Combo Piano “Ribbon”
"Ribbon"
(Sycamore, ewe) 2004
Takuma Watanabe: Piano, and Other Instruments
Various Musicians
Few musicians working in Japan defy all categories as fully and successfully as Combo Piano. Not only is the music hard to describe, much less to file in the CD store racks, but it's wonderfully hard to describe.
Pianist, composer, and general music-jester, Watanabe, who IS Combo Piano, creates music that performs in multiples; it intrigues, questions, transcends and connects, never resting for long before moving to another mode and mood. The distinctively individual voice of Watanabe's compositions and arrangements strike with the unexpected force of minimalist art, but not just that. He works here on this latest release in a calmer mood than on his other recordings, implanting inside the musical pauses and openings, a rich pool of deep emotions.
The title track "Ribbon" has a meandering, stunning beauty to it. As elegant as a daydream walking through the city, the song captures a sense of longing with graceful melodic motions. "Blood" is equally soft and gentle, sweeping along with electric feedback set against chiming piano and violin-cello lines. The layers add up into a rich yet delicate structure. These two songs' stately pace creates a wistful feeling that make you miss the complexity of their structure at first, only to reveal it strongly after several listens.
The strange treatment of electric piano and samples on "crayon box" and "runs toward my girlfriend" are weird and perplexing. It makes you think at first your CD player is out of whack. Then, you look at the titles again, and understand a certain humor, a certain child-like love of just playing around, and you can remember the feeling of having your own crayon box once long ago as a child, before life got so seriously adult, and the many "runs" that one has in life.
"Birthday out of season" has an almost orchestral feel, with a fuller use of drums and the only jazz-like bass as well. Watanabe's piano here does more than state and counterpoint, but defines the space in which the song moves. "Arena" is an equally muscular number, with a bolder range of feelings, and strong undertow-like drums, shifts in rhythmic textures, and a sharp cello line. Both songs show a broad, open sense of direction that really picks up and moves. These two songs also balance out the meditative pieces, and establish the overall sequencing of the CD, which has a beautifully flowing and affecting wholeness to it.
It might be tough to know where to file this, but that's the CD store's problem. Most people will file it right next to their CD player at home to listen to again and again.