Yellow Magic Orchestra: Solid State Survivor [MUSIC ON VINYL]

Why you'll love it

This numbered Music On Vinyl edition is pressed on 180g vinyl from high-resolution 24-bit/96kHz files of the original masters. In Japan the album hit No. 1, spent 82 weeks on the Oricon LP chart and won Best Album at the 1980 Japan Record Awards.

This edition

• 180g vinyl
• Numbered
• Mastered from 24-bit/96kHz transfers of the original masters

About the album

One of the songs here started life as music for a Seiko watch commercial, which says a lot about Yellow Magic Orchestra: three Tokyo session players who could make a jingle sound like the future. Haruomi Hosono, Ryuichi Sakamoto and Yukihiro Takahashi recorded their second album at Alfa Studio in Shibaura through the spring of 1979, with Hideki Matsutake programming the Microcomposer that drove the sequences.

Sakamoto's "Technopolis" is often cited as an early spark for Detroit techno, Takahashi's "Rydeen" gallops along on a melody that later became the theme of Sega's arcade game Super Locomotive, and "Behind the Mask," with lyrics by Chris Mosdell, was later recorded by Michael Jackson. There's a crisp, robotic take on the Beatles' "Day Tripper" with Makoto Ayukawa on guitar, and Sandii sings on "Absolute Ego Dance."

It was the best-selling LP in Japan in 1980 and has sold around two million copies worldwide. Not bad for three chaps whose original plan had been a one-off electronic cover of a Martin Denny tune.

Also at Kops: more Yellow Magic Orchestra on vinyl · browse Electronic

Tracklist

Listen

On Alfa / Music On Vinyl (cat# MOVLP1467), a reissue of the 1979 album.