What do you get when you take a prolific composer and producer and have her rework some of her most familiar music, add some original material and release the album Stateside? You get Yuki Kajiura’s “Fiction.”

Kajiura has a fairly distinctive style even apart from the fact that a lot of her songs’ lyrics are written in languages other than Japanese. And no, not all of the songs on the album are English either, as a couple of the tracks from the anime series Noir are represented here, namely “Salva Nos” and “Canta per Me,” albeit in renditions far more grandiose than the originals. The versions of “Key of the Twilight” and “Fake Wings” (from .hack) are fairly straightforward but no less enjoyable for that fact.

It’s the lesser-known tracks that really make the album, though. “Cynical World” is pretty, peppy and dark all at once. “Fiction” and “Vanity” are a hauntingly beautiful pair of songs. “Zodiacal Sign” is a collection of what could be considered “action sequence” background music from another anime title, and “Open Your Heart” is sweetly uplifting, almost too sweetly perhaps, but by that point on the album one tends not to mind too much.

Don’t let the fact that half of this album started life as music for anime series turn you away. Try the promo, which features “Key of the Twilight,” “Open Your Heart,” “Cynical World” and “Fiction.” Unless what you hear really turns you off, I wholeheartedly recommend this album to you.

YK – Fiction promo

I’d say that this is known as the post-Phil Collins album by Genesis, except for the fact that it’s barely known at all. This is the album that landed with a resounding, if curiously muffled, thud on Amercia’s shores.

Poor Ray Wilson. He didn’t deserve to only get signed on for one shaky, uncertain, occasionally brilliant album and then have the band dissolve out from underneath of him. How does a guy follow in the footsteps of not one but two household-name frontmen?

“Calling All Stations” is, like most post-Abacab Genesis albums, something of a progressive/pop hybrid. There are smart hooks and power chords interspersed with delicate keyboard work and occasionally clunky lyrics, just like we’d come to expect from the band’s last half-dozen releases. The only radio-friendly track, “Congo,” is a decent piece of pop-rock in its own right, as is the title track, “Calling All Stations.” “Alien Afternoon” is whimsical Genesis in the mid-70’s mode with modern technology behind it. Romantic ballads, a Genesis staple thanks in large part to the departed Mr. Collins, are here aplenty in the form of “If That’s What You Need,” “Shipwrecked” and especially “Not About Us.” The album is capped with the social-consciousness epic, “One Man’s Fool,” which isn’t nearly as clunky as you’d expect from a song just this side of being something U2 might have produced if they went for baroque prog-rock stylings.

All in all, it’s not the best album they made but it shows considerable promise for what might have been. Ray’s singing and the songs he contributed to in other ways were certainly getting my hopes up for the next album… which, of course, we’ll never hear. Ah well.

Today’s promo consists of “The Dividing Line,” “Congo,” “Not About Us” and a brief bit of “One Man’s Fool.” I had the damnedest time fitting four clips into this one, folks… though maybe I could’ve used less of the “Dividing” bass riff. Hmm.

Genesis – CAS Promo

I bought this album because of a music video. A creator of AMVs whose work I admired greatly, Justin Emerson (aka the now-retired ErMaC), used a track from BT’s “Movement In Still Life” album for a video that I didn’t enjoy as much as some of his other work but I kept watching it anyway… so I could listen to the song.

The album is very much in the party-mix category, with a variety of dance beats, barnburners (“Never Gonna Come Back Down”) and hip-hop influences (“Smartbomb” and “Mic-Chekka”), but there are also beautiful bits like “Satellite” (used in the music video) and the dancier “Dreaming” (which, oddly enough, I want to use in my next AMV).

For the promo, I pulled “Satellite,” “Dreaming,” “Smartbomb” and “Running Down The Way Up.” I don’t think this one works quite as smoothly as the Dada promo, but it’s not really all that shabby either.

Oh, and in order to get “Sam” to speak his part correctly, I had to tell him the artist’s name is “Bee Tea.” Heh.

BT – Movement promo

In 1992, KGON still played new music by newer bands, and I was a board-op on the weekends. In among the Nirvana and Pearl Jam tracks was a snarky, upbeat little piece by a band you probably haven’t heard of. The band is Dada, and the song “Dizz Knee Land” is from their debut album, “Puzzle.” When KGON went all-classic-rock, the other board-op and I (whatever happened to Loren, anyway, I wonder?) raided the music library (with permission, mind you) for stuff they weren’t going to play anymore, and I picked up one of the copies of the album.

I can’t really explain why I like this one so much. It’s not really my normal style, being a sort of laid back California sound, mostly low-key, and not exactly the cheeriest record ever made. There’s a haunting beauty to tracks like “Surround,” “Dorina” and “Here Today Gone Tomorrow,” as well as a quirky sense of humor that shows up in the lyrics of the aforementioned single as well as the sexy romp “Posters” and odd fare like “Dog” and “Timothy,” one of my favorite tracks.

I’ve uploaded and linked the promo I made, so you can hear bits of four tracks: “Dizz Knee Land,” “Mary Sunshine Rain,” “Surround,” and “Who You Are.” And if you decide to pick up “Puzzle” and wonder what other albums to buy, I heartily recommend their self-titled 1998 album. The only other one of their I own is “American Highway Flower,” which I’m not completely sold on. Don’t let that stop you from trying it out yourself, mind you.

(Say, what do you know? I got the entire review done in time for the 9:30 posting. Go, me!)

