37. The Piano It's Me (CD)

SUEMITSU & SUEMITH - Allegro Cantabile
Video sent by SilentMic

Album cover of The Piano It's Me, Sony Music, no infringement intended.

Album Info:
Artist: SUEMITSU & THE SUEMITH
Release Date: 3.21.07
Publisher: Sony Music (SMEJ)
Running Time: 69 min.

The Piano It's Me Song List:
(According to JPSEEK.com)

ディスク：1
1. Ｔｈｅ　Ｐｉａｎｏ　Ｉｔ’ｓ　“ＳＵＥＭＩＴＳＵ”
2. Ｓａｇａ
3. １００　Ｓｔｒａｗｂｅｒｒｉｅｓ
4. Ｔｈｅ　Ｓｏｄａ　Ｆｏｕｎｔａｉｎ
5. Ｎｉｇｈｔ　Ｗａｌｋｉｎｇ　Ｍｉｓｓ　Ｌｏｎｅｓｏｍｅ
6. （Ｕ　Ｈａｖｅ）ｔｈｅ　Ａｌｔｅｒｎａｔｉｖｅｓ
7. Ｗｈｉｔｅ　Ｃａｔ　Ｗａｌｔｚ
8. Ｓｏｎａｔｉｎｅ
9. Ｐａｎｓｙ
10. Ｓｏｕｌ　Ｃｏｎｃａｔｅｎａｔｉｏｎ
11. Ｓｈｅｒｂｅｔ　Ｓｎｏｗ　ａｎｄ　ｔｈｅ　Ａｉｒｐｌａｎｅ
12. Ａｓｔａｉｒｅ
13. Ｓｕｎｄａｙ’ｚ　Ｓｕｎ
14. Ａｌｌｅｇｒｏ　Ｃａｎｔａｂｉｌｅ

ディスク：2
1. Ｔｕｎｉｎｇ
2. Ａｌｌｅｇｒｏ　Ｃａｎｔａｂｉｌｅ～Ｐｉａｎｏ　ａｎｄ　Ｓｔｒｉｎｇ　Ｏｒｃｈｅｓｔｒａ
3. Ｔｈｅ　Ｐｉａｎｏ　Ｉｔ’ｓ　“ＳＵＥＭＩＴＳＵ”～Ｐｉａｎｏ　ａｎｄ　Ｓｔｒｉｎｇ　Ｏｒｃｈｅｓｔｒａ
4. Ａｒａｂｅｓｑｕｅ～Ｐｉａｎｏ　ａｎｄ　Ｗｏｏｄｗｉｎｄ　Ｅｎｓｅｍｂｌｅ

Album Review:
Surprised by that cover design? Maybe, but if you have seen the PV of Allegro Cantabile, you will like it. SUEMITSU & THE SUEMITH's new album, The Piano It's Me, hit stores today (3.21.07). I got it right away, because I've been looking forward to it for a couple of months. Since this is by SUEMITSU & THE SUEMITH, people would naturally expect the OP from the NODAME Cantabile anime to be featured on this CD. It in fact does! It also contains the orchestra version of it, which makes for some fun listening/comparing.

Now onto a bit of an intro of SUEMITSU & THE SUEMITH. This is also a fairly new artist, who goes by the name of SUEMITSU Atsushi, the reason why he chose the band's name to be that way is beyond my understanding (and if I were to listen to all of his interviews, I would still want him to change it). He is the person on the CD cover, as you will find in your research of him, the hat-on-backwards thing has become his trademark --- his sense of style, if you will --- and so he dresses that way in many of his pictures.

Atsushi is a single man act, and that is extremely admirable, just like Izumi Sakai of ZARD. They compose their own music, writes their own lyrics, and performs by themselves. True musicians. But we shaln't linger more on that. Atsushi is a good singer, with a broad range (I'd say most of his songs are from a low C to a high G) that can be considered very tenor. He uses a lot of mixing and equalizers, and his voice is sometimes electronic-sounding (which tells you he doesn't do a lot of live-performances, but that's off topic).

The album starts off with a very corny English song with a girl and Atsushi going, "I'm having fun.. cus I feel I love you. This is the sweetest concerto in the world, because you are together with me~" His English is actually quite good, very fitting for his tone quality (think.. John Legend coarse). The second song, Saga, hit it right off, exhibiting SUEMITSU's signature sounds. Fast paced piano and funky beats, heavily mixed with vocals, drums, and electronic instrumentals. The most notable part about his music is that the chorus usually isn't very catchy --- it is the build up to the climax that really makes it sound GRAND.

There are two singles hidden in this CD, the 1st is obviously ALLEGRO CANTABILE, while the second is an earlier release from last year --- Sherbet Snow and the Airplane --- also a very uplifting song. Come to think of it, the songs from this album can be group into two main categories, the cheerfully-looking-ahead songs, and the reflexive songs. Sherbet Snow and the Airplane is a song about crying out to a friend/lover saying "do you feel like you miss you?". Very catchy.

Other cool songs to listen to when you are going to work include.. Astaire and (U Have)the Alternatives. You will hear Atsushi's electronic voice in all of these mentioned songs, again, I want to say this style is very good stuff, it blends everything into a whirlpool of sound and charges the audience with energy while changing the focus of the music to the instrumentals. Very nice.

This album has two seperate disks, because of the style differences, the second one is just a very fun orchestric soundtrack. On a side note, since many of you would have noticed by this point, I have 2 images up for this album. The bottom one is actually NOT the inside cover, but the cover of the single, Allegro Cantabile. I thought it would be neat to show it. :)

In conclusion, this is a break-out hit for me, because obviously SUEMITSU isn't a multi-platinum band. However, I suspected the quality of this album from the day I first heard the OP for NODAME Cantabile, I don't think I've been more pleasantly surprised than this time. Try the album! I'll provide you all with a torrent link, JUST FOR THIS TIME!

DOWNLOAD The Piano It's Me (Full Album): USING THIS TORRENT!

Album cover of The Piano It's Me, Sony Music, no infringement intended.

The Piano It's Me Review Ratings:
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Popularity: [86% (Solid)]
Musicality: [90%]
Production: [91%]
Lyrics: [89%]
Fun: [94% (good mixing)]

Overall Feel: [90%]
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Review by silentMic, with research from WikiPedia, JPSEEK.com, SUEMITSU & THE SUEMITH. All ratings are for reference, and do not necessarily reflect professional values. No directly copied text whatsoever. Copyright 2007.