO-related albums for years and I can tell you the three I think are the best.

god, I couldn't even imagine paring it down to three. Hosono's Paraiso would definitely be the first one though.

How do you guys rate Pacific?

Hosono-produced stuff can go from shiny, glorious synth/sample based pop to fairly standard commercial production. As the '90s loomed the guys seemed to fall in love with cheesy "rave" sonics and lost much of their charm. I like the glitchy "clicks-n-cuts" approach of HASYMO and the Hosono/Takahashi collabs of the early '00s but - again - they seem to have gotten stuck in this sound, or at least Sakamoto has, for the last 10 years or so.

yea this is pretty much spot on. so weird hearing Hosono do straight techno stuff in the mid 90's, still kind of strange though. Medicine Compilation (not actually a compilation) has some great stuff on it. N.D.E. I never got into. Sakamoto fell into some bad habits in the early 90's too, trying to do overly commercial pop stuff that IMO just wasn't very good. not surprising that the YMO reunion album was kind of a dud. for what it's worth Takahashi had a bit of a career renaissance in the 90's; his late 80's period is where he really fell off, but from like '95 on he really seemed to find himself again. he has a song that's like a half-cover of Underworld's "Jumbo", it's incredible.

really wish Sketch Show would've gone beyond the two albums. I thought Loophole was really special.

Pacific is bad smooth ez jazz "fusion" (speaking as someone who likes that kind of stuff) BUT the early version of "cosmic surfing" (the only electronic song on the album) is vital to the YMO story

Love "Loophole". To me the last great YMO tune was this
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mnPkiVRbJts

omg no pacific is the best kind of library jazz

to each his own, it gets much too "sweet" for my tastes

yeah, was hoping more for American Garage circa Metheny vibes but listening now, it's nowhere near as awesome as that. Not hating it though, it might perfectly slot into my life at a late date, but right now there's too much other stuff on this thread to binge on

I'd highly recommend asami kado's la fleur bleue. takahashi produced that one & it's basically the optimal ver of his more sentimental style. great record.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFIJtZjISWo

he does backing vocals on this too right? definitely sounds like a number of YT tunes.

I'm guessing most of you have heard this, but if not - Akiko Yano's "Rose Garden" is on another planet. Up there with anything YMO themselves did.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRSm1osRINo

sure sounds like it but I've never been able to find a physical copy for a reasonable price :-/

tadaima is so great.

anyone familiar with her stuff from the 90s on? I caught her live a few years ago and it was she was def in jazzy singer songwriter mode. it was fun but I for sure gravitate towards her electronic records & I get the sense that's the style for much of her later material. but I'd be interested in some highlights if anyone knows this stuff.

mega dated 90s fun with photoshop techno cover for go girl is making me want to start there:
https://www.discogs.com/Akiko-Yano-Go-Girl/release/3731210

These Miharu Koshi records may be of related interest too, if you didn't already know them.

there are some really cool music videos of her on youtube

You may want to check out the yanokami records then - a collab between her and Rei Harakami. sadly Harakami passed on at a rather young age. Here's a cover of Sylvian/Sakamoto's "Bamboo Music", with Yoshinori Sunahara (ex-Denki Groove, now in METAFIVE) taking over Harakami's role:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WnjiGYxsRI

the other song I found from that performance is great too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZG8OjWhFMlE

For the most part I don't know her 90's stuff too well - I think I've heard her 91 album Love Life and it was incredibly pretty, as is basically everything she's done. But if you're looking for more stuff like Tadiama that ain't it. Her latest (Welcome to Jupiter) is full of younger collaborators and seems very interesting, but I've only heard a couple tracks (which were great). In general she seems like the sort of artist who has a lot of great stuff but you have to know which albums are which since there are a lot of solo piano and covers discs in her catalogue.

mega dated 90s fun with photoshop techno cover for go girl is making me want to start there:
https://www.discogs.com/Akiko-Yano-Go-Girl/release/3731210

that reminds me, there is a sort-of guide here - not updated since 2005 though
http://technopop.info/ay.html

Go Girl

(@) 99.8.4 Epic cd: ESCB 2006

This one has sort of high tech album art. While not at all old fashioned, its not the sort of techno collage music the cover looks like. It was recorded with American musicians and Jeff Bova (the Hammonds) co-produces about half the album with her (she the other half, he shows up on most tracks). Her son Futa Sakamoto sings backup on a track. Enjoyable, plenty of synths, though no, as I like to call them, synth thrills.

