Sundaze 1531

Hello, ah yes overslept big time, sometimes these joints really have it in them...

Today another post on the Japanese musician, activist, composer, record producer, writer, singer, pianist, and actor based in Tokyo and New York. Gaining major success in 1978 as a member of the electronic music group Yellow Magic Orchestra, Sakamoto served on keyboards and sometimes vocals. He concurrently pursued a solo career, if ever anyone painted pictures with sound, Ryuichi Sakamoto supercedes them all. Hardly surprising then he's delivered some great soundtracks, but here today some of his nineties work to   .... N'joy

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Ryuichi Sakamoto (born January 17, 1952 in Tokyo, Japan) studied at the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music, where he graduated with a BA in composition, and a Master's degree with special emphasis electronic and ethnic music. Sakamoto began his career in the late 1970s, working as a composer, arranger and producer with some of Japan's most popular rock, jazz and classical artists. He released his first solo album in 1978 but came to fame as a member of Japanese synth-rock outfit Yellow Magic Orchestra with co-founders Haruomi Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi. He collaborated with David Sylvian on a number of singles and most of Sylvian's albums.

 He appeared in the 1983 Nagisa Oshima film Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence alongside British rock singer David Bowie; he also wrote the film's musical score. He won the Academy Award for his score to the 1987 Bernardo Bertolucci film The Last Emperor, and has also won two Golden Globe Awards for his work as a film composer.In addition, he also composed music for the 1992 Barcelona Olympics opening ceremony. In the early 1990s, he briefly reunited with YMO, playing an instrumental role in the techno and acid house movements of the era, before parting ways again shortly afterwards.

 His 1999 musical composition "Energy Flow", also known as the alternative title of the single disc Ura BTTB, was the first number-one instrumental single in Japan's Oricon charts history. He has also occasionally worked on anime and video games, as a composer as well as a scenario writer. In the late 2000s, he reunited once again with YMO, while continuing to compose film music.

Since 78 he has released almost 90 albums (solo & soundtrack) , on top of that 2 dozen collaboration albums and YMO 33 years 110+ albums , every 16 weeks an album for 33 years, amazing workethic, puts lots of artists to shame. The 2007 jpg shows a 55 year old man that has greyed considerably, but he looks sharp and balanced into the lens back at you.

 He is also known as a critic of copyright law, arguing that it is antiquated in the information age. He is a member of anti-nuclear organization Stop Rokkasho. Married life obviously suffered and he has been unattached for most of his career, still he has two daughters one of which has stepped into her parents career (mother=Akiko Yano), the J-pop singer Miu Sakamoto.

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If eclectic is your bag, then Heartbeat might be your thing. Like Hector Zazou, Ryuichi Sakamoto employs a realm of many styles on this upbeat collection. Songs performed in Japanese, Russian, French, and English (by friends Youssou N'Dour, David Sylvian, and Deee-Lite's DJ Towa Towa and Super DJ Dmitri) top an already brimming album that is everything its predecessor, Beauty, wasn't. Two completely different versions of the title track add arty spice. "Triste" is a wonderful, lazy-afternoon stroll in Paris jazz; "Lulu" follows suit. Is there no end to this Sakamoto's talent? He does jazz, rap, and chucks in a couple of solo piano pieces reminiscent of his soundtrack work. "Songlines" came about via his score for Pedro Almodovar's High Heels. "Boram Gal" and "High Tide" -- with guests Youssou N'Dour and Arto Lindsay, respectively -- are both delicate and swathed in summer. Ingrid Chavez adds poet's fire to frozen dust on "Returning to the Womb" and contributes eerie funk on "Cloud #9."

