Beautiful

Fantastic Plastic Machine | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 15, 2001)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Emperor Norton
• ASIN: B00005AQKL
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #178,809 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Beautiful Days

2. Paragon

3. Love Is Psychedelic

4. On a Chair

5. Whistle Song

6. Son Minute of Love

7. Todos Os Desejos

8. I'm Still a Simple Man

9. Black Dada

10. God Save the Mona Lisa

11. Beautiful Days (Reprise)

12. Take Me to the Disco [Malibu Mix]

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

One-man music machine and cultural trendsetter Tomoyuki Tanaka (a.k.a. Plastic Fantastic Machine) is back in a big sassy way with his third release, Beautiful. Other than an overall mellowing of PFM's occasionally over-amped arrangements, the biggest surprise on Beautiful is the generous use of strings that make the record a bit of an odd duck, more appropriate for the boudoir than the dance floor. In fact, only the endlessly spunky "Take Me to the Disco" is a bona fide dance track here. Otherwise, Beautiful moves through a record collector's dream that includes the super-sophisticated, string-driven groove of "On a Chair," the fluty Latin jazz of "Whistle Song," the lazy, jazzy funk of "Black Dada," and the insanely overarranged spoken-word hoedown "Love Is Psychedelic." But despite all the musical territory covered there's a real cohesion to the whole affair; it's distinctly urban and hip without being pushy about it, with a sly sense of humor riding just under the surface. Occasionally Tanaka's broad palette gets a bit overloaded, with the strings going in one direction and the groove another, but for the most part he manages to pull it all together in a balancing act that both Burt Bacharach and Howie B could be proud of, and that's really saying something. --Carl Hanni

Product Description

Heralded for his mixture of 60's Europop and Electronica, renowned Japanese DJ Tomoyuki Tanakaaka Fantastic Plastic Machine, is back with his 3rd and most ambitious record to date. Guest vocalists include legendary jazz pianist Bob Dorough and Hirth Martinez. 13 tracks. Packaged in a digipack. 2001 release.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a huge improvement (not that fpm was bad in the first place), May 24, 2001

By 

Jonathan Goldstein "musiclover" (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Beautiful (Audio CD)

I own all three of FPM's albums. Though I liked the kitchy aspects of the first two, and their frequent use of bossanova and other lounge sounds, they were far too uneven. The first was better than the second, and I enjoyed it immensly, but neither had the constant inspiration that this album does. This album is well titled, beautifull from beginning to end in all sorts of imaginative and startling ways. Though there is much diversity, all the songs are held together by a thread and I beleive the album itself must be looked at as a whole, not as a collection of individual songs that have nothing to do with one another.

To put it simply, I'm addicted to the album, songs 6 and nine are the two songs I've been searching for my whole life as a lover of brazilian music. They modernize the sound in a way that does complete justice to the source(better justice than most artists who are exploiting the bossanova genre these days, and there are a lot of such artists). This cover of the Whistle Song is one of the best bossanova tunes I've ever heard,and I've listened to a lot. The album doesn't restrict itself to brazilian jazz however, though it is very heavily influenced by it. One can hear a new element, that of seventies soul. This is Jamiriquai territory, and at times the funky base lines on this album seem like they would fit right in on any Jamiriquai record. This addition to the FPM sound is the key to this albums superiority over its predecesars. Every song on this album, regardless how original and out there, is incredibly soulful, and thus more enjoyable. An especially cool thing Tanaka (I hope thats his name) does, is give the singers of many songs unique and interesting voices to convey. By this I mean that the nature of the singing itself hints at the personality of the narrator of the song. Though this done on previous albums, its used to excellent affect here, giving each song a true life of its own. This album single handedly carried me across the United States during my car ride home from school. It is impossible not to feel joy while listening to this album, an upbeat though sometimes surprisingly melancholy journey. When you're done listening to it you definately feel like its taken you somewhere. All fans of FPM must check it out, and those that were previously annoyed by his sound (many people I've played it for) will find this album much more accessible in its own cheesy, kitchy, funloving, and beautiful way.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A Very Odd Duck Indeed, November 9, 2001

By 

Curmudgeon "grantc" (West Australia) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Beautiful (Audio CD)

(...) Personally, I find it very disappointing after FPM's previous album, "Luxury". "Beautiful" harnesses saccharine strings, anonymous vocals and odd rhythmic structures to generally poor melodies, resulting in music that twitches constantly without really engaging the listener; several of the tracks sound more like experiments with software than songs. The lyrics are generally silly and nonsensical without being funny or witty. As someone who usually enjoys what could be termed JapPop I find "Beautiful" an ambitious but unsatisfying addition to the canon.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Stylish Escapades., October 13, 2001

By 

M. Williams (Texas, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Beautiful (Audio CD)

This album is a good starting point if your are interested in FPM. What I love about this record is how slickly produced it is. Its a borderline dance album but it has plenty of Jazz, string, and flute arrangments. If your expecting something for the dancefloor look elsewhere, Beautiful is something to relax too. The only downfall with the album is that some songs are just not that good to begin with. "God Save the Mona Lisa," Take Me to The Disco" are nothing special, the lyrics on those two tracks are just awful. I would still invest in buying this album, all together it is a notable album worth listening too.