Fire Bomber - Angel Voice

This is going to be a weird one.

The first challenge I ran into when composing this review was who to credit as the artist. The song “Angel Voice” was written and composed by Yoko Kanno, the singer performing the song is Yoshiki Fukuyama, but no official name for the band is credit for the song. The character who sings the song is named Nekki Basara and his fictional rock band is called Fire Bomber. Really I could have chosen any of the listed options.

Yoko Kanno, writer/composure or
"Angel Voice."

Alright where to begin; music saves the world, at least it did in the anime mega hit of the 1980’s Macross Super Dimensional Fortress. Macross was a science fiction adventure that pitted humanities battle mecs, called valkyries, which were capable of transforming into jet fighters as well as a halfway in between robot and jet mode, against giant armored aliens called Zentradi. The Zentradi were emotionless warriors who had segregated their men and women completely from one another so they really, really had no idea about strong intimate emotions and as a consequence music really messed them up. Humanity learned that by projecting a giant broadcast of beloved pop singer Minmay out into the battlefield this would cause the enemy to lose focus and effectively become stunned in place. So effectively music saves humanity in a very literal sense in the original Macross series. It is charming.

Yoshiki Fukuyama, singer of
"Angel Voice."

Macross 7 is a sequel to the original series, and it is weird. Self absorbed orphan rock star Nekki Basara and his band Fire Bomber end up working with the military abroad the city sized battle station the Macross 7, because their music is assisting them in a great many ways. They even build Basara valkyrie that can be controlled by his guitar, which is stupid. Macross 7 is a stupid anime, that is not to say that is it necessarily bad, but it is stupid.

However Macross 7 had one thing going for it that the original did not, it had a rock band. The music from the original Macross Super Dimensional Fortress has a charm in its own right, but for a rock and roll guy like me, the pop music that consisted of Minmay’s play list never did much for me. While Macross 7 is a bizarre and at times bafflingly silly story about unlikeable characters mostly doing unbelievable things, the music is pretty damn good.

It is something the Japanese musicians seem really proud of is writing music for their animated television shows. There is a whole genre dedicated to it. Here in the west bands may volunteer to write original material for a motion picture, but we rarely see established musicians spending their time on televisions shows, let alone, cartoons. There is an endearing nature to enthusiastic musicians like Yoshiki Fukuyama who put into their work for what might be considered childish nonsense.

Basara Nekki, main character of
"Macross 7."

If I am being perfectly honest I never finished watching Macross 7, but it was not the series or it’s soundtrack that warrants the attention I write about today. There is a four episode sequel titled Macross Dynamite 7 which involves a whole new dilemma involving mystically space whales; I’d say you can’t make this up, but evidently somebody did. The climax for this sequel is our protagonist Basara in his valkyrie, that is controlled by his guitar, performing a song to the space whales and thus forming a bridge of communication as the space whales sing along with him. It is a strange moment, in a strange series, about a strange man. However in many ways this feels like the natural conclusion to the series, more so than the series I never actually finished, so maybe I’m wrong, but it feels like the natural conclusion to the story arc that Basara was experiencing.

Every connection Macross 7’s plot attempted to make between the rock band Fire Bomber and the boring main story felt forced. It was like there was two completely independent and mutually exclusive plot lines going on that had nothing to do with one another and nothing about them indicated that they should ever cross paths, that is, until this ending to this sequel. Space whales, sure, very weird plot device, but all of a sudden warring factions have to stop and behold while a rock star makes the breakthrough that neither of them could. Basara does not use music to save the world, but he stops a galactic brawl from taking place and forms a bound with a truly alien life form with music, and that is impressive nonetheless, and more important than that perhaps it feels like the sort of heroic thing a not very heroic, and frankly self absorbed, artist like the character Basara would seek. This is the naturally conclusion for that character, this is want he looking for all this time.

Then again maybe I am wrong I never could muster the patient to watch all of Macross 7.

So why talk about this at all? Because the song Nekki Basara plays at the end of the series is freaking beautiful. That song is “Angel Voice.”

