FICTION - Yuki Kajiura (2003)

grunty

I have reached Yuki nirvana
It appears a happy birthday and anniversary is in order since the album turns 15 years old. We might as well revisit this.
PS. I found some FICTION topics but they seem to be only talking about the re-issue (non)details and not the actual music.

fiction2.jpg


『FICTION』 梶浦 由記
YUKI KAJIURA FIRST ALBUM
US version: July 1st, 2003
JP version: Aug 6th, 2003 (re-released Apr 23rd, 2008, cover above)

Tracklisting with Yuki Kajiura's liner-notes
(and some google translate of parts that made sense, maybe someone has/makes a proper translation of the whole thing):
SELF LINER NOTES
  1. key of the twilight
    「.hack//SIGN」サントラからの曲。この曲は打ち込みをちょっといじっただけでRemix。他に入れたい音も無かったので。自分の中でとてもシンプルにまとまった曲で、このシンプリシティーはそのままがいいなと。

    Remix, no additions. From .hack//SIGN.
    "It is a song that is very simple in myself and this simplicity is good as it is. "
    ------
  2. cynical world
    アルバム新曲。敢えて何も語ることのない梶浦メロディーなのかもしれません。メロディーの勢いで歌詞が何だか怖くなってしまいました・・・。バンドのレコーディング、後から録ったイーリアンパイプソロ、楽しかったですね。

    Album original song.
    Uilleann pipes added after the initial band recording.
    ------
  3. fake wings
    「.hack//SIGN」サントラからの曲。構成少し変えて弦足してRemix。サウンドトラックの方はともかく寂しげにしたかったので生弦は避けたのですが、曲そのものとしては弦がいるのがあまりにナチュラルだなあと。

    Remix, newly recorded strings. From .hack//SIGN.
    "Because I wanted to make it lonesome anyway, I tried avoiding strings, but it is too natural to have strings as the songs themselves. "
    ------
  4. fiction
    ア ルバム新曲。アルバムタイトルでもあります。「Fiction」という言葉が昔から好きで、私はこの言葉を、人がいなけば、誰かが敢えて作らねば決して生 まれて来なかった「人の手によるツクリモノ」という風に捉えている気がします。あらゆる音楽、本、絵画も、全て本来ウソの世界、ツクリモノ。素晴らしい 様々なツクリモノ世界に彷徨う時、私はとても幸福です。

    Album original song.
    ------
  5. vanity
    アルバム新曲。何となくピアノを弾きながら歌っていたら、するすると最後まで流れて来たメロディーそのまま。本来ピアノと歌、な曲です。アルバム新曲は一曲少なかった筈だったんですが、この曲は作成時期の終盤に出来て、これも入れたいね、という事になり録っちゃいました。

    Album original song.
    ------
  6. red rose
    ア ルバム新曲。唯一のインストゥルメンタルでしょうか。怪しげなヴォーカルは相変わらず入っていますが・・・。歌素材、ギター(エレシタール)、パーカッ ション、イーリアンパイプのリール、かなりその場任せ&思いつきで録って行って、楽しかった曲ですね。アルバム中最も頭悪そうで(笑)。妙に気に入ってい ます。

    Album original song.
    ?Vocal, electric guitar, percussion, uilleann pipes improvised during recording.?
    "It seems the most bad in the album (laugh). I like it strangely. "
    ------
  7. canta per me
    「ノワール」サントラからの曲。キー変わったのでオケも1から。オケのフィーリングは変えていませんが、今回歌って貰ったDebさんの悲劇的かつパワフルな声がこの曲にとても合うなと。

    New recording, lowered key. From NOIR.
    "I do not change the feeling of the band, but Deb's tragic and powerful voice that I got singing this time will fit very well with this song. "
    ------
  8. zodiacal sign
    「ア クエリアンエイジ」サントラからの曲。弦を生に差し替えてRemix。エンジニアのJoeがこの曲にサブタイトルを付けてくれました。その名 も"futuristic Egiptian disco"。バトルモードの一応緊張感溢れる曲のはずだったのに、そう言われると頭に壺乗せたお姉さまが踊りだしそうに聞こえて来てしまったりもし て・・・。

