Gentlemen Take Polaroids [Remastered] - Japan

Japan left behind their post punk aggression completely after the slightly schizophrenic "Quiet Life" and became one of the most original groups in English pop with their fourth release, "Gentlemen take polaroids".

Gone are the screaming guitars and raucous vocals and in is a more sophisticated sound and musical style.

Things that were hinted at on "Quiet life" now took centre stage as the ...
...that would become their trademark. Quite simply, they sounded like no-one else and whilst they were dumped in with the new romantic fad, they were nothing like it.

The five piece (David Sylvian - vocals. Steve Jansen - drums. Mick karn - Bass. Richard Barbieri - synths. Rob dean - guitar) recorded in Air and Townhouse Studios in London in 1980 under the production eye of John Punter. The results divide fans as to whether this or "Tin ... more

Japan left behind their post punk aggression completely after the slightly schizophrenic "Quiet Life" and became one of the most original groups in English pop with their fourth release, "Gentlemen take polaroids".

Gone are the screaming guitars and raucous vocals and in is a more sophisticated sound and musical style.

Things that were hinted at on "Quiet life" now took centre stage as the still young band began to craft intelligent and evocative songs that would become their trademark. Quite simply, they sounded like no-one else and whilst they were dumped in with the new romantic fad, they were nothing like it.

The five piece (David Sylvian - vocals. Steve Jansen - drums. Mick karn - Bass. Richard Barbieri - synths. Rob dean - guitar) recorded in Air and Townhouse Studios in London in 1980 under the production eye of John Punter. The results divide fans as to whether this or "Tin drum" is their best offering. It is certainly better than it's predecessors.

"Gentlemen take polaroids" opens the album which, whilst a decent and direct pop song is actually one of the weaker songs on the album. It does, however, showcase the bands musical abilities. Steve Jansen's drumming and Mick karn's
bass had by now become virtuosic, but thankfully never overindulgent.

Things really kick off with "Swing", and snaky, funky tune with everything rolling along at a beautiful tempo, David Sylvian's vocals at their most sultry.

"Burning Bridges", like the later bonus instrumentals, would not have sounded out of place on a Giorgio Moroder film composition. Essentially an Chinese inflected synth instrumental with a few lines of vocals tagged on the end, it does boast a wonderful sax solo from Karn that breaks the austere synthesised march-like opening with a seductive airiness.

"My new career" is an especially poignant song about loneliness and isolation that could actually have been a country and western tune if delivered by any other band. A heavily synth based pop tune with real emotional weight is not an easy achievement but Japan managed it here, once again with Mick Karn's musical prowess mixing things up a bit, with some searching fretless bass lines in the verses and some nice little sax solos.

The single "Quiet life" featured some energetic sequenced lines and the successful formula is repeated here on "Methods of Dance". A sax wails over the intro as Steve Jansen takes his time before kicking into a full dance beat with some excellent fills. The vocals just appear over the music as if from nowhere with a suitably understated melody line that builds into a fantastic chorus with guest female vocalist followed by some almost spaghetti western guitar from Rob Dean.

As they had previously done, Japan made the choice to include a cover on this album, with the Smokey Robinson penned "Ain't that peculiar" making an appearance. It is almost unrecognisable from the original though, and the Japan treatment is in full effect with all the ingredients present that made them so immediately recognisable. The drum beat is catchy and the vocals and bass seem to weave in and out of each other with some seriously eerie keyboard backing things up.

"Nightporter" is stripped naked. A simple Eric Satie inspired piano motif underneath Sylvian's painfully beautiful vocals. Strings and oboe blend in seamlessly to fill out the song but this is lonely arranging at it's best. The single " Ghosts" from "Tin drum" would continue in this vein. It is hard to pick a favourite from the two. A great song if you want to wallow in self pity for a few minutes.

The original release ended with "Taking Islands in Africa", a percussion heavy affair, with some incredibly advanced electronic work considering the era. Once more, the vocals are deep and restrained, even though some of the synthesised melodies create an uplifting mood throughout.

Two instrumental bonus tracks, "The experience of swimming" and "The width of a room" have been tagged onto the end of this remastered cd, both sounding like film scores. The first is quite reminiscent of the kind of music the French avant gard were using at the time in films such as "Betty Blue". The latter, definitely the kind of thing you might have heard in "Scarface" by Moroder. The disc is rounded out with a Steve Nye remix of "Taking Islands in Africa" which may or may not be interesting to production geeks I guess.

Whilst not a "perfect" album, this one comes pretty close with only one slightly lesser track. However, the deficiencies are more than made up for by the genius of tracks like "Nightporter" and "My new career" especially.

If I could only have one Japan album, I would have to toss a coin between this and "Tin drum". It does use dated technology yet the sheer quality of the songwriting ensures that this album does not and will not become dated, and the remastering has freshened things up too.

I can't see any good reason not to have this in a cd collection and also I was seriously in love when I first heard it. I can't remember the girl's second name now, but I still remember every line of this album.

Some things are built to last.
 

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