Haruomi Hosono

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LwA7I6Vs8M

i've got that on my phone, along with the six disc set of songs he wrote/produced for others, such an incredible amount of good shit in there, always fun when something you haven't heard yet comes up on shuffle

BIG rec for inoyamaland if you're into that cluster/harmonia sound

yeah mr nununu might as well do yourself a favor now and get both those Harmonia albums, you're bound to stumble on them eventually

I love the Cluster & Eno record -- I gather the Harmonia stuff is along those lines? Will look into that soon. (Incidentally, I was reading a recent Inoyama Land interview and one of the guys says Cluster & Eno is his favorite album of all time.) (And another by the way, I appreciate all the Kraftwerk suggestions above. Got three songs lined up to hear when the time is right.) (Also ripped all four YT videos above and slotted them onto my almost-broken walkman, so those'll get heard real soon.) (A Japanese comment on the Hosono song: "If you're from abroad and listening to this... you're some enthusiast!")

its better

Who is the "G.Miller" that wrote "Japanese Rhumba" according to the Paraiso liner notes?

Gerald
https://voices.pitt.edu/TeachersGuide/Unit8/JapaneseRumba.htm

Cool, thanks! I'd figured it was Hosono having fun with a piece of orientalism but the Japanese lyrics threw me.

Would listen to a comp of japanese GI songs.

Harry didn't write Fujiyama Mama either :)

Yeah i wonder if there is a comp around

Yah I knew that from that awesome Rhino 50's Rock & Roll box :)

Rhino should have made a GI songs box too.

But the Japanese verse in Fujiyama Mama IS Hosono's own, I think. The raunchiest of them all, as it happens.

I loved all the tracks linked just above, by the way (the other mid-'80s ambient productions, and that gloriously weird and edgy Hosono solo instrumental version of the Three Kingdoms song I knew as a vocal song from the 20th Century Pops box). Lately I'm busy being blown away by Medicine Compilation...

spiritual New Age is one of those things that's probably never coming back but yes HH was very good at it

still love to revisit this video every once in a while, very amused by the fact that once upon a time something like this could be a hit. can't question HH's dedication to it either I mean check out that ponytail. hopefully a reissue of this album isn't out of the question

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2safm8

also "Asatoya Yunta" is a traditional Okinawan folk song, so that's actually 3 covers on Paraiso. given 1978 was also the year of Cochin Moon, Pacific, and the YMO debut I guess he may not have had a whole lot of time for songwriting :) I actually have a few versions of that tune, I think if you compare it to Sakamoto's on Beauty you can hear the difference in how these guys think. RS's is really pretty and immaculately arranged of course, but HH is the one who really extracts the magic from it, doing it in a way that I'm guessing hadn't really been done before

In case anybody doubts my level of nerdy dedication to the Yellow Magic Orchestra cosmos, here's some actual math I did the other week. I was wondering whether, considering all those Paraiso covers, HoSoNoVa might not be a songwriting statement equal to Paraiso. Turns out, it isn't. But it's not *that* far off either. Okay and here's the math:

PARAISO
Tracklist space: 33% covers, 67% originals
Runtime: 25% covers, 75% originals

HOSONOVA
Tracklist space: 42% covers, 58% originals
Runtime: 40% covers, 60% originals

hah, I actually didn't know there were any originals on Hosonova. dunno if I've listened to that more than once though.

The video of Love, Peace & Trance is so good! I had no idea *that's* what that album would sound like. Really excited to explore Hosono's '90s now.

Are people here aware that he wrote and recorded a whole album for Chisato Moritaka in 1998? Basically everything but the actual vocals is him. And whatever instrumentation isn't him, is Miharu Koshi helping out. I've only let myself try the last two tracks so far but they both kick ass.

I love HoSoNoVa, frogbs (I let myself break with chronology because I was so curious what all the rearrangements on Flying Saucer 1947 would be like, and so fell in love with that album, and instantly needed more of that era...) It feels like he's come back full circle to his Happy End sound -- which I know is not what most people here love Hosono for, though. The covers are charming (if delivered very straight... probably too straight... but then again, I say that without having investigated the originals) but the originals are just great pieces of work. Catchy, atmospheric, sweet, heartfelt.

second disc is basically alternate versions of most of the album's themes - faster tempos, different instruments, stuff like that. one of them is a take on "Birdoj" from Endless Talking which confirms my suspicion that it was written for the soundtrack. the last 4 tracks are previously unheard compositions I think, one of which has a choir. last track is sort of a disco thing, it's hilariously weird

Gotta figure out if this is online somewhere. Just rewatched Night on the Galactic Railroad and not only can I confirm that Birdoj is on there, pretty much exactly as we hear it on The Endless Talking; it turns out Mercury Fall is also on the soundtrack. And there's a supremely beautiful track towards movie's end that I haven't heard elsewhere. Maybe it's on this CD2.

And by "on the soundtrack" I mean "in the film." Really gotta make a habit of stepping away from my ILX posts for five minutes before I hit "submit."

it might be - track 10 on the bonus CD could be it, it's the same tune but it sounds less 'sharp', almost as though it was played on a different model of keyboard. a lot of the second disc is like that, they don't feel like 'new' arrangements as much as they do the same tunes from the soundtrack transposed onto a different set of sounds. but there are some new takes on the title theme. it's not essential exactly but you may find it amusing. I can zip it to you if you like. otherwise it may be on Soulseek.

A zip would be great! I haven't managed to get Soulseek to work out here.

Speaking of 1985, Paradise View goes on climbing my list of favorites. Full of beautiful, eerie melodies.

And yeah, innarestingly, a lot of the songs that are actually played in the film are *not* quite the same arrangement that's on the soundtrack album.