Why hasn't more Japanese music spread on digital paysites? I did see P-Model's Perspective and Another Game was released two years ago on mp3.

I'd guess it's bc japan's record industry has been slow to adapt to streaming services in general. there was almost nothing on spotify a few years ago unless labels outside of japan put out the records (e.g. sakamoto). but I've been noticing that newer acts are frequently on there lately. noticed just about all of the suiyoubi no campanella catalog went up when their first major label record dropped, presumably bc they are being marketed towards a younger demographic? (catalog acts like ymo, yano, etc. are still largely absent.)

and thank you for the yanokami rec! familiar w/yano & harakami (r.i.p.) but not this collaboration. cool!

it's been strange to see things pop up on the US iTunes store that has no Western presence whatsoever - the new Denki Groove album just went up on there, I also found the latest by Yasuyuki Okamura (!!) and Ryukyudisko (!!!). strange because this is not stuff you'd normally find on file sharing services, or even what.cd when that was up. it's funny to search through all the usual channels and come up empty and then to be like...oh, it's on iTunes

The Denki Groove album is on amazon too.

And for supreme Hosono production beauty you can't pass up Chiemi Manabe. It's criminal how much this album goes for on Discogs. This def. needs a quality vinyl reisssue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BcacNcpQ3c

Rei Harakami's own records are all pretty great too, particularly 'Lust'

anyone familiar with her stuff from the 90s on? I caught her live a few years ago and it was she was def in jazzy singer songwriter mode. it was fun but I for sure gravitate towards her electronic records & I get the sense that's the style for much of her later material. but I'd be interested in some highlights if anyone knows this stuff.

I love 2004's Honto No Kimochi, a really great mixture of styles even getting close to some raucous Number Girl style guitar pop, also featuring Harakami on a couple of tracks.

that sounds great. will check it out soon, thank you!

how is the new denki groove? they're all p good, so I imagine that it's at least p good

XP - Welcome, ping an mail to my profile address (not the webmail link) and I'll send it to you.

I'm saving it for a bit later :) but the samples I've heard have been good. the album title seems to give away the album's overall sound

I'm probably not the guy to ask though since I love pretty much everything they've done, so I'm just gonna say that yes, it's excellent.

cool :)

and xp - appreciate that but I have a copy. gave it a cursory listen yesterday. 行かないで is beautiful. will need to spend some more time w/it.

also randomly tried out yano's elephant hotel, and wow, some really great songs on here. super eclectic; working in a large variety of styles & sounds. sounds like a lot of session players to me. very nice.

here's something I happened across - a cover of Hosono's "Sports Men" by Kimonos, a duo featuring Leo Imai. covering Hosono's stuff is tough but I think they nailed it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gi8futLRbM

Sports Men is one of my favourite Hosono solo tracks and that's a really fantastic cover

just want to say that I totally love the two yanokami albums & thanks for the rec frogbs

no problem - they're definitely very cool albums

by the way I've been really digging the new Denki Groove...it's longer and less refined than anything they've done since their comeback, with a number of extended tracks and a lot of great melodies (as usual). definitely going on my year end list.

Another great member of the YMO family is Masayoshi Takanaka:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xv_YC56zq4c

He was the guitarist on YMO's first (and best, I think) album. The song above has Sakamoto on keys, and while discogs doesn't credit him for writing or arrangement, it's clear he co-wrote the song. Compare it to Tong Poo and Sakamoto's influence is unmistakable.

Here's another with Sakamoto on keys.

Here's a rare example of all four YMO members coming together on a non-YMO album. Even Matsutake is on this one:

Rajie - Giraffe Landscapes (1979) -- you can hear Tong Poo again, Behind the Mask, the elements are there. Unmistakably YMO.

just snagged this during last night shopping spree

http://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/ijcAAOSwo3pWctwE/s-l200.jpg
http://www.ebay.com/itm/YELLOW-MAGIC-ORCHESTRA-YMO-YMO-USA-YELLOW-MAGIC-ORCHESTRA-2-VINYL-LP-NEW-/332158065189

Lucky you, that's the best YMO album. That pre-Jpop YMO is so embedded in every anime and NES soundtrack. Japanese to the core.

YMO user's guide in Wire issue 404

Cool, I might keep an eye out for that.