Fire those retro rockets

There are some things I wouldn't willingly listen to, like atonal music and by extension most pop music. Oldies are included in that list and I've only ever wanted to listen to that stuff due to purely academic reasons, like passing a contemporary music history course.

It's not that old music is strictly bad, but I am not a child of that era or, it seems, any era at all, so I feel this generational disconnect. Although digital recovery from analog sources has worked wonders, it's a strike against me for not being able to shake off the stigma that songs still sound old even if they are light years better than before.

It is probably also a strike against me for using anime as an excuse a gateway into the past. Well, whatever works. I know of several people who would never in their right mind listen to big band jazz, but for whom the jazz soundtrack contributed to Cowboy Bebop's appeal.

So far Doujin Work's ED is the only stand out feature amid a standard OP and mostly mindless content. Mai continues her fun retro schtick in Yumemiru Otome [320 kbps], hauling in a Dixieland band, walking bass, and backup vocals. Jazz clarinets defy classical conventions perhaps solely because they're not played in a classical fashion. Thin reeds, bright sound.

The rhythm section keeps things on a pretty even keel. Only the clapping falls on the back beat. There isn't much in the way of typical jazz syncopation other than in the instrumental breaks, and Mai's accents tend to fall on all of the beats. This is written like a march, something that most songs try to avoid if at all possible. But, as Yumemiru Otome proves, marches don't have to be dry and boring affairs. They can be, dare I say it, fun.

Nakashima Mika is listed on her profile as one of her favourite singers. That's hard to see, as the two seem only connected through the very large umbrella known as jazz. Within that sphere, their singing styles are polar opposites with Mai so far being much brighter and upbeat.

I'm still impressed that she is only 15. She carries a maturity and understanding usually possessed by singers at least 3 years her senior, although whenever I think this I should remember that Utada Hikaru and Tamaki Nami, among others, hit it big at 15. Miracles seem to happen more often than I'd like to think.

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Hitohira OP/ED

Hitohira is indeed a gem, but you don't need me to tell you that. I am once more behind the curve, but the OP and ED tracks are so refreshing to listen to that I am compelled to mention them.

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Part of the reason why opinions on songs can be so subjective is that I as a listener have a memory. Call it baggage, if you will, which stems from the atmosphere, emotions, even memories, invoked by whatever is loaded into WinAmp. Since I have this high tendency to loop single tracks for hours and days at a time, those sentiments are highly reinforced.

Having most recently had the dignified composition and performance of Yuki Kajiura and Yuuka Nanri ingrained in my mind, the effect of Yume, Hitohira and Smile is not unlike stepping out of a darkened concert hall and into a breezy mid-afternoon day with clear skies, as if attending a lunchtime concert was not unusual on its own.

Both tracks are distinctly relaxed, which is an odd thing to say of the much faster ED. Yet both draw inspiration from the days of a more spontaneous sound, where people were mostly comfortable with blues but there was still treasure to be found.

Yume, Hitohira [full length, washy audio] recalls a time when it was perfectly acceptable, even expected, to have a string ensemble in a pop song, of casual conversations with an enameled piano. The whole thing smacks of jazz, from the odd (but cool!) sounding intervals in the melody, to the trumpet interjections that punctuate the chorus. The only thing I didn't much like was chorus, which sounded a bit washy. I don't know if it was from the strings being a little too loud, possible pedal in the piano, ringing that didn't fade fast enough in the bells (xylophones) in the final chorus, or some combination thereof.

I am even more taken by Smile. It hits the ground running and never lets up. The short passage that is the intro and outro borrows a page from hyper-active Broadway musical numbers. It's in the same vein as nowhere and Silly-Go-Round — high energy, tight vocal lines — but it's not as dire as nowhere and it's not as reserved as Silly-Go-Round. The piano that audibly keeps pace with the vocalist throughout is a joy to listen to. Sunny synthesizers are, well, sunny synthesizers.

I was surprised that the vocalist for Smile is a mere 15 years old. This was a performance on par with Tamaki Nami, who debuted in her mid-teens as well. Mai Mizuhashi's style seems distinctly retro, judging from Smile and Yumemiru Otome, the Doujin Work ED. Her collaboration in the Kamisama Kazoku ED, a classic rock song, just reinforces this stylistic image, although the OP for the above is an exception.

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