Gutbrain Records

Friday, 01 February 2008

I clicked my way to Amazon Japan to order biographies of Masaru Sato and Akira Ifukube and couldn't resist ordering several other books, some about other Japanese film music composers, some about Nikkatsu Studio.

Of course, I can't read any of these, but I could painstakingly work my way through them with the aid of a dictionary and a book that explains the rudiments of Japanese grammar. Despite my having studied Japanese at the Japan Society for several years and knowing over 700 kanji, I still can't decipher even the titles of these books, let alone the text inside.

This limitation explains why I didn't know what this CD was, other than a "people who bought those books also bought this, or so we claim" item. I didn't need more than the cover photo to decide to buy it, though I was able to tell that it was the soundtrack to something called Captain Ultra.

Sometimes CDs like this contain music that I'm not into, lots of marches and stiff anthems. The music on this CD is by Isao Tomita, though, who wrote some music I really like, such as the score to Prophecies of Nostradamus.

Most of the Captain Ultra music is very good, with excellent use of electric guitar, analog synthesizers and tape delay. Some of it is acoustic and more conventional, occasionally reminiscent of some of Ifukube's work. There is a bit of march and anthem, but it's kept to a minimum.

I also broke down and bought My Favorite Ennio Morricone Music Presented by Junichiro Koizumi. I couldn't resist a compilation of Morricone film music cues put together by the prime minister of Japan (as Koizumi was when the CD came out). I'd like to see some other world leaders follow his example.