Our German friend Christian Morgenstern is still looking for new talented people and this time he's introducing an artist native of Nagano and called Dr Shingo. This Japanese producer has a significant musical background (he learned music and played various instruments in many styles). Now it seems that he found his way making electronic music. This first album shows it. Like other Forte Records releases, sleeve design is both original and funny : for sure the little smoking Mickey Mouse or the nice mentions "stereo - can also be played on mono equipment" & "high fidelity - a new dimensional sound" will make you smile ! But let's go back to Dr Shingo's music... The common denominator between most of his tracks is the typical 80's sound thanks to the use of vocoders, many melodies & synth sounds... He's influenced by various styles like Japanese techno of course ("Cotton blues", "Japanese robo"), video games ("Yellow invader"), kind of trance ("Galaxy girls" and the amazing "Death before disko" remix) and some quiet melodic & melancholic tunes à la C. Morgenstern / Kraftwerk ("Leo's dream", "Welcome to space odd-yssey", "Space walk"). Dr Shingo surprises also with a vocoded remix of "Smells like teen spirit" by Nirvana ! Finally, he deserves to appear by the side of the best HI-NRG producers with his two bombs "Have you ever seen the blue comet ?" and "I walk this way"... Simply excellent !! Moreover, crazy Ural 13 Diktators are part of the CD version with a strong & funny remix of "Have you ever seen the blue comet ?". Other CD-bonus : the same track revisited by Takkyu Ishino himself in an electro techno way (all these versions were previously released on Forte 17). So as you can guess, Dr Shingo couldn't find any better label than Forte to show to the entire world his huge talent ! Well, you have only one thing to do now : go to Forte web site, listen to "Dr Shingo's Space Odd-yssey" and don't miss the great bonus track only available as mp3 download. Dr Shingo : revelation of the year !!
(original publishing date: 12/08/2002)
www.forterecords.com
Ludo, 23/06/2003