I got the itch to do another mixtape type dealie once again. I was looking over my past ones and saw that more often than not there were more than a few soundtrack pieces bleeding onto them, I'd conciously been trying to avoid it in the past but this time I went all in and embraced it. This time we focus on soundtrack work coming out of Japan - inspired by a coworker linking me to another mixtape of a simialar theme by Mac DeMarco over on NTS - though his is firmly rooted in the videogame sphere. I have considered it before, there are some legitimate amazing tunes out there - the electro/dubstep vibes of Sumire Uesaka's Pop Team Epic to the seedy spiritual successor to Electroclash in the blog house stylings of TeddyLoid's Fly Away there's plenty to go at. And that's just the super upbeat stuff!
There is no J-Pop this time but there's a remarkable amount of varitey on show in this small selection. From jazzy conventional soundtracks like the opening trio that takes a breakbeat turn with the soundtrack of Racing Lagoon to thumping techno courtesy of the soundtrack to the PS1 Ghost In The Shell Game, before coming back into land with some ambient, trip hop and straight up hip hop in the final quarter. And I didn't even end up using some of the stuff I had planned, originally I wanted to chuck some D&B in there from Soichi Terada and Shinji Oritio, and even some of the legitimate 1980's stuff from the Bubblegum Crisis soundtracks. It didn't come to be this time, but that's all well and good because that just means I have more fuel for if I decide to do another one of these! Tracklist follows after the player:
Tracklist:
Ryuichi Katsumata - Sileighty Toujou (Initial D Extra Stage Original Sound Tracks, 2001)
Taku Iwasaki - Police Woman (Angel Heart Original Soundtrack, 2006)
Yoko Shimomura - Arise Within You (Parasite Eve Original Soundtrack, 1998)
Noriko Matsueda - Loop Demo (Racing Lagoon Original Soundtrack, 1999)
Shinji Orito - Empty Space (Clannad Original Soundtrack, 2004)
Rei Harakami - Pone (Boogiepop Phantom Original Soundtrack, 2000)
Kensuke Ushio - Boogiepop And Others (Boogiepop And Others Original Soundtrack, 2019)
Kensuke Ushio - Fire Witch II (Boogiepop And Others Original Soundtrack, 2019)
Takkyu Ishino - Ghost In The Shell (Megatech Body.CD.,LTD. - 1997)
Kenji Kawai - Nightstalker (Ghost In The Shell (Original Soundtrack), 1995)
Akira Yamaoka - The Day Of Night (Silent Hill 2 Original Soundtracks, 2001)
Akira Yamaoka - The Reverse Will (Silent Hill 2 Original Soundtracks, 2001)
Masafumi Takada - So That The Forms Of Heavenly Maidens Linger Before Me Yet More (Samurai Champloo Original Soundtrack [Hip Hop Samurai Action], 2006)
Force Of Nature - Just Forget (Samurai Champloo Music Record - Impression, 2004)
The Seatbelts - Space Lion (Cowboy Bebop, 1998)
It might not be the best mixing I've ever done, but overall I'm OK with it, I got the variety in that I wanted and even some deeper dives like Racing Lagoon to boot. If the MIDI sax of the opening tracks is turning you away, I understand, but try and stick it out to the Boogiepop section of soundtracks, they're some really beautiful pieces and the Rei Harakami one is potentially my favourite of all the things he ever did. I've got somethin else lined up to post fairly soon, but hopeully there are some tunes in here that will tide you over for a day or two. And as always - Stay safe and enjoy the music.
-CVF
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