Yuki Kajiura Appreciation Station!

Say what you want about Kajiura, but she's done some pretty awesome scores for some pretty awesome shows. If there's a song or five of hers that you think are completely awesome, share them here!

(This includes any fictionjunction, Kalafina, see-saw, as well as random projects)







Okay, that one might be cheating slightly since it's a remix, but all the music in it was composed by Kajiura. So there.

Hm, all the links are flagged "Only admins are allowed to see this link"?

Apart from that, I'm a huge Kajiura fan...I bought the domestic releases of the first Noir soundtrack, both Madlax ones, and Le Portrait de Petite Cossette, plus the import of Xenosaga III (and I even got the LE of the Xenosaga II hintbook as it comes with a mini-soundtrack of Yuki Kajiura's contributions to that soundtrack), and both My-HiME soundtracks, plus the single for "Lacrimosa"...and I nearly did a happy dance when I learned, the day after first watching Madoka Magica, that "Magia" was available from iTunes in the U.S.

While it's not an entirely illegitimate complaint to say that there's a certain "sameness" to her work, I still find that her individual pieces are definitely distinct from one another even though her overall musical style is definitely her own.

Links should be fixed, I think.

I think the "sameness" has gotten a bit better in recent years. You can still tell it's her, but when you think about how far she's come since .hack...wow.

I mean, compare 'when the fairytale ends' from the 6th KnK movie



and 'everything, not nothing' from the 7th KnK movie



to anything she's done prior to and including Mai-HiME?

There's a marked difference. I mean, there's still the techno "OONTZ OONTZ" in battle themes and the chords and choral work are similar, but you have to admit her recent stuff has evolved.

The links...now contain little mini-images of the forum.

Oh, fer cryin' out...

...

Hang on.



FORUMOTIOOOOOON!

It set those automatically for some weird reason. I checked the thread while not logged in and I was able to see everything after I made the changes. Lemme know if it's still acting weird.

And now back to your regularly scheduled Kajiura Appreciation Thread

Yay, all working now! *pauses to listen to several and savor the music*

I see what you mean, there. There's some of her classic stuff, and a bit more of her...I guess you could call it pseudo-Southwestern? Not that it actually is, more that it reminds me of tumbleweeds blowing through a dusty street in New Mexico or something. There's a fair amount of that in Madlax, in particular. Though she did expand in different directions earlier on, too; for example, "rolling down the U.M.N." in Xenosaga III is purely jazz-inspired...

Of course, even though her range has expanded somewhat, she still gets back to her roots often too; "Sis Puella Magica," while an absolutely wonderful song, is pure Kajiura, just like "Margaret" or "godsibb"; you could identify the composer in three seconds flat.

I think the most variation happens when she's working with the Bee Train company, since you can hear lots of different styles in Noir, Madlax, El Cazador etc. because the auters basically told her to compose whatever and they'd make it fit no matter what. That freedom really shows.

Although I am surprised to hear you say that you think she's gotten better in recent years. The general fandom consensus is pretty much the opposite - that she's stuck in a musical rut since around the Mai-HiME soundtrack and seems to be falling back on "safer" options rather than trying to experiment with her music like she used to do.

I think that's to do with the very staple style in that she's usually classically influenced and there's some Kajiurago in there somewhere, even if it doesn't seem to fit well. And there's always been that problem of her having an amazing musical idea for about 15 seconds worth of songs and then instead of working with it she drags it out and bashes you on the head with it for about 3-5 minutes until you're tired of it and wish that the bashing wasn't just auditory so you could pass out and forget you ever had to endure it.

Dramatic license there.

I'm afraid I've picked up some of the fandom's negativity through osmosis, so you'd have to forgive me for that. I still love most of her songs and everything Kalafina comes out with, even if I think Kajiura's not that good with FictionJunction. Unless we're grading her on how pretty Wakana looks, in which case FictionJunction ftw, not including the odd moment where Keiko reasserts herself as the gorgeous queen.

I think she's gotten better about her compositions being less obtrusive to whatever show they're in, not necessarily that she's been getting better about composition variety. I do wish she'd try some new things, but I'm happy enough with her general orchestral/choral/oontz-oontz-battle-theme compositions to not really be bothered by how much she uses or reuses them. vv

That's not to say I'm fine with everything she's ever done (I found the Tsubasa Chronicles OST to be lacking save for one or two tracks), but overall, I'm happy to listen to whatever she writes.

Also, Kajiura and TYPE-MOON seem to go hand-in-hand. I was sad, however, not to hear any remixes of All Evils of the World or Emiya in the Fate/Zero anime. :(

^ Oh, yeah, anything classical will immediately give me a bias towards it, since that's my favourite genre of music, so I'm cool with any kind of orchestral/choral stuff, but... Only if it's short! I don't really like listening to the same 20 seconds of music on repeat for the rest of eternity until the song ends. For example, Sagitta Luminis bores the everloving Hell out of me because it just doesn't change significantly in the melody at all, and it's 6 minutes!

Also, there seems to be a move towards more folkish types of songs with Yane no Mukou ni, moonfesta, Distance and Manten, as well as the Madoka soundtrack, so I'm looking forward to stuff along those lines. I have a weakness for anything that even relates to tradition, including music, which is why I'm so huge on enka.

Hopefully the new single - Hikari Furu, the tie-in with the Madoka movies - will follow that path, and be some kind of remix of Decretum like how Manten was a remix of Let The Stars Fall Down.

Does the copyright allow her to remix those songs? I'd like to hear that, too.

She got to remix Sword of Promised Victory for F/Z, so I don't know why she didn't do All Evils/Emiya either. Shame, since I was really looking forward to those two showing up. :(

If you like the folksy-ish songs, there's also Hikari no Senritsu. (The rest of the Sora no Woto OST is folk-based, too, although Kajiura didn't compose the score for the show. Worth a listen if you like that kind of music. Un Lumiere Envoutant and Servant de Feu are always favorites of mine (and I know there are funny symbols I'm missing in the first title. I'm lazy. x__x))

I have to run off to work now, but I'll take a look at the ones you linked when I get back. :3

^ Weird. Maybe she thought that the original was too awesome to remix, or she couldn't remix it without it sounding nigh unrecognisable.

Yeah, Hikari no Senritsu is one of my favourites, as well as storia, for that reason. I never really checked out any anime that Kalafina sang for, though, 'cause they always looked... kinda terrible imo, with the exception of Kara no Kyoukai and Kuroshitsuji. I didn't watch the latter because I heard they ruined the manga, which I love, and I didn't watch the former because it didn't interest me. Oh, I did watch Madoka... but I found that cliche and boring and the fans kinda intolerable, all of which pushed it up to fifth in my Top Ten of Hated Fandoms so idk.

Those tracks remind of the Strike Witches soundtrack, for some reason. I like them, but I'd probably skip them on Shuffle, considering they're pretty same-y. Saying that, I like that Servante de Feu song since it actually varies melodically, even if the singer sounds too weak for the loud backing track.