Ryuichi Sakamoto - 1978 - Thousand Knives of Ryuichi Sakamoto

Ryuichi Sakamoto

1978

Thousand Knives of Ryuichi Sakamoto

01. Thousand Knives (9:35)
02. Island of Woods (9:51)
03. Grasshoppers (5:16)
04. Das Neue Japanische Elektronische Volkslied (8:06)
05. Plastic Bamboo (6:31)
06. The End of Asia (06:23)

Recorded at Nippon Columbia Studios 1, 2 & 4, Tokyo on April 10 - July 27, 1978.

Ryuichi Sakamoto - Synthesizers, Drums, acoustic piano, marimba
Hideki Matsutake - computer operation, synthesizer programming assistance
Harry Hosono - finger cymbals (#1 )
Kazumi Watanabe - Alembic guitar solo (#1,6) & rhythm (#6)
Motoya Hamaguchi - Syn-Drum solo (#1), Brazilian bird whistles (#2)
Yuji Takahashi - acoustic piano duo w. RS (#3)
Tatsuro Yamashita - castanets (#4)
Pecker - Syn-Drum solo (#5)

Ryuichi Sakamoto's first solo album appeared before he formed Yellow Magic Orchestra in late 1978, after the young keyboardist had earned his MA in music from Tokyo University. Six long instrumentals make up this CD, but apart from a taste for Asian-sounding synth lines, they hint at very little of what was to come in YMO. "Thousand Knives" is a long disco-lite jazzy workout with a very un-synthesized guitar solo by Kazumi Watanabe (who would later join YMO on tour and have his solo album produced by Sakamoto). Side two's "Da Neue Japanische Electronische Volkslied" and "The End of Asia" (later revamped in YMO) are closest to the new wave of Japanese electronic music that he would spawn. "Island of Woods" and "Grasshoppers" trade in rhythm for sound landscapes, and the sort of cheeriness that would pop up later in Sakamoto's childrens movie scores. Harry Hosono turns up on one track, and generally the album is a pleasant, if unadventurous, listen.

This is the definition of progressive electronic. Predicts just about everything that's going to go on in the next 40 years of the genre before it even got started. Great melodies too. This is a must listen in my world