Stroking that rare sweet spot between art and pop, Japan eschewed easy or definitive classification. Of course, they were always inextricably linked to Japanese artist Yellow Magic Orchestra and in particular Riuyichi Sakamoto, who wrote the final track here- ‘Taking Islands In Africa ‘ – but there are classical influencers in the won ton soup too, as well as synth pioneers like Kraftwerk and Radiophonic Workshop.
Theirs was a sophisticated sound, all too often dismissed as pretentious, precious or too esoteric. But I think that’s a tad unfair – like Bauhaus who received similar criticism, they simply traced their own path. This album, their fourth , is often forgotten for the more successful ‘Tin Drum’.
Multi -instrumentalist Mick Karn, with his wind instruments and famous fretless bass was one of the band’s secret weapons; the other being David Sylvian, his voice as creamy as it was grainy. They were more than just pretty futurists.
The title track is danceable, witty and a little dark.Then there’s the incredibly gorgeous, yearning waltz ‘Nightporter’, which, as with the similarly drum- free ‘Ghosts’ a few years later, became a UK hit. There’s not many eighties artists that had the audacity to homage Erik Satie. They burned bright, then fizzled out too soon, as with all things pyrotechnic.
