the mood of “rydeen” is particular is very LETS GOOOOOOO!!! what a tune.
― brimstead, Friday, 29 March 2024 14:58 (one month ago) link
So apparently, when they were making BGM, Hosono asked Sakamoto to write a new song in the vein of Thousand Knives. Sakamoto said, "Fuck you. Why don't you just put Thousand Knives on it then?"
― TheNuNuNu, Wednesday, 24 April 2024 22:15 (one week ago) link
Extensive 2020 interview with Hideki Matsutake!
https://www.electricityclub.co.uk/logic-system-interview/
I love that Hosono kept the Infinite Space Octave in mind for THREE YEARS.
― TheNuNuNu, Friday, 26 April 2024 00:53 (five days ago) link
Everyone. Single favorite Yellow Magic Orchestra song. Go!
If the Tong Poo > La Femme Chinoise > Bridge Over Troubled Music > Mad Pierrot > Acrobat suite counts as a single song, then that's the one. The debut is not my favorite YMO album but Side B is definitely my favorite album side.
If not, then it's gotta be Gradated Gray -- one of Hosono's most soulful vocal performances (AND one of his best sets of lyrics), plus that insane -- subtle, ghostly -- band arrangement. If Technodelic as an album is the apogee of the three in full-on-collaborative mode, Gradated Gray is the apogee of that collaboration WITHIN the album. The drums in the chorus destroy me (that little kick-snare combo: "every minute..." kick SNARE). And the vocal melody at the end! Mixed quieter than the main vocals, like they're intentionally encouraging you to listen in. "To where... gray meets white. To where..."
Frogbs, is it still your favorite too?
― TheNuNuNu, Tuesday, 30 April 2024 03:53 (yesterday) link
that song definitely connected with me during a long drive - there's that line "my car radio's playing a song, that makes me feel very strange"...like yeah I'm listening to it right now. I agree there's something about how everything lines up in that song that feels a bit strange, it's very precise but feels a bit backwards. it's probably still my favorite, so long as you can't pick an entire album side :)
I also like the Sketch Show arrangement of it. fun to see them actually play it so you get a sense of what the band members are actually doing. the added guitars in the chorus are really something.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6JaenTfVnQ
and then, 10 years after, this countrified, sorta jazzy arrangement. amusingly without even watching the video I can tell that's Harry on piano. his playing is not unlike it was on the Monad albums.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-NjSg54eNSM
― frogbs, Tuesday, 30 April 2024 13:57 (yesterday) link
I-in my defense, Side B of the debut is seamless! And each song is the exact same tempo! (And as such, the proggiest the band got?)
Gonna check those out soon. I didn't realize the song stayed in live rotation.
― TheNuNuNu, Tuesday, 30 April 2024 15:10 (yesterday) link
Also -- after frogbs called the Technopolis fade-out to my attention, (with everything fading out early, but Takahashi's drums playing on at full volume), I realized that Absolute Ego Dance ends the same way: the other instruments fade first, the drums stay (along with some percussive odds & ends). And then Rydeen is the exact opposite, the drums drop out first, and everything else keeps going for a while -- as if paving way for the (relative) quiet of Castalia.
― TheNuNuNu, Tuesday, 30 April 2024 15:14 (yesterday) link
Side B of the debut is interesting to me since all 3 tunes do clearly go together but they were all written by different members. They never really did anything like that since. I think back then the band was just supposed to be a one-off on a sort of gimmicky concept so they were all going outside of their usual styles and clearly having a lot of fun with it. in YT's solo catalogue you'll hear songs like Nice Age or Ballet or Cue, but not La Femme Chinoise. nothing Hosono did really sounds like Mad Pierrot.
― frogbs, Tuesday, 30 April 2024 16:50 (yesterday) link
The After Service version of “La Femme Chinoise”
― brimstead, Tuesday, 30 April 2024 17:47 (yesterday) link
For my OPO
Taiso for me, but it's only a hair ahead of like 20 other songs of equal stature, imho.
― Maresn3st, Tuesday, 30 April 2024 22:23 (yesterday) link