Em. wrote:
Just based on your opinion of Cowboy Bebop I'm gonna give the other anime you mentioned a try.
Hey, that's great, thank you Em. You may like some of them, not Arjuna though, seriously, that show was very disappointing.
Ergo Proxy
Mostly electronic and industrial sounding, good only if you have a taste for this kind of thing. I like this kind of music, but honestly I think that this stuff is kinda weak if you're looking for stuff that is emotionally impacting. It's mostly vibe and atmosphere, which isn't inherently bad, but the material here just lacks substance. "Romdo Overshadows" is my favorite track, and "Wombsys" is also a good one, from a very memorable moment in the show. I also think that Ergo Proxy has one of the greatest OPs in all of anime, second only to Cowboy Bebop, and I'm not just saying that because of the song. I do love Ergo Proxy, and it's score is a good one, just not very memorable.
The Vision of Escaflowne
Wow... just... WOW! What can I possibly say about this music that's not an understatement? I love this score. The track I usually listen to first, "Flying Dragon" captures the feeling and overall tone of this show perfectly, it seals up everything I love about the fantasy genre. I love fantasy and sword-and-sorcery, more so than science fiction. Fantasy films are rare, GOOD fantasy films even more rare, but a fantasy anime from an Asian country that barely has a grasp on European-based mythology and what makes it great? That's a fucking diamond in the haystack. Everyone loves and remembers "Dance of Curse" and yeah, it's great, a powerful and hard-hitting track that punches you in the chest with choir vocals and doesn't let up until the very last moment; in particular I really love the string section where it sounds like a waltz that's gone out of control. But a part of me dislikes how much attention this one track gets though. In every thread you'll see on other message boards about Escaflowne, you'll see talk of this one piece of music, when I think that the score as a whole should be discussed.
Honestly I think that the track "Epistle" is every bit a powerful as "Dance of Curse" and is more meaningful to me because the scene in which you first hear it blew me away (the action scene near the end of episode 14). "Shrilly" is another favorite of mine, I love how it starts off small but grows larger and more out of control. I love the use of strings in that piece. "Ne Zu Mi" is a great track too; I love the playfulness of it. "Arcadia" is a great, operatic track and has and excellent use of strings. I love the last approximate 45 seconds or so of this track, I wish that string section at the end lasted just a few more measures, it has that bitter-sweet ending feeling and I love it! "Blaze" is another fantastic track that heavily relies on vocals. What I like about this one is the feeling of shock and revelation, it just sounds like it should go along with a "Luke, I am your father!" type of scene. "Chain" is also good, capturing the feeling of going to fight where the odds are stacked against you. That nervousness, that tension of preparing for battle is so crystallized in this track. "Hitomi Theme" is also good.
But the one I really want to emphasize is "A Far Cry." This is my favorite piece from this soundtrack and that's saying alot. Those strings, those beautiful, sorrowful strings. There's so much going on in this piece. Sorrow, doubt, fear, desperation, agony, pain, loneliness, awakening, realization, revelation, regret, anxiety, ...... I'm searching for another word to sum this up but I don't think there's a word in the English language that can wrap up every feeling contained in this one piece of music. If there's a word for "the pain of being alive" let me know.
One thing I don't like about fans is that I think they give too much credit to Yoko Kanno for this soundtrack. She wasn't the only person responsible for this masterpiece, there was also Hajime Mizoguchi, who composed some equally great segments of this score. Especially when you consider Yoko Kanno's (again, I'll used this description) eccentric style which is present here again, I think she gets a little too much attention for this score. There are some wierd track in there like "Country Man" or "Ask the Owl" which are completely unnecessary and unpleasant to listen to. "Machine Soldier," "Market Place," "Medicine Eater," "Godds Drunk," no one cares about that crap and no one wants to hear it. Also the all-caps on the songs titles is annoying. Because of this I put together my own "Unofficial Mega-Mix" of just the good stuff that's worth listening to, in a specific order that to me is the best listening order.
In spite of it's flaws though, the score is fantastic. And I'm going to make this statement and I'll stand by it:
THE MUSICAL SCORE SOUNDTRACK OF
THE VISION OF ESCAFLOWNE
COMPOSED BY YOKO KANNO AND HAJIME MIZOGUCHI
IS
OBJECTIVELY
THE GREATEST
MUSICAL SOUNDTRACK
OF ANY JAPANESE ANIMATION
EVER
OF ALL TIME.
Nothing else even compares to it. There are some others that get close, but no other anime soundtrack goes as far to covering such a wide range of feeling, emotion, and action and does it as expertly well as this score. It's just the greatest, period.
more later