The lyrics are in Japanese but a simple translation reveals the song, more or less, about searching for something beautiful, and if we listen carefully we should be able to hear it, an angel’s voice. For the most part I feel “Angel Voice” is a guitar song, sure there is a bass and drums like any traditional rock song, but the focus is very much on the guitar and Yoshiki’s voice, and the intro and outro is made up exclusives by this lead guitar. Speaking of Yoshiki’s voice we have to address the most iconic and obviously best part of the song, the wailing “whoa whoa whoa,” that compromises entire last third of the song.

At roughly the four and a half minute mark there are no more words to be said and Yoshiki breaks into a repeating of “whoa whoa whoa,” which in plain text may not sound overly exciting but believe me it is, and you don’t have to believe me, you can go listen to the song and hear it for yourself, which is, after all the whole point of me writing any of this.

There is a lot of emotion in this ending display, and it is very powerful and catchy. Either intentionally or unintentionally Kanno has touched on one of the oldest and most effective tricks in pop music’s book, create a sing along part that literally everyone can learn instantly, the best way to do that is to not use words but a sound like “whoa.” A truly irrelevant side effect is anyone speaking any dialect can sing along with Yoshiki, but I must stress this is an irrelevant effect, because there is something very special in the way he wails and the heart he puts into his voice that transcends language anyway, and the soul of his voice strikes in the heart of humanity itself.

Also, because the fountain head of inspiration for this song is a truly bizarre one, you can hear the space whales singing along at the end of the song, and the song fades with them. This perhaps would normally be lame but it somehow works. It adds a little extra charm and it ties itself back into its bizarre anime connection.

I guess the moral of the story is great music can come from the wildest of places and it is always worthwhile to keep an open ear for what you might find.

- King of Braves

The Seatbelts - Blue

I’m getting sloppy, it’s the seventeenth and I haven’t already sent out my monthly endeavor.

I had a certain plan set out for the next few months of what I wanted to do, but I like surprises, so I try to even surprise myself when I can, so lets shake things up a little.

I planned on waiting a full year to win over any doubtful minds that my messages of musical importance are in fact in good taste and possessed intellectual content. I figured I would play it safe with my song choices, the songs I have already gone through leave little doubt in the minds of rational people that I am obviously right to preach about their artistic wonder. But I am a man that likes to stand out, and since I already worry the risk running dry and boring it is high time I shook things up a little with a song a little more out of the ordinary.

Seatbelts is a musical group that is more or less out of Japan, though there members are many and from all over the world. Headed by Yoko Kanno they consist of somewhere between thirty to forty members, maybe more. The name “Seatbelts” came from the somewhat humorous express quoted by Miss Kanno herself, “we have so many styles within the band, you’d better strap on your seatbelts.”

Naturally like nearly everything out of Japan these days commercialism is how I came to know of Seatbelts. A lot of groups in Japan only really make it big do to their influence on soundtracks for animated series. You may have noticed the obnoxious amount of anime on television in the last five years. Well I liked Japanese animation before it was cool, way back in grade school, when I was still a kid and ironically anime for the most part was far more mature. Animation when done well is really nothing less then video art, and back ten plus years ago if I wanted to see something that actually contained subject matter that didn't completely insult my young intelligence I needed to look to Japan, or Fezetta and Bakshi but there movies were few.

Two of my favorite animes were hosted with the works of Yoko Kanno and her crew, “Macross Plus” and the now famous “Cowboy Bebop.”

Commercialism leads to second rate garbage, usually. The integrity to make music can easily be jaded when a pressure from outside money based influences push along the artistic project. However, as I am often caught saying, restriction often breeds true creativity. Anyone can create art if they throw random color on a canvas, and then lie about the meaning behind it all, but given a strict ridged objective and then finding a means to convey that message, meaning, or emotion is not only more challenging but often offers the greater creation. Who says creativity lacks structure, balance, and logic? Go back to hell with your random garbage. It comes out of you involuntarily, much like vomit and it shares the same value.

Macross Plus was a sequel to the infamous, “Macross, Super Dimensional Fortress” also know as “Robotech” in North America. Macross Plus however easily stands alone since any continuity that lays in mystery from original to the new is of such little importance the plot and characters remain wholly intact in the eyes of the viewer who does not know. The overall four part series is about rivaling test pilots that also share a common love interest, the fight each other in their transforming jets that take the form of humanoid battle suits. Obviously Macross Plus lies in the genre of science fiction. The music chosen is thus created appropriately, very techno and pop based are all the tracks, not my style of music at all, but as far as music of that sort goes I have to admit Macross Plus has a decent soundtrack.

