Recorded
Dec 77-Jan78 Yukihiro Takahashi and Sakamoto and HH play together only
on one track. The band name was a rather obscure takeoff on a Captain
Beefheart song title as rumor has it. This is often considered the
definitive pre-YMO album though Takahashi's contemporarily recorded
suave French-Pop album "Saravah" has all 3 future YMO members working
together far more extensively. The style here is Exotica and more like a
tropical band album than a synth album so musically this isn't much
connected with YMO's style apart from YMO carrying over many exotica
refrencesw on the debut, so Parasio is relatively distant from YMO (Cochin Moon
is actually closer to YMO due to heavy synth use). There is synth
though. Interestingly, Sakamoto did his own album of roughly this kind
of sound though more pop / disco on his album Summer Nerves... Fan page ...
In 1981, elsewhere in Japan, the not-nearly-as-popular-but-still-great
Moon Riders had just released the highly regarded "Camera Egal Stylo,"
which marked their about-face into new-wave, and were working on the
highly-regarded album "Mania Maniera," which was apparently too bizarre
to release upon its completion in 1982. Lots of elevated regard was
floating around between YMO and them apparently. Therefore no surprise
that the 1981 album by the Beatniks, the on-again-off-again
collaboration between YMO frontman and drummer Yukihiro Takahashi and
head Moon Rider (and Earthbound soundtrack scribe, to you video game
fans) Keiichi Suzuki, is as fantastic as it is.
The oddly named
"Exitentialism" (yes, ExiTENtialism...don't ask me!) is, to be sure, a
bit tilted in the YMO direction. YMO, and especially Takahashi, were
stars; the Moon Riders were and are Not. Consequently, Exitentialism is a
bit of a 60%/30% split in Takahashi's favor--not a huge problem, as by
this point Keiichi Suzuki's voice was at the beginning of its steady
decline. As an album, Exitentialism plays like a combination of YMO's
"BGM" (think U-T and Cue), the Moon Riders' "Camera Egal Stylo". They
released 4 more albums over the 2 decades that followed. Exitentialist A
Go Go [1987] , Another High Exit [1994], The Show Vol.4 Yohji Yamamoto
Collection Music [1996] , M.R.I. Musical Resonance Imaging [2001] . Easy
does it... Rho-Xs