Dada – Puzzle promo

The lead-off single, Sunrise, from the new Duran Duran album has been kicking around the airwaves for quite some time now. Now that the album’s out (and my workplace was kind enough to kick me over a copy), I’ve had a chance to see if the rest of the album lives up to such a peppy, catchy selling track.

I’m not sure how best to put this, but how about I just say that as a pop record, it succeeds on its own merits.

I should explain. I generally listen to two types of music, much to my dear father’s chagrin: Rock, and Pop. The line between the two is often muddied, and I tend not to really care one way or the other which is which. The only real distinction between the two in my mind is that of Safe versus Risky. I don’t care how many guitars are playing, if the song is crafted so as to appeal precisely to a core demographic, it’s Pop. (Insert diatribe about so-called edgy “alternative rock” bands here.) Rock, admittedly, usually involves electric guitars. The Pet Shop Boys don’t exactly write what most people would consider “rock music.”

Like I said, the line is often muddied. But bear with me, here.

Astronaut is a very good pop record. It’s neatly, almost lovingly produced. There are nice variations in tone and tempo and effect. However, there’s not a risk taken anywhere. This thing is instantly recognizable as a Duran Duran record, and at no point is there a surprise track. Maybe your experience was different, but I was pleasantly surprised by some of the tracks on The Wedding Album. I’m thinking both of the two hit singles (Come Undone and Ordinary World) and some of the unaired tracks (Love Voodoo and Too Much Information). They sounded, of course, like Duran Duran… but they were just different enough to make me think, “Hey. Not bad. Way to do something unexpected, guys.”

I listened to this new album all the way through and while at no point did I think that a particular song sucked (oddly enough, this too is unlike my experience with The Wedding Album), none of the songs stuck in my mind either. Are the lead-off tracks good? Sure, they’re catchy and peppy and all that, but a year from now nobody’s going to be listening to them.

The closest thing to “something different” comes at the end of the album in the form of Still Breathing, a dark-ish piece that includes the idea of burning down one’s hometown. Now if only it was a more memorable song, I’d be more excited about this.

By comparison, the Franz Ferdinand album is also a very carefully crafted pop record, but it works in a way Astronaut entirely fails to. If I was a more knowledgeable sort, I suppose, I could put my finger on exactly why, but there you have it. This is why I don’t write for Rolling Stone, Pulse, or that neighborhood rag you see at the store but never bother picking up.

I’ll say it again: This is a very good pop record. If you like Duran Duran at all, this is not a bad purchase. I actually suspect that a few of these tracks would make outstanding remixes. But… I wanted something I could really get stuck in my head and enjoy the hell out of, and this ain’t it.

The third album from the one-man band known as VAST is out and I’ve given it a few listens through. My overall impression is that in depth and richness it sounds more like the first album, but it’s constructed along the same lines as the second in terms of keeping the pacing snappy and the song lengths down under four minutes apiece. (There are two notable exceptions to that rule, one good and one not-so-good.)

Visual Audio Sensory Theater, the self-titled-ish first album, was a dense and dark experimental work that was just as likely to explore religious as romantic themes. It is among my favorite records of all time, which is why I so eagerly awaited the arrival of Nude and before it Music For People, which I found to be generally enjoyable but with too much of a “must sell to radio” construction about it. My biggest beef with People is the uniformity of song length coupled with the reduction of subject matter down to being just a collection of love (new and lost) songs. It’s not a bad album, really, but it’s not exactly what I think of as a worthy follow-up to the original work.

Nude is better. The subject matter is still love, new and lost and obsessive alike. One can hear more interesting things going on under the surface this time around, though. It feels as though Jon Crosby is trying to do the interesting things he did on his first album while still keeping to the industry-friendly song lengths and rock-n-roll elements that keep his bread buttered.

Let’s cut to the, er, cuts. The two lead-off tracks are “Turquoise” and “Thrown Away,” respectively. They’re good, solid toe-tappers. Then we get to “Don’t Take Your Love Away,” which… isn’t. One of the two tracks to run over four minutes, it’s also the only track that leaves me completely underwhelmed. Ah well. “Be With Me” picks the pace up again, while “Lost” manages to be somber without sucking the enjoyment out of the listening experience.

“Winter In My Heart” is one of the standout tracks here. There’s a quality of elegant pain to it that captivates me. It also counts as the obligatory parental-advisory moment, since Jon seems compelled to work an F-bomb just once into every album. Don’t ask me why.

“I Need To Say Goodbye,” “Japanese Fantasy,” “Ecstacy” and “Candle” are generally good pieces, though only “Fantasy” stands out as particularly interesting among this set.

The other over-four-minutes piece is “I Can’t Say No (To You),” and it makes up for all of the failures of its counterpart early in the album. I think this song shows best the promise of what we can expect to hear on future albums… at least, I certainly hope to hear more pieces at this level. It’s dark, obsessive, gentle and beautiful all at once.

Nude closes out much as Music for People did, with a typically quiet piece centered on an acoustic guitar and uncluttered arrangement, in this case a little gem called “Desert Garden.” While not as hauntingly beautiful as “Lady of Dreams” from People, it’s still a charming little love song that I suspect will grow on me with time.

While I nitpick and kibbutz here about specific tracks, only “Don’t Take Your Love Away” actually disappoints. Nude is a worthwhile listen, though perhaps not a true classic in the making. I’ve taken to looking at VAST as a work in progress… and this album shows progress and promise.