Hundred Sights of Koenji [ORIGINAL RECORDING REMASTERED]

Koenji Hyakkei

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 11, 2008)
• Original Release Date: 2007
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Original recording remastered
• Label: Skin Graft Records
• ASIN: B00140GXGU
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #52,240 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
"Not only the most brilliant of all of contemporary Japanese bands, but perhaps the greatest group currently operating in the world." -- Alternative Press "No irony here: this rocks with the teeth and heart to cut through the `scenes' and the `overground' like a knife. ... Koenjihyakkei may go down as Tatsuya Yoshida's greatest achievement: the most perfect fusion of straight prog, the avant-garde, and hardcore punk. Amen." -- Pitchfork

For the first time ever, Skin Graft Records proudly presents Koenjihyakkei's legendary debut album, Hundred Sights of Koenji, to western listeners. With the original issue on Japan's God Mountain label largely unheard and fetching enormous prices on the collector's market, Hundred Sights of Koenji returns to print in a deluxe remastered edition. Originally released in 1994, it includes the full RUINS line-up of Yoshida Tatsuya, Masuda Ryuichi, Kubota Aki, and Kuwahara Shigekazu for a futuristic journey to those hallowed fields of yore. Koenjihyakkei is Area and ELP at their most excessive, Deus Ex Machina with tempo changes multiplied by 100, and Magma at their Orff-ian choral, fusion jazz, overcharged gospel peak. Here begins a new chapter in the storied Zeuhl scene, where foreign tongues, interplanetary wars, and inhuman technique rule the roost.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Hundred Revisions of Koenji, March 28, 2008

By	Corey A. Edwards - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Koenjihyakkei is the brainchild of one of the most driven and talented drummers, bandleaders, and all around musical geniuses of this century and last: Yoshida Tatsuya. Better known for his drum bass duo Ruins, Koenjihyakkei may be his most amazing achievement yet, combining jazz, prog, punk, traditional music, classical, and more in such a fashion as to create something so unique and amazing as to be indefinable. Think Magma but don't get all worked up expecting dense walls of long, droning obscurity. While Koenjihyakkei is most certainly avant garde, what they are not is boring or terribly difficult to "get". Most of the tracks on this first album not only rock, they're catchy - yet everything else I've said before, as well. I repeat: "unique ... amazing ... indefinable."

A note for those of you who already have the God Mountain version:

Koenjihyakkei's eponymously titled album "Hundred Sights of Koenji" is one of my all time favorite albums. Having been out of print and darned difficult to locate for years, I was thrilled to hear that Skin Graft was rereleasing it stateside. When I read that Yoshida Tatsuya was not only remastering the album but rerecording the drums I was intrigued. While I am not usually a fan of revisionist history, the job that has been done on this album is amazing. It was not so much remastered as completely remixed - and I mean completely. Couple this with the new drum tracks and what you have is not Koenjihyakkei's "Hundred Sights of Koenji" but an almost entirely different album: Koenjihyakkei's "Hundred Sights of Koenji v2", as valid a stand alone from the original album as if it were a live release.

If you already have the God Mountain version of this album, do yourself a favor and pick up Skin Graft's. If you haven't either, pick up Skin Graft's ... then get to work tracking down the original Japanese release. Either way, it'll blow your mind.