Naughty boys and their yellow magic

For a devoted fan of electronic music the pickings were slim in the early 90's. A backlash against the synth driven pop of the 80's led to the rise of Britpop and the guitar driven dirges of Pulp, Blur, Oasis, et al. During these bleak days I sought solace in a variety of strange (electronic) music; "any port in a storm" and all that.

Artists such as Wendy Caros and Isao Tomita didn't appeal too much (as my tastes have matured and both now have a place in my music collection) and never really came up to the standards of my hero Jean Michel Jarre. Tangerine Dream and The Art of Noise were two bands that I felt I should like, rather than having a natural affinity for. Yello and Vangelis were all well and good, but they still lacked melodic drive and proved to have quite inconsistent back catalogues (I'm thinking more Vangelis than Yello here to be fair).

That left the 'odd child' of electronic music; Yellow Magic Orchestra. My introduction to them came through their remix album Hi-Tech/No Crime. Albums like this where were quite de rigueur in the 90's (The Art of Noise's "FON Mixes" and Yello's "Hands on Yello" etc etc). I liked a lot of the melodies in the album but it somehow left me cold and uninterested. Yellow Magic Orchestra albums were (and to a certain extent still are) difficult to obtain and so my interest in them cooled. However, in 2003, remastered versions of their albums were released in the UK and I dipped my toe back into the YMO water.

To listen to Yellow Magic Orchestra you have to re tune your ears away from western sensibilities and remember this band were trying to do something new. Not only were they determined to retain the sound of their Japanese heritage but they also wanted to add the bright fun loving melodies and sounds so despised by Kraftwerk and their contemporaries. They were, and remain, unique and fun loving.

P.S. As I mentioned earlier, not all Y.M.O. albums are easy to come by in the UK. Albums such as "Solid State Survivor" and "Yellow Magic Orchestra" are very easy to find, whilst "×∞Multiplies" and "BGM" are quite rare. Consequently, the unscrupulous are trying to make a killing on amazon by charging silly money for these rarer albums. Top tip is to use eBay and collector sites such as eil.com as they actually represent the best value for money and there can even be a bargain or two to be had.