Friday, October 7, 2011

Blade Runner EMS Recombination 2011 - The Japanese Tracks


Bonus Disc

01. Japanese woman's birth control advert on billboard/Off World blimp advert/At the noodle bar 2.45
02. If I didn't care/Flute music on the busy streets while reading a newspaper 0.33
03. Percussion music while sitting at the counter of the White Dragon 0.52
04. Pris and Sebastian enter the Bradbury 1.38
05. Japanese woman on building advertising display/Pris peeking at Sebastian's apartment 1.13
06. Deckard looking up at the iron and glass roof of the Bradbury atrium 0.42
07. Roy pushes a nail through his hand 1.11
08. Deckard escapes through the window ledge/Deckard climbing on the rooftop 1.30
09. Chidori no Kyoku [The Plovers] (Full length version) 11.54
10. Ogi no Mato [The Folding Fan as a Target] (Full length version) 10.42

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Notes :

Some of the tracks presented here are essentially (re)assemblages of elements buried in the official view/mix of the movie, enhanced for the listener with soundtrack, audio effects and narration to place the cues in their cinematic context; the flute music and percussion piece being an extreme example of this more cinematic approach to the soundtrack. The rest of the tracks were remixed from the original audio streams to add extra aural details on the japanese cues. There might be some debate as to whether some of this is part of Vangelis' original compositions for the movie, or just someone else's creation. A couple of cues were finally uncovered and included here, thanks to the input of 1187hunterwasser and Kazushi Kimura of the Blade Runner fan network. The rest are part of an ongoing search, which one day may come to a conclusion and expand the Blade Runner soundtrack catalogue further.

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Comments :

One of the aspects of the multicultural melting pot portrayed in Blade Runner was the influence of far eastern culture in the daily life of 2019 Los Angeles. From the Chinese food vendors of the White Dragon noodle bar, through the Cambodian sales lady on Animoid Row, right up to the Shimata Dominguez Corporation sponsorship of the off world colonies. Pervading all of this was the music of the far east, whether blaring out from an animated billboard or drifting down from on high from the ever present advertising blimp. Of the pieces played, “Ogi No mato” is the most widely known among the fans, in a mainly truncated version. There were other pieces played and not always as conspicuous. Last year when one of the tracks was identified through the fan network as “Chidori no Kyoku”, the EMS team members began a search of various sources to identify which version of this track was used.
The most likely candidate was a performance by Michio Miyagi. The second step was to review the film and find when the music was played. The track in an excerpted form turned up in the background music playing during the scene with Deckard waiting for a seat at the White Dragon. Layered with other music including “Ogi No Mato”, identifying whether the Miyagi version was the correct one came down to a blind audio test between B5hm, who noted where the excerpt in the film corresponded exactly to the part of the Miyagi track, and DC. When DC independently identified the same part, they both concluded apart from a slight alteration in pitch, this was the correct version. DC began the time consuming process of transferring the track from vinyl to digital media and cleaning the track up, removing over 14,000 audio defects to present the track in its fullest and cleanest version here.
The search still goes on for the alternate blimp track heard as it passes over the Bradbury and during the scene as Deckard hangs from the side of the Bradbury. B5hm’s Japanese source could only identify two words “hito me” literally translates as “person’s eye”....

The EMS Team present here cues taken from the different versions of Blade Runner including previously unreleased flute music and percussion piece.
These pieces were heard in the background during the sushi bar sequence and are presented here for the first time.

B5historyman

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