Search - Yoshida Kyodai, Yoshida Brothers :: Ibuki

Not just for old people

06/06/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

"When I first bought this CD, all my Japanese friends looked at me really funny, because, apparently, only old Japanese people listen to this stuff. I'm glad that I bought it, though. It's different from traditional stuff in the pace. If you listen to most of the 3-string guitar stuff from Asia, it's all kinda slow, and there's a lot of rests between each "plink" sound. But on this album, everything's pretty fast, so you definitely won't fall asleep. I took off one star, since some of the tracks sound pretty much the same."

LIke nothing you're used to listening to

M. E. BURNS | Minneapolis, MN USA | 04/06/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I first heard this album when my host family lent it to me in the summer of 2003. The opening track, "Modan", blew my mind, simply because it was a pair of traditional shamisen, wrought funky like the the opening theme of some forgotten movie. The tone of the album as a whole is peaceful and transporting - for a time I was able to imagine myself on a slow wagon to Aomori instead of a crowded Tokyo subway. If no one else can understand my love of Ibuki, that's ok - it remains one of the most treasured elements of my CD collection. It took me two years to find it again after leaving Japan, and it figures heavily in all my chambara daydreams to date."