T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land // Un Chien Andalou (1929) dir. Luis Buñuel // Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky (1949) // William S. Burroughs, Queer (1985) // Francisco Goya, Saturn Devouring His Son (c. 1819-1823) // Julia Kristeva, Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection (1980) // Pink Floyd - The Wall (1982) dir. Alan Parker // Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Young Goodman Brown” (1835) // Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves (2000) // Elliott Smith, “Don’t Go Down” (2004)
Today Suga and RM paid tribute to the Japanese composer Sakamoto Ryuichi. He was known as a pioneer in electro and hip hop music but his musical interest were wide and eclectic.
Riot in Lagos (1980) is considered an early example of electro-funk music. In 2011, The Guardian reported it as one of the 50 key events in the history of dance music.
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Sakamoto collaborated with a number of western artists. In 1981 he worked with Talking Heads and King Crimson guitarist Adrian Belew and Robin Scott for the album Left-Handed Dream. He had a long time collaboration with David Sylvian from the band Japan.
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He won a BAFTA for his film-score for Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence (1983) and he also appeared in the film alongside David Bowie and Tom Conti. He also wrote the score for The Last Emperor, Sheltering Sky and The Revenant amongst others.
Sakamoto Ryuichi has been an important influence on Suga. When he was in Japan last year he played tribute to Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence on Instagram. We know now that he also had a meeting with Sakamoto during that visit.
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In January, Suga chose his 10 favourites from Ryuichi Sakamoto and he talked about the influence the composer had had on his own life.
Here are some of the tracks from Suga's top 10. They show the breadth of his interests and talents. You may want to check out the other tracks.
Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence
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7) Energy Flow (first instrumental no.1 on Oricon chart)
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10) Undercooled (recorded with Korean rapper MC Sniper)
The Sheltering Sky (Ryuichi Sakamoto) "Sakamoto Music"
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The sound of Ryuichi Sakamoto is the sound of ancient Greece. A kind of rough sound that is never flat. I heard so. If you think about it that way, you can draw a huge line between his great works. It recreates the high mountains and rivers of Greece. Because it is a sound originated in Europe, it is likely to attract Westerners in particular.
King Crimson - "The Sheltering Sky"
From the bootleg
Fripp's Return at the Court of the Crimson King
(Recorded October 9, 1981)
Last song scrobbled from iTunes at Last.fm
Recorded at The Venue, London UK, and clearly an audience recording. The show was released by the bootleggers complete as a CD, and also as a set of three 7" 33-1/3 RPM singles, entitled Act 1, Act 2, and Act 3
One of my favourite interviews of Luca talking about working with Armie (and Timmy)
“So we had this triangulation of Armie Hammer, me, Bernardo [Bertolucci], Debra Winger, Paul Bowles and [Andre] Aciman, all together making this little scene - and that, for me, is the beauty of cinema.”