Ryuichi Sakamoto - Heartbeat (flac 283mb)

01 Heartbeat 4:46
02 Rap The World 4:53
03 Triste 4:23
04 Lulu 4:19
05 High Tide 4:47
06 Song Lines 2:56
07 Nuages 2:15
08 Sayonara 5:24
09 Borom Gal 3:59
10 Epilogue 3:42
11 Heartbeat (Tainai Kaiki II) - Returning To The Womb 5:20
12 Cloud #9 5:17

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Sweet Revenge is an amazingly sophisticated album in which Sakamoto sets the distinctive and heart-rending chordal and harmonic ideas of his soundtrack work to trip-hop and neo-bossa-nova beats. The songs are fronted by a succession of guest vocalists who each contribute lyrics which add up to an amazingly coherent whole--a mature meditation on love, longing, conflict, revenge and regret. As usual, Sakamoto was ahead of his time. By spotlighting the deep poetry of J-ME and Latasha Natasha Diggs, this 1994 album anticipated by years the introspective hip-hop diva trend popularized by Lauryn Hill. This is a moody album, by turns dark and sublime. It seems to age better than his equally brilliant 80s pop efforts like Neo-Geo, which can sound pretty dated in spots. With this in mind, I'll venture that this is Sakamoto's best pop album since YMO.

Ryuichi Sakamoto - Sweet Revenge (flac 285mb)

01 Tokyo Story 1:16
02 Moving On 5:45
03 Sentimental 5:56
04 Regret 5:38
05 Pounding At My Heart 5:32
06 Love & Hate 5:27
07 Sweet Revenge 4:07
08 7 Seconds 3:33
09 Same Dream, Same Destination 4:04
10 Interruptions 4:51
11 Water's Edge 5:20

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Inspired by both Brazilian music and the boundless possibilities of the Internet, electronic composer Ryuichi Sakamoto wrote Smoochy, an endlessly intriguing exploration of what happens when the old world meets the future. Using his Brazilian Internet concept as a foundation, Sakamoto goes on to add a variety of other musics, including jazz and Latin pop, to the music, creating a dense and fascinating musical web of electronics and percussion. Occasionally, he gets too self-consciously arty for his own good, but most of the album finds Sakamoto at his best.

Ryuichi Sakamoto - Smoochy  (flac 337mb)

01 Bibo No Aozora 5:43
02 Aishiteru, Aishitenai 5:13
03 Bring Them Home 3:41
04 Aoneko No Torso 2:20
05 Tango 4:40
06 Insensatez 0:50
07 Poesia 5:26
08 Dennogiwa 5:54
09 Hemisphere 5:23
10 Manatsu No Yo Ana 2:41
11 Rio 5:21
12 A Day In The Park 5:22
13 Tango (Version Castellano) 4:38

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Sakamoto calls it an opera, and one may argue about this term, but not about the fact that this is the work of a genius. Published in a rather low key manner, this CD contains a very raw version of the life performance. Sakamoto masterfully blends a luggage full of orchestrated poetic commentary and sound bits from the 20th century to create a trip of a lifetime. The skillful way he has constructed the methods to expose life's inter meanings and human existence is a huge task to say the least, however with ticket in hand this is one trip you won't forget! The intermingling of a variety of languages, express to the listener the urgency that we are all one planet. From the orchestrated cliffs to the lakeside poets brings a clashing of ideas that can only dissect and create a whirlpool of emotions that brings the listener to experience a total assault on the senses. The operatic and chamber vocals found though out weaves the catalyst to LIFE ....... Ahhhhh Sweet Life! With this work, Sakamoto takes another step in establishing himself as one of today's greatest composers.

Note there's two versions of this work one recorded September 99 in Osaka and Tokyo

Ryuichi Sakamoto - Raw Life Osaka  (flac 507mb)

01 Door Open 1:52
02 Overture 14:12
03 1-1 War And Revolution 15:51
04 1-2 Science And Technology 17:23

05 2-1 Evolution Of Life 20:27
06 2-2 History Of Gaia 16:16
07 3-1 Art 8:28
08 3-2 Response 3:44
09 3-3 Light 16:42

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