    Remix, newly recorded strings. From AQUARIAN AGE.
    Called "futuristic Egiptian disco" by Joe Chiccarelli.
    ------
  9. awaking
    「アクエリアンエイジ」サントラからの曲。元タイトルは「awake」。冒頭の歌メロ部分を取り出してウードとブズーキでアコースティックに。Mix中にスタッフが付けたサブタイトルは「奴隷船の歌」。しゃりーんという鈴の音が鎖を引きずるようだと・・・。

    From AQUARIAN AGE. Original song "awake".
    (grunty note: I'm pretty sure "awaking" appears in the show so it's essentially /?a remix of?/ an outtake from the soundtrack CD.)
    Called "a slave ship" song by the staff.
    ------
  10. open your heart
    この曲は、実は作った時から頭の中でイーリアンパイプが鳴っていました。当時はどうしてもプレイヤーさんを見つけることが出来ず断念。数年越しに今回実現できて満足です。やっと自分の中でこの曲を終えられた感じ。朗々たる響きをお聴き下さいませ。

    (grunty note: Seems to be a remix of "open your heart~reprise" with uillean pipes replacing the sax rather than a complete new recording.)
    "The uilleann pipe was ringing in my head from the time I made the song. At that time I could not find the player by all means abandoned. I am satisfied that I can realize this time over several years. Finally feeling I could finish this song in myself."
    ------
  11. winter
    アルバム新曲。唯一心温まるバラード系でしょうか。なぜかタイトルだけ前に決めてしまって、「winter」で数曲作ってみて(こういう作り方も珍しいですが)、結局このシンプルな曲になりました。ひたすら素朴に。歌もオケも。ほとんど一発録りです。

    Album original song.
    ------
  12. salva nos
    「ノ ワール」サントラからの曲。オペラヴォーカルに女声合唱、弦も入れて。サイズもキーも変わっているので一から録り直し。曲のテイストそのものは同じです が。ある意味ひねりの無いストレートさが身上の曲だと思っているので、今回もストレートに、もう一段階盛り上げてみました。楽しいですねえ、こういう曲 は。

    New recording in new key. From NOIR.
    Strings, female choir and opera vocals.
    ?Tried to make it more simple than the original.
    ------
  13. lullaby
    「ノワール」サントラからの曲。以前聞かせて貰ったDonnaさんの母性溢れる声が素敵で、この曲を歌って貰いたいなあと。Jazzな方なので、今回は彼女のバンドに構成もアレンジもお任せで録ってみました。ライブ聴いてるような楽しい収録でしたね。

    New recording. From NOIR.
    ?Recorded with Tulivu-Donna Cumberbatch's band because of her Jazz sensibilities.
    ------
  14. echo
    曲、というよりはアルバムの文字通り残響、でしょうか。ピアノでぽろっと。

    "A song or literally a reverberation of an album?"
    ------
Code:
https://web.archive.org/web/20030812080108fw_/http://www.jvcmusic.co.jp:80/kajiura/fiction/fiction_notes.html

What's your favorite moments here?

I have a hard time picking, I like the album so much. One day I'll be rocking "cynical world", another - "fiction" or "red rose".

I still dream that one day all of .hack gets the remix treatment "key of the twilight" received on FICTION.

It's easier to say what I didn't appreciate here and that was the replacement of Yuriko on canta per me... Deb Lyons' vocals are far too aggressive on it for my taste. The instrumental itself is already pretty aggressive so with her vocals it just makes this rendition hard to listen. Yuriko got shafted here...
 
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I hate how Deb Lyons sounds in canta per me, her accent is too american there for my taste, (and the accordion arrangement is less good than the original for me), but i like her in "winter". Not a big fan of "open your heart" as a song either, but the live ver is much better. All the other songs are top and tbh cant choose which is the best.
 
