[quote="xtsquintx"]I think this pretty much sums it up:

[img]http://i35.tinypic.com/iopzs0.jpg[/img][/quote]
IM post of the week right there.

I really hated Ooparts on my first listen, but a few days later I sat down and listened through again (with a set of nice headphones this time) and I actually like it quite a bit. It's not great, certainly not their best, but I've accepted that the late-90s pillows that I initially fell in love with is simply not what they're going for anymore. The variety in their music is a bit of a blessing/curse situation.

Dance with God - Pretty alright. Like the intro a lot. Whatever weird reverb they put over the chorus is annoying, though. Good intro to the album.
YOUR ORDER - Okay, but forgettable. Strikes me as a b-side. Pretty straightforward, nothing too interesting going on.
Melody - Starts off a bit flat, but picks up, and I love the chorus.
Lemon Drops - Fun song, reminds me a little bit of that energy their older stuff had, but not too memorable.
FOXES - Strange, but cool. I really like the electronic bits they throw in before the chorus. The two trumpet samples are mixed WAY too loud tho.
Beyond the moon - Tied for best on the album. Hell of a little gem stuffed into an otherwise-"alright" package. I love Manabe's part. Terrible decision to have it fade out though, this song deserves to have an ending.
Johnny Strobo - Another "okay but forgettable" b-sideish one. I like the sound of Manabe's guitar in it.
Ameagari ni mita Maboroshi - Pretty good. Overtly the main single compared to the rest of the album.
LIFE SIZE LIFE - Another "okay but forgettable" b-sideish one. Could have been better if the English didn't blow.
Primer Beat - Those dirty goddamn cockteases. They end their album with a badass throwback to their old jazzy days? This song fucking rocks. When they want to, they've really still got it.

Three Engrish songs, wow. For some reason I had a feeling there wouldn't be any at all. Sawao's English pronunciation has improved a ton, but his writing directly works against that. When he says a sentence that makes sense it's generally understandable on the first listen, but then you get stuff like "I neither am such man nor long for him" that flew entirely over my head. If you read it you can see what he means, but he could really use somebody who actually speaks English to touch up the grammar, call in Kweller or somebody.

I was kind of hoping the album would be more in line with Ameagari, but most of it strikes me as sort of a new spin on My Foot era stuff. Overall it's pretty good. 7/10 for me.

To IM:
[quote="Sawao Yamanaka"]
Don't you understand?
Who do you think I am?
I'm not probably the man
as whom you regard.
Why should you misunderstand?
You should know my strange songs.
Still don't you understand?
I'm not considerate man.

I'd just like to feel music.
I make and sing a favorite song.
Only that thing.
[b]If you're dissatisfied, disappear.[/b]
[/quote]

[quote]I don't want to sing that kindly song.
I neither am such man nor long for him.
But everyone still likes him twopenny song
[Exert yourself! Don't exert yourself!]
Do you aim at a slave?
I'd like to be life-size

You don't like telling a true thing.
[I'm that person] It's desired.
Your ear faces to only the pleasant voice.
Today and tomorrow are your real one.
I don't agree with you.
Because I'd like to be life-size.[/quote]

There's a reason why these songs are in English. What a waste.

[quote="Raid"]To IM:
[quote="Sawao Yamanaka"]
Don't you understand?
Who do you think I am?
I'm not probably the man
as whom you regard.
Why should you misunderstand?
You should know my strange songs.
Still don't you understand?
I'm not considerate man.

I'd just like to feel music.
I make and sing a favorite song.
Only that thing.
[b]If you're dissatisfied, disappear.[/b]
[/quote][/quote]

Why I love Poison Rock'N Roll. Haters be damned.

Oh no, broken English. That's sure gonna show those mean haters.

get it right

I guess I could elaborate further on why I like it but I'm not going to spend a lot of time writing about it. Basically, for me it's the universal theme of enjoying something to the disapproval of others. The song very clearly gets that message across despite the engrish. I'm sure a lot of people would be able to connect with that message.

Perhaps some don't think much of the music itself. For whatever faults that can be deduced for the song, I feel like there's much bigger fish to fry than POISON ROCK'N'ROLL. It seems like it'd be a fun song to play on Guitar Hero.

[quote="Brye916"]get it right[/quote]

wut

edit:

Yes, the lyrics for the chorus to Poison Rock'n'roll are rather shoddily worded.

[quote="Cloudy_One"]I guess I could elaborate further on why I like it but I'm not going to spend a lot of time writing about it. Basically, for me it's the universal theme of enjoying something to the disapproval of others. The song very clearly gets that message across despite the engrish. I'm sure a lot of people would be able to connect with that message.

Perhaps some don't think much of the music itself. For whatever faults that can be deduced for the song, I feel like there's much bigger fish to fry than POISON ROCK'N'ROLL. It seems like it'd be a fun song to play on Guitar Hero.

[quote="Brye916"]get it right[/quote]

wut

edit:

Yes, the lyrics for the chorus to Poison Rock'n'roll are rather shoddily worded.[/quote]

I wasn't aiming towards you specifically, more or less everyone that didn't take Raid's post as it was.

Alright, I finally got a chance to listen to the album. This isn't going to be a song-by-song rundown—just some of my thoughts.

So here's my overall take on it: I think it's decent. It's not particularly stunning, but it's not an utter piece of shit either. The best thing about the album is that, stylistically, it's not that formulaic—there's a lot of variation between the songs that keeps the album interesting. Look at the contrast between Lemon Drops, Ameagari ni mita Maboroshi, and Primer Beat, for example. Three songs that are substantially different in sound. On the other hand, a lot of the stuff on Pied Piper, for example, was rather monotonous. Pied Piper, New Animal, No Surrender, Ladybird Girl, Poison Rock'n'Roll—they're all pretty similar to each other. I didn't see any of that on this album—it's fairly balanced. Granted, there were a few clunkers that dragged this album down (Melody, Foxes, Life Size Life come to mind), but they weren't really [i]bad[/i] songs in my opinion—I just didn't care for them much.

Another thing that impressed me personally was Shin's drumming on this album. It's a lot more dynamic and creative than usual, which is a huge plus in my book. Also, I really liked a lot of Manabe's solos—they even shone through some of the more mediocre songs (e.g. Melody). And the basslines were pretty interesting all throughout the album.

And about Primer Beat: I knew it was going to be good, but I didn't expect it to be as amazing as it turned out to be. Manabe's guitar just sings throughout the song, and that's some of the best drumming I've heard from Shin in quite a while. The other cool thing about it is that, in addition to the jazzy feel, I swear there's a bit of this rockabilly feel to it as well. It's an interesting experiment and throwback to their old era, and it turned out beautifully.

Aside from Primer Beat, my other favorites would be Lemon Drops, Dance with God, and Ameagari ni mita Maboroshi. In that order, I'd say.

So yeah, my two cents right there. Granted, this is after only one listen-through, so I'll probably have somewhat different opinions after it's settled in more.

[quote="Raid"]To IM:
[quote="Sawao Yamanaka"]
Don't you understand?
Who do you think I am?
I'm not probably the man
as whom you regard.
Why should you misunderstand?
You should know my strange songs.
Still don't you understand?
I'm not considerate man.

I'd just like to feel music.
I make and sing a favorite song.
Only that thing.
[b]If you're dissatisfied, disappear.[/b]
[/quote]

[/quote]

Best quote ever!

I was starting to get annoyed by the increasingly "simplistic" drumming that Shin has been doing lately, but with songs like Ameagari... I like how straightforward the beat keeping and drum rolls are. The simplicity of his drum beat always gets to me on the fade out from the outro. I still think Manabe should go crazy with the riff during the fade out... there's so much room for improvisation instead of just playing those same notes. I LOVE that riff, but when I cover Ameagari, I can't help but add in things to the main riff towards the end (you'll see when I finally upward my cover, IM).

[quote="Brye916"]get it right[/quote]

What IS there to get right?

[quote]If you read it you can see what he means, but he could really use somebody who actually speaks English to touch up the grammar, call in Kweller or somebody.[/quote]

This is a FANTASTIC idea. As long as he's going to be hanging out with him, why not have him do a little grammar checking. Because honestly, I've really warmed up to almost every song on the album, and the only thing that still holds me back is the Engrish.

Well, I finally listened to it for myself. I'm honestly really disappointed.

I'd have to agree that this album is pretty bad. It's not that the songs are "awful" or "unlistenable", I just don't find myself wanting to go back and listen to them. Pretty much all of the songs are extremely mediocre, with the exception of course being the awesomeness that is Primer Beat. But other than that, I don't find myself getting a song like FOXES or lemon Drops stuck in my head. I don't walk around wanting to whistle along to the tune of Beyond the Moon. Most of the songs just seem to be a random collection of riffs that seemed to sound alright, they don't sound like a lot of thought was put into them.

Like many people have said already, the songs just aren't memorable. I really like Pied Piper quite a bit, it had a good handful of really good songs that I want to listen to more than a couple times. But Ooparts really only has one song that I want to go back to, which is really disappointing considering that I was pretty stoked for this album from listening to songs like 1989, etc.

Overall, I really don't care for this album at all. I'm not saying that the Pillows don't have it anymore. But come on. After 20 years of being together you're bound to have at least a couple albums that aren't your personal best. I'll give it a couple more listens, but from the few times I've listened to it, I'm really not impressed at all.

On the bright side, Primer Beat seriously rules. It's like a combination of the Living Field jazzy feel with the more upbeat songs from Penalty Life.