THE VERY BEST OF JAPAN

This band is one of the most surprising additions into ProgArchives in my opinion. Surely David Sylvian has brilliantly continued his solo career, never afraid of taking risks and experimenting with new ideas, but JAPAN is very much a product of the times, Techno/ New Wave pop of England from the late 70's and early 80's. Maybe it's their usage of Oriental elements and a notable originality compared to many other New Wave acts, but my guess is that very few Prog enthusiasts would fall for this band. But onto this compilation.

I admit I haven't heard all of their albums and since this CD doesn't clearly tell which tracks come from which albums (or if they are only single tracks), I feel a little lost with this compilation that seems heavily to concentrate on single mixes, remixes and such. All I can say is that the majority of these songs are not very good and haven't stood the test of time. They are cold and monotonous electro-pop songs without the catchiness of the best songs by, say, Duran Duran. Even Sylvian's voice sounds worse than later on in his career.

There are few quite good songs, and one jewel: 'Night Porter', a moody slow piano ballad reminding a lot of Erik Satie's Gymnopedies. In the leaflet there's only some piece of obscure short prose that I don't get at all. What it has to do with music? Why there is no useful information of any kind? I'm afraid I can't give this more than 2 stars. I also believe JAPAN's final albums (Tin Drum at least) are better as a whole than this compilation.