Magical 花澤香菜

The colours of The Magical Forest glow in this remarkable recording which brings together Sinikka Langeland’s Norwegian-Finnish-Swedish Starflowers quintet with the singers of the Trio Mediӕval. It’s an inspired concept: the Trio Mediӕval, with their affinity for folk music and their unique vocal blend, adapt themselves ideally to Sinikka’s sound-world, which is once archaic, timeless and contemporary. The quintet members, all bandleaders in their own right, are amongst the most characterful players in Scandinavia today, and Sinikka sets them free to improvise around her cycle of songs, built upon myths and legends of the world tree.

James Last was a German big-band leader with a large fan base in Europe, although he never had a comparable following in the United States. Last's trademark was arranging pop hits in a big-band style; his series of "party albums" became equally well-known. Over the course of his career, he sold well over 50 million albums…

Magical Power Mako - Music From Heaven (1982) {Belle Antique Japan 9460 rel 1994}
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© 1982, 1994 Marquee Moon / Belle Antique Japan | 9460
Psychedelic / Experimental / Electronic / Ambient / Experimental Rock

Recorded and released in 1982, immediately following the rather disappointing Welcome to Earth, Music from Heaven was Magical Power Mako's creative breakthrough. The Japanese guitarist's earlier work, while fitfully intriguing, had felt somewhat derivative of British and German progressive rockers of the same period. Music from Heaven, while it still owes a debt to Brian Eno's collaborations with the likes of Cluster and Harold Budd, is a much more cohesive and listenable album.

Michael Head, former frontman of the Pale Fountains and current co-leader along with his brother John – who is also a Strand – of Brit pop outfit Shack, turns in a stellar chamber pop performance with Magical World of the Strands. Head, who is no stranger to either classy, baroque pop or neo-psychedelia, has composed an album of gorgeously illustrated songs that are lushly orchestrated by a standard rock quartet augmented by a flutist (Leslie Roberts) and a string quartet. The result is an album that, while little known, is a classic, a masterpiece of modern chamber pop.

John di Martino has been described by Paul Pines as a musical "shape shifter", inhabiting three different worlds. As a straight ahead jazz pianist, he has performed and recorded with such notables as Kenny Burrell, Pat Martino, James Moody and Eddie Gomez. Mr. di Martino is a sought after musical director and has accompanied Jon Hendricks, Diane Schuur and the late Billy Eckstine.

On this second shot by Magical Power Mako (not with his bandmates but with his family), his experimental trial as the previous work is suppressed but gets to be more sensitive and theoretical for music. That is, in my humble opinion, Mako might accept that everything eccentric is not alright but consistency of music should be needed. With featuring many kinds of instruments, he might consider the important thing is musical integration. Well, please listen to the first half named as 'Butch Side'. The stream-like starting of the first track Andromeda is the proof as above mentioned. Oh, I see, the integration could be constructed because he was the one and only player in this work. Tundra, with quiet and cold psychedelia, next Oriental chandelier Silk Road, and wonderfully hot and juicy Woman in South Island…all are made so compact, not scattered. Could they be easy for us to listen? Leaving Butch's voice behind (sorry), Pink Butch (Lalala) is a beautiful piece of cake. Very sweet, very melancholic, and very feminine.