Cowboy Bebop is where Seatbelts really shinned him my eyes.

Now anyone, who says to me, “I know about Cowboy Bebop, I saw the movie,” spare me your ignorance. The movie was nothing more then one long episode, and not a particularly good episode. Not bad, but not great.

The last anime I truly enjoyed, was naturally created back 1997, of course I wouldn’t see it until 2001-2002 when it finally came to late night cartoon television. It was also the last time I would dare say this about a TV show; “The entire project was a piece of art.”

Cowboy-Bebop, country-hip hop, a clash of styles. Well the entire series carried that subtle and simple side factor through beginning to end. The TV show was a western sci-fi about two bounty hunters living in a big ship in space, one was an older retired cop who was patient and responsible, the other a younger hot headed former Mafia hit-man that never, and I mean never, talked about his past. I’ve seen many a western television show try to rip off Bebop since 97 but they all pale in comparison.

The art style for each episode varied appropriately, from comedic, to jazzy, blues, western, samurai, heavy metal, drugs, mobster, and outer space. Every fight scene was in sync with the music, characters actually moved to music, and painfully subtle hints were given out to the main overall plot though never clearly stated. It was a show that rewarded the viewer who paid attention and further awarded the viewer to have the insight to connect the dots. They never really explain why Spike and Vicious hated each other so much; but you knew they really hated each other.

You can understand why I am so taken by Yoko Kanno can’t you? Each episode needed a different song to go with a clashing style of genres and themes, who else could do it except a group with forty members ranging from pop singers to opera singers, blues guitar players, to orchestra piano players, heavy synthesizer to Austria choir.

I am no big fan of jazz but they wrote some great jazz for the opening theme.

I like the blues a little and you might have guessed a moody show like Bebop contained a lot of blues.

The overall “cowboy” theme with the bounty hunter being named “cowboys” forced some country into the mix.

Lighthearted episodes were more techno and pop oriented, highly experimental… and not always for the best.

Do I need to explain the significance of an episode titled “Heavy Metal Queen”?

What they did with the Cowboy Bebop score was nothing shy of impressive. The final episode came so fast that to do this day there is an army of angry, nerdy, fans that are pissed about how it ended and that it did end. Frankly I couldn’t be happier with how it ended. It was powerful; it left me wanting more but excepting I couldn’t have more.

I don’t think I would dare describe in full the intricacies of the ending, why ruin it, and why ramble on more then I already have? But the final song for the ending credits for the last episode stung with power that is rarely obtained in anything.

The song “Blue.”

Simple enough name isn’t it. Holds only little literal meaning, symbolically, zounds.

I’m not sure I can describe Blue, but I’m going to try. It would be a pop song… it would be if not for the presence of the choir. It is fairly electric, with heavy synthesizers, but it is light and easy listening. A really, really, good pop song? I would almost say so, if not for the choir, it adds such a unique element to the song, the young voices… so beautiful, yet so haunting. The somber tone in the singer’s voice so morbidly depressing yet so hopeful and uplifting. It is such a brilliant clash of styles.

Never seen a bluer sky,
Yeah I can feel it reaching out,
And moving closer.
There's something about blue.
Asked myself what it's all for,
You know the funny thing about it,
I couldn't answer.
No I couldn't answer.

Things have turned a deeper shade of blue,
And images that might be real,
May be illusion,
Keep flashing off and on.

Free. Wanna be free.
Gonna be free.
And move among the stars.
You know they really aren't so far.
Feels so free.
Gotta know free.

Please Don't wake me from the dream.
It's really everything it seemed.
I'm so free.
No black and white in the blue.

Everything is clearer now.
Life is just a dream you know,
That's never ending.
I'm ascending

If you know Cowboy Bebop well enough you know those lyrics are very appropriate which means all the more Yoko Kanno and Seatbelts took the subject matter of the series into consideration when creating the perfect soundtrack. It may not be the best music ever, but it is the very best music for Cowboy Bebop. Then again a song like Blue, it is pretty awesome. It is really like nothing I have ever heard before. Blue is something so rare now of days, something truly original.

Until next month, keep on rocking in the free world.

- Colin

A great live performance: