Voting Thread

Two back to back Piece of the Week posts due to a fairly busy week. At least that’s my excuse anyhow.

The pieces this week give off a different vibe that isn’t quite in-your-face or emotionally charged, making it really hard to evaluate them properly and dispense with the points. Most of the pieces did a good job of adhering to the theme though because of the theme, most of the tracks are fairly melancholy or downright despondent. While I had been hoping for more of the adventurous kind of lost-ness, the despairing mood largely prevailed, resulting in the following tracks nominated:

Kanon – Shoujo no Ori
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This piece evokes that whole feel of being lost in a winterscape, which, given the source of the song, makes it really appropriate. While it does carry an emotional charge for most of the way through, I thought the motive gets repetitive and the only part where this becomes more interesting is around 0:42 where the mood becomes really somber as it dispenses with the aforementioned emotional charge. Unfortunately, that doesn’t last long enough to receive any major development and transitions back to the repeating motive shortly after. For those who have access to the Kanon/Air Piano Arrange Album “Re-feel”, I’d give that one a listen since it’s a much better rendition. This version gets a pass from me seeing that there are far better tracks this week.

Hidamari Sketch x365 – Shinmiri
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“Shinmiri” has that lazy, drifting vibe that combines a sort of easygoing aimlessness as the subject is in a wonderful, dreamlike state. The introduction with the intonation brings out the aforementioned vibe, and if this piece were to consist entirely of that motive, it’d be plain boring. However, the solo violin around 0:35 marks a divergence that stands well on its own, and, when combined with the intonation and background instrumentation from the introduction, makes the piece a whole lot more enjoyable. This one deserves 1 point.

Pokemon Heroes – Search for the Girl
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Wow, this piece was certainly an eye-opener (ear-opener?) and though it may come from a somewhat maligned source, it still packs quite a punch through its mix of violin and accordion to create a sound that makes this piece stand apart from all of the other tracks in this week’s selection. There is an upbeatness that encourages the listener to seek out adventure and excitement in the beginning before transitioning into a flowing melody that brings forth more tension as the piece progresses. You can hear the atmosphere become more mournful as the feelings of loneliness and insecurity envelop the subject, but the way it keeps the listener engaged is what makes this piece truly shine, and listening to it felt like a shot of fresh air. Definitely deserving of 2 points.

Wolf’s Rain – Gravity
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I’m not all too surprised to see this track make an appearance because I do consider it Maaya Sakamoto at her very best. Her ability to convey that sense of longing is superb and the melody itself packs a pretty strong emotional punch as it draws you in and takes you for a melancholy ride. Enjoyable all the way through, this one gets 2 points from me. The only complaint that I have is why we haven’t heard tracks that are as high caliber as this from Sakamoto as of late (“Triangular” was terrible).

Zettai Shounen – Ho
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This piece is probably the most despondent of the lot because of how strongly it emphasizes that feeling of loneliness, as though there’s a hole in your soul. While such moods can be very powerful, this track’s execution doesn’t quite hit the mark because of a lack of development in that despondent theme. It also doesn’t help that this piece is just too short for anything meaningful to come out of it. There’s potential for “Ho” to be much more, but we didn’t get it in this instance.

Soukyuu no Fafner -Dead Aggressor- – Doubt | Mayoi
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“Doubt” is fairly similar to “Ho,” but it’s slightly better because of how well it uses dissonance to whip up an unsettling atmosphere that is similar to the feeling one gets in a forest after dark with no light sources to guide you through. While this piece isn’t going to be getting any points from me, it’s certainly more enjoyable even if it’s not remarkable.

Serial Experiments Lain – Signal of Loneliness
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
I really like the melancholy vibe that you get from the guitar work in this song which, on the whole, gives this piece a nice, folksy feeling as though you’re listening to someone singing this song while around a campfire as the moon shines brightly. The singer’s tendency to go off-tune helps contribute to this overall mood by sounding genuinely folksy. A few minor gripes that I had was the repetitiveness, especially the “ahh nani wo” which could have had their iterations reduced by one so as to not draw things out for too long. Save for that (and it’s a very minor issue that doesn’t detract from the overall enjoyability), this song is solid and only slightly loses out to the next piece on this list.

Paprika – Shizuku Ippai no Kioku
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Looking back, it’s hard to believe that I disliked this piece. But that was back in the day when I had failed to appreciate the kind of vibe one gets out of the cacophony as chaos descends to reign supreme throughout this piece (and this movie for that matter). Having knowledge of the context in which this piece is heard helps a great deal because once you realize the nature of the parade, you’d be hard-pressed to come up with a piece that more accurately describes the surreal atmosphere. The deluge of visuals and sound that the parade scene throws at you does an excellent job of conveying the confusion really well, and by succeeding at getting me to feel really lost as I watched that film, this piece definitely deserves 1 point.

Casshern Sins – Memory Past
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
This piece depicts the sense one gets from being lost by delivering it in a calm, quiet, and subtle track. The image I get while listening to this is that of a wanderer, a directionless soul who searches both within and without to find some sort of destination, but in spite of that effort, none materializes. It’s a poignant piece, but like a few tracks we’ve heard thus far, it feels too short. Had this been developed just a bit more, I could see it becoming a stellar track.

