Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Absolutely brilliant; there is not a single note wasted, January 6, 2005
Thank you, Quentin Tarantino, for including "Battle Without Honor Or Humanity" in the "Kill Bill Vol 1" soundtrack; it was absolutely the most amazing piece of instrumental music I've heard in years (as well as being one the most noteworthy grooves of 2003).
Like a latter-day Jeff Beck with a side hobby in Zen gardening, Tomayasu Hotei has put together an unbelievably good collection of moods, grooves, and modern mixes on this, an import CD that I gladly pay the extra money for. His style is understated, in that his brilliance is evident but he doesn't feel the need to make certain that his instrument is constantly turned up in the foreground so that he can play any many notes in as many different key variations (are you listening, Joe Satriani?) as possible; he writes songs that are about music, not his own sense of self-indulgenge.
Largely an instrumental collection, it could be said that Hotei's music is well-suited to lend additional atmosphere to filmed action, and in truth "Battle Without Honor Or Humanity" is not the only track recently included on a soundtrack. "Katana Groove" and "Dark Wind" were pieces that Hotei wrote for "Samurai Fiction", a movie inwhich he also stars (in, it has to be said, a very alluring performance). "Battle Without Honor Or Humanity" itself appears in no less than three variations (NOT remixes; this is important, as the song's CD single DOES include two remixed tracks; the two additional versions here are separate reinterpretations of the same groove that do not immediatelyrecall the single version) on this CD, weaving between the other trcks like a recurring theme, almost as with a classical music piece.
And when listening to "Battle..." the obvious Led Zeppelin influence makes itself known almost at once; it is fitting that he should include a Tokyo-popped cover of a Led Zep standard, and to that end "The Immigrant Song" does not disappoint; a well-produced cover that is not immediately recognizable, Hotei chooses not to match Robert Plant's impossible heavy metal wail and instead uses his own vocal range (a nefarious growl) to put his own stamp on the classic. "Believe Me, I'm A Liar" and "Space Cowboy" are the two other vocal tracks, with the former more of an exercise in drum-&-bass and the latter a muddled homage to Ennio Morricone's Spaghetti Western sountracks.
The mood among the intrumental tracks runs the gambit from darkly sinister ("Jingi", "Kill The Target") to morose and longing ("Howling") to surprisingly warm ("Fetish"), with Hotei's guitar expressing the mood more than ably; a friend of mine once accused the sound as being too "prog rock", but while I don't dispute the angle by which he came to that conclusion, I think most instrumental tracks where a guitar is used for a particularly vocal range is going to sound somewhat bombastic as a result. But if you enjoy good music written and performed by a master musician who knows precisely what a song needs, this CD will be a well-received reward.
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15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great music - but watch out for the malware, November 17, 2005
Others have already commented on the music adequately, but there's something else on this album that you need to know about.
This is one of the now infamous Sony Rootkit albums. If you stick it in a PC it will attempt to autorun an installation which will hide many files from users and will add code that intercepts certain system calls and loads down the machine. Even worse the rootkit has been exploited by virus writers.
As of mid November 2005 (this week) Microsoft has declared this rootkit to be Malware and their anti spyware software will remove it whenever it encounters it.
There is a very small warning on the back of the box, a second warning says that on normal players, which can't install their malicious software, the disk may not play. Search for Sony, BMG and Malware to confirm the nature of this exploit.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good Album, but Way Too Expensive, July 10, 2004
By A Customer
You can find this album for way less in other places. At one particular online music shop you can pick it up for a fruity 9.99
You will instantly recognize the first track as being from Kill Bill, but you will soon grow to enjoy the rest.
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