A Steal at Any Price lower than 31 dollars US.
donkeye | all up in your face | 11/06/2001
(5 out of 5 stars)
"This album is hideously expensive. It's like being kicked in the butt and slapped in the face and told to enjoy it because you paid for it.Is it worth the money? Of course not. How could it be? How can any cd be worth 40 dollars US? It's not possible. It's a form of arrogance to buy an album priced like this. It's like saying, I'm the biggest dumbest richest Boredoms fan in the whole universe, and my only reason I'm holding down this feckless job is to support my habit of buying outrageously over-priced Boredoms import cds.Unfortunately, this is a stunning, electrifying release by the Brian Wilson of the most avant-garde rock band on the planet, Eye Yamatsuka. His remix of Vision Creation NewSun is by my estimation a work of handsome genius. Where the road to nirvana was a whirling dervish ride on Vision Creation, here it is a ballroom dance. The music is intense, but flirtatious. There is a new, sort of funk to this record that Boredoms have been very slowly approaching in their regular releases, but have yet to fully embrace.There's really no reason to buy an album at this price, and no matter how good it is, a nausea will probably set in when you listen to it and realize it's not a cd burned straight from God's own burner. Nevertheless, if you ever find it cheap, or if Amazon has a BIG XMAS SALE on REBORE Vol. 0, I'd suggest it's worth putting on the ol' Wish List.You could always pilfer it from the Internet, yes, but the album art is actually quite stupendous, so you're missing out there. Some people don't care for album art or package, but I do. Like that special Japanese version of Boredoms's album Super AE packaged in a yellow plastic pack that when you touch it it makes swirly red around your finger, like something psychedelic. Cost me 40 bucks US to get that package!!"
EyE's masterpiece, thus far
Allan MacInnis | Vancouver | 06/07/2001
(5 out of 5 stars)
"The newest in the Rebore series, Volume 0 is Yamataka -- I think that's how he's spelling it this year -- EyE's reworking of the VISION/CREATION/NEW SUN disc, and is also titled "VISION RECREATION NEWSOUND" (Guess he can be excused, as a non-native speaker of English, for missing out on "revision.") It was released in Japan in spring of 2001, just after volume 3 of the Rebore releases by DJ Krush, as far as I know. THIS IS THE BOREDOMS I HAVE WANTED TO HEAR, this is what I dream the Boredoms could be. SUPER AR was too big and fuzzy, with too many repeated passages and big thumps for my taste; VISION CREATION NEWSUN was brilliant, but still a little too DRIVEN, a little too intense for me to want to hear it more than once in a row. EyE, for Volume 0, really breaks apart the sounds of that album and mutates them, plays with them, and adds what sound like samples of tribal music and other stuff here and there. The result is something both very listenable and bizarre -- a playful, unique, perverse, and DEEPLY STONED musical statement that has all the complexity and inventiveness of the best Boredoms stuff without it ever feeling like a nail is being hammered into your skull. (Don't get me wrong, I like that stuff too, I just like this a LOT more). Any serious avant rock fan would find this disc VERY satisfying, and it stands up there with masterpieces like Ground-Zero PLAYS STANDARDS as one of the finest moments in Japanese experimental music that I have yet encountered. ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC STUFF. The cover art, note, is very minimal and restrained, for a change, though it is definitely Eye's. I highly recommend this disc to ANYONE who cares about the Boredoms, or Japanese avant garde music, or people who like Eye from Naked City, or, hell, anyone who is smart and has taste. It will NOT disappoint; it seems to me a MAJOR musical statement, an erasure of the horizon, a move even further into a completely new music, unique in the world, despite its familiar aspects. Acidhead Pomo tribal music for the 21st century; a possible direction that popular music COULD go in, if only the people making it were as smart and creative and daring as EyE. Note, Naked City fans, that he does NOT do much gibbering or shrieking here --. Nevermind. You won't be disappointed. (And by the way, Amazon's price is VERY reasonable -- the CD is almost as expensive, even in Japan)."
Good but not great.
Jamie Graves | Westport, CT United States | 09/06/2001
(3 out of 5 stars)
"I was very excited for this album. I really enjoyed Unkle's rebore vol. 1, I loved Vision Creation Newsun and most of what Eye touches turns to gold, so I had pretty high hopes. On the first few listenings I REALLY enjoyed this album. Eye avoids a lot of the pitfalls of remixing, choosing to literally remix the original tracks, switching them around, altering speeds, and generally making new and interesting things out the VCN material. I still think it is very good, much better than most crap out right now, but taking the ($) price into account, I don't think it's worth it. I think VCN was a much better overall album, with many of the same sounds. This one is a album to relax to, not the amazing journey that VCN was. For boredoms completists only,"
Track Listings (7) - Disc #1