10th Anniversary

That's really what this is. In 2004, Kyoto Jazz Massive celebrated 10 years of their music, and with loads of friends from around the world, they came up with a three cd series. They were titled "RE: KJM" (Red Cover), "For: KJM" (White Cover), and "By: KJM" (Black Cover). These three discs were straight imports, and initially retailed at about $30-$40 state-side. Re: KJM had artists re-interpreting many of their songs. For: KJM had songs dedicated to them and even had a song done by them. By: KJM featured KJM's remixes. This one, the gold covered "10Th Anniversary", is a double disc set released by Compost Records (their label in 2002) featuring many of the songs from there along with a mix from a random 12" of their tunes. Yup - the three discs came out in 2004, and this gold one came out in 2006. A bit of a delay.

The music here's good. Energetic and neat broken beats on the tracks. CD1 starts out with Quantic's rendition of "Brightness of These Days", followed up by a neat broken beat mix of "Where Love Shines" by Incognito - given the trademark Kyoto Jazz Massive percussion treatment. It's such an alive sort of sound... the cut kind of reminds me of a Jiva song. That's followed up with Phil Asher & Rasiyah in "Time to Fly", the opening track on "For: KJM". Great song, nice glide, gentle soul. Other highlights were Kenny Dope's take on "Shine" (man, I miss THAT Guida De Palma, where it wasn't forced!). Other hits were Domu's, Kaidi Tatham/Dego and Afronaught's tracks. Basically, a broken beat fest of cuts.

CD 2 starts out with Da Lata's take on "Ronca de Cuica" which was solid, but not that impressive to me. Jazztronik's crazy beat-heavy version of "Shine" pumped up the album quite a bit. Strange song, but interesting, all the same although the beats, after a while, feel distorted (and it wasn't my speakers... take great care of those!). "Aphrodite" by Louie Vega and EOL was one of my favorites though of the three disc series... really nice latin vibe to it with the drums, xylophone and guitar in harmony. Nice little cocktail jam. Monday Michiru put in a very nice take on one of KJM's biggest cuts, "A Calmaria", with a poem as she does. Would've been even tighter without some of the electronic in it - but still a wonderful song. Other highlights from disc 2 were Sleep Walker's version of "Eclipse" and I lked Aurora's "Nacel Do Sol"... Nacel Do Sol in particular takes me back to the good old "Bossa Tres... Jazz" days.

So is this one worth it? It's really up to you & what you want. If you like Kyoto Jazz Massive, but don't want to dish out maybe $90 for the three cd's (at one point, the red and white ones used to be $50 each!) then definitely. But keep in mind that it doesn't have all of the songs from the others (Markus Enochson had a remix to one of the tracks that actually got pretty popular, but isn't featured on this), and that the black "Re: KJM" was a mixed set with some fading/crossing (this one is all, 100% stand-alone tracks). Also be on the lookout for some of the cuts on vinyl. Also, unlike the others, this version is NOT in Kanji. Finally, KJM haven't stopped putting out music & producing. Shuya Okino JUST produced an album loaded with broken beats, while Hajime Yoshizawa (the uber-talented pianist) still works on different projects and with other groups (Sleep Walker, Bossa Free, etc.) and KJM in general are still alive and kickin' bossa beats. As the three albums and this one proves, they've got loads of fans and peers that can't wait to see where the future takes them.

Aside from Satoshi Tomiie of King Street records, brothers Shuya & Yoshihiro Okino collectively known together as "Kyoto Jazz Massive" (KJM) are the best and most recognized DJs internationally from Japan. Their careers as solo artist is more than a decade long. As KJM they have been performing together since 1994.

In celebration of their 10th Anniversary, Universal Music Japan, Quality Records, and Extra Freedom.,ltd have released 3 albums (RE:KJM, For KJM, and By KJM) dedicated to their time and success. Together the 3 albums total 32 tracks featuring unreleased music and remixed tracks by the brothers and friends. Please check my reviews on theses three albums, as this "10th Anniversary" is a reissue item.

In this 10th Anniversary compilation by the same name which comes packaged in gold, Compost Records contracts the original 3 disc 32 track albums into a 19 track double-disc for the world market. It comes at a cheaper price too as in the Japan each of the 3 original albums which are sold stand alone are sold at a price of about 2,600 each which is roughly about $25 US dollars. For purists and those with the extra money to spend the original 3 are great items to own although the first release in my opinion was a little bit on the downside. The good news here is that a majority of songs I liked best are retained and the ones I didn't like so much are gone. For anyone who is a fan of Kyoto Jazz Massive or nu-jazz, club music this is definitely a buy.

This double CD is a selection of tracks from their three japanese-only anniversary albums, Re KJM, For KJM and By KJM, where they compile remixes and productions from their career.

KJM are a reference when we talk about nu-jazz with broken beat, brazilian or house trends just to name a few, so it's easy to say that the 10th Anniversary album is amazing from the beginning to the end.

It's a pity that the three individual anniversary albums being quite hard to find because there's some wonderful tracks there missed here, specially from By KJM.

Maybe the only fault of this compilation is not being a 3CD set.