Bleach – Nothing Can Be Explained
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This piece is yet another pleasant surprise and I particularly like the way it manages to make you feel as though you’re in an alien environment through that discordant opening bit followed by the voice work which drifts in and out, as though it were a disembodied spirit trying to drive you insane with its echoing, ephemeral chatter. “Nothing can be Explained” executes the feeling of being lost really well as the vocals leave you feeling uneasy, as though you’re trapped in a landscape that’s so strange you have no clue where to even begin going in search of an escape route. I especially liked the use of the round, which emphasizes the element of lost-ness, making this yet another solid track, even if it loses out on getting point nods from me.

So there you have it! My point distribution can be found below. I think the theme of lost was a bit more difficult to find good pieces for, but the good thing is that there were a lot of tracks that stood out as being interesting and made for a nice listen all in all. I think that Week 4′s legendary theme will be a bit better as far as track quality goes, so I’ll definitely be looking to see what people come up with.

(+2) Pokemon Heroes – Search for the Girl
(+2) Wolf’s Rain – Gravity
(+1) Hidamari Sketch x365 – Shinmiri
(+1) Paprika – Shizuku Ippai no Kioku

Review: Hidamari Sketch’s soundtrack didn’t initially catch my attention when I first listened to it. There were a few interesting tracks, but the huge tracklist made it difficult to really recall any of the pieces aside from the main themes in any precise detail, which is part of the reason I hesitated in picking up Hidamari Sketch x365’s soundtrack for so long. My expectation for this album was that it would recycle a large chunk of music from Hidamari Sketch and while that is the case, I daresay that composer Tomoki Kikuya managed to improve upon his earlier compositions. As a result, Hidamari Sketch x365’s soundtrack, packed primarily with jazzy pieces with a touch of some soothing fare, feels fresher and more enjoyable while retaining the quirky melodies that fit so well with the series.

Part of what makes Hidamari Sketch x365’s soundtrack so appealing is the wide variety of music that it incorporates into the series, thereby preventing the soundtrack from being boring. The first full-length track, “Waku Waku Hidamari Sou” uses a swing rhythm for its base and the result is an upbeat, lively track that uses a violin and a vocalist to create a melody that brings out the excitement and the unexpected in the characters’ day to day lives. And after the energetic “Hatena de Wasshoi,” the soundtrack makes way for “Ohayou’s” slow, mellow violin melody that brings out a calm and easygoing nature. To counter that, the soundtrack brings in pieces like “Isoga Nakya” to mix things up a bit through a heavy synth track that adds various percussion instruments to the beat and the aptly-titled “Mysterious” that creates its eponymous feeling though a solemn xylophone melody and a violin and percussion part playing the harmony. Together, all of these tracks reflect the diverse set of experiences that the series offers the viewer ranging from slow, contemplative moments where pieces like “Yuttari” and “Kirei na Yozora” fit perfectly to energetic tracks like “Minna Ganbare” which capture the excitement that one might get when participating in a competitive event.

Just because the pieces fit doesn’t make them great tracks though, and as one might expect, there are a few oddballs that are clearly intended to mesh with the atmosphere on the screen, but aren’t too compelling without the context. For example, “Nandaro” uses the same repeating melodic line for its entire duration, which gets dull upon repeat listens because that melody was never interesting to begin with while “Nanka iru?” uses a synth beat that feels overwhelmingly heavy and ponderous compared to “Isoga Nakya.” Thankfully, there weren’t many tracks that got on my nerves, making this album one of the more consistent soundtracks out there.

Perhaps the most delightful thing about this album is being able to listen to the arrangements of other tracks. Clear examples that come to mind are “Ooya-san da” and “Choko Choko,” both of which derive their melody from “Waku Waku Hidamari Sou,” but the way in which they’re arranged is different enough that they aren’t tedious to go through. The former track uses a bassoon melody that plays the theme in the minor key while the latter plays that theme through a solo violin that uses a pizzicato melody with a piano chiming in intermittently to differentiate themselves from the original. “Mattari Hidamari Sou,” featuring an accordion, piano, and vocals playing a jazzy melody, gets an enjoyable arrangement in the second half of “Nesugoshita!” which moves at a fast tempo through its piano melody backed by a percussion section that, together, creates a sense of excitement and packs a lot of energy into a short span of time. Though I had mentioned that I was worried about the possibility of track recycling in this album, these arrangements are very enjoyable because the way Kikuya takes the source material and changes the tempo and instruments or the key over to the minor mode brings about a new side to the original melody that is equally superb.

On the whole, the diverse track list means that you’re not left with a situation in which the album becomes monotonous and drones on and on like what so often happens with anime soundtracks. These tracks capture the mood and atmosphere of Hidamari Sketch x365 which structures its episodes as a series of light-hearted vignettes and the tracks’ length helps complement that presentation. Though some degree of knowledge and familiarity of this series is required to get the most out of this soundtrack, you really can’t go wrong in listening to this one since the tracks are solid enough on their own as to be enjoyable.

Rating: Very Good

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