Ryuichi Sakamoto's career has had its share of High Art moments. His artistic home has been in modern classical composition, and it's been his ability to channel that serious upbringing into immediacy that is at the heart of his commercial success. His tenure in the massively successful technopop group Yellow Magic Orchestra almost seems like a digression, a bit of fun that allows some time away from the potential stuffiness of "serious" music, even if YMO had a lot more on its mind than simple three minute pop ditties.

Given that, the fact that 2009's "Out Of Noise" feels as much like a museum piece as an album is right in line with expectations. Available as a single CD, it's the deluxe edition that is the "true" version, coming in a hardbound 30 page book complete with Sakamoto's abstract ruminations on the albums theses, as well as track by track commentary by curator (yes, curator) Diego Cortez. Cortez' writing is quite thorough, but not strictly necessary, as Sakamoto's miminalist compositions are clearly made to evoke moods beyond what mere text can convey.

The twin forces of ice and warmth have informed Sakamoto's work for the last several years, specifically as it pertains to the ocean and global warming, as most recently witnessed in "Ocean Fire," 2007's collaboration with Christopher Willits. "Out Of Noise" is less disturbed than "Ocean Fire," the latter's undercurrent of sinister, alien dread replaced with a more refined aesthetic that brings to mind art galleries as much as the glaciers that inspired a handful of the album's tracks. Of these tracks, "Glacier" is (unsurprisingly) the most explicit: the piece is quietly huge, deep tones surrounded (literally) by a trickle of melting ice as a woman by the name of Karen Filskov, Sakamoto's tour guide during a recent trip to Greenland, speaks in her native tongue about global warming.

If all this talk of curators and Greenlandic sounds heavy handed, it's worth noting that Out Of Noise works beautifully as a context-free mood piece. Well, mostly context free: it doesn't take a look at the booklet to detect a theme of water and nature: Keigo Oyamada (Cornelius) collaboration "Ice," like "Glacier," hovers quietly around the sound of running water. "In The Red" (featuring guitar from Oyamada and Sakamoto collaborator Christian Fennesz) feels like it's floating. Punctuated only by a sound sample of a man saying, repeatedly, "I'll be alright," the track is a big question mark: you sure you'll be alright, mister? "Tama" is icily dark, sinister notes wheezing against a tinkling background. Much of the album inhabits the oddly comforting space between dark mystery and a gentle warmth, a warmth that takes on unsettling undertones, considering the album's ecological concerns.

Critics might say that Out Of Noise is music for thinking, not listening, a criticism that misses two very important points: one, there's no reason these things can't go hand in hand, and two, they don't have to happen simultaneously. Out Of Noise's lush sonics invite unthinking surrender quite independent of the text's objective meaning. Also, while the whole package does indeed feel like a trip to the museum, what's wrong with that? Like much minimalist art, it can act as an enhancement to the listener's imagination, an act the album's pristine sonics and unhurried pacing rewards. Tastefully sinister moments aside, the only true discord occurs with the last track, "Composition 0919," a choppy, hyper, electronically manipulated piano piece that serves as a wakeup call. Whether this call is a call to ecological action, or simply a cue to wake up from the album's extended daydream atmosphere, is up to the individual.

---

Available in standard and deluxe versions at Amazon Japan