Definitely one of yuki’s best. I liked every track, and while deb Lyons was kind of meh in cpm, she made up for it in winter.

The original songs are all fantastic, and I really appreciated the way yuki remixed or updated old ones.

Even after all thes years, I feel like this album most effectively embodies kajiura’s strengths as a composer.
 
The album is great!
I loved all the songs expect for Canta Per Me, but i do love the instrumental/(I prefer Yuriko), I loved the Fiction's version of Salva Nos!!!
:hearts:i love Yuri Kasahara! And I love the fact that Yuki included Tokyo Konsei.

Over the years I wished for more Yuri just like in Noir. (I just love dramatic singers)

I loved both the Noir and Fiction version of lullaby
And the fact that Yuki collaborated with an African singer who happens to also be a Contralto is a bonus from my side
:love::love::love:

As for Open Your Heart, I prefer the reprised version of the song from HACK
Not so much from Fiction.

I really loved Cynical world, from the lyrics to the instrumental itself.

Fiction will always have a place in my heart.
(The song I mean) it's one of my personal favourites

Truly appreciate the spontaneity and hype zodiacal Sign has! I always feel happy and energized after listening to it.


I love both versions of Awake and Awakening

Yeah I basically loved all the songs expect two songs mentioned aboved.
 
I like every song except for Lullaby, which to me doesn't fit and I always skip. The original version would have fit better here I think. And I prefer the more ethereal singing on other versions of Canta Per Me over Deb's red-blooded, Mediterranean style here. The quirky, new wave arrangements and mixing on this album, which is a sound that Yuki has left far behind, gives this album an interesting and cohesive sound, even though it's really a kind of greatest hits collection of songs written over several years (I guess this is true of all of her Fiction and FictionJunction albums). It reminds me of some of the 80s albums of Peter Gabriel and Laurie Anderson, with all this synth percussion. If I had to pick a favorite, I would have to be boring and pick Key of the Twilight.
 
I love the whole album~My absolute favorites are Cynical world, Salva nos, and Lullaby. My least favorite is Awaking, which I feel is pretty weak compared to everything else on the album.
I'm probably in the minority (or the only one, hue) but, other than the accent, and incorrect pronunciation, I actually like Deb Lyons singing Canta per me. I also like Emily Bindiger's rendition.
 
My favorites are Cynical World, Fiction, Zodiacal Sign and Vanity. Especially Vanity. I really like Open Your Heart, but the way the singer sings it makes it sound like she's out of tune even though she's not, and I always kind of wonder why YK didn't find an Italian singer to sing Canta Per Me, since she found English speakers to sing all the English songs.
An interesting story about Lullaby: for a project in my computer music class last year, I had to write a song. Just for fun, I decided to take the lyrics of a YK song that I didn't yet know (I own the US release of Fiction, which doesn't include Lullaby) and compose my own melody and accompaniment. Having done that, I then tried listening to the song for the first time, and I believe it to be the one and only YK composition that I don't like. But I only heard half of it once (my mom didn't like it either and told me to turn it off) so maybe I should reconsider.
 
Even after all thes years, I feel like this album most effectively embodies kajiura’s strengths as a composer.
The thing with FICTION to me is how I don't hear the same harmonies/cadences/progressions/phrases/kajiura-tricks that in more current tracks instantly make me roll my eyes with how common/played out they are. I don't know if they are simply not here, or maybe are but not as obvious/in your face or maybe I'm just listening to FICTION in super nostalgia mode...

Edit: for better clarity. I hope.
 
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^ key of twilight, zodical sign, salva nos, definetely has harmonies :) maybe what has changed since then is that back then it was all from a single vocalist with multiple vocal layers, while now she uses multiple vocalists instead, most of the time.
i think part of what makes these song sound better are also the different musicians. She's been working with pretty much only Korenaga, Sato Kyoichi and Takahashi Tomoru all the time ever since 2008. This has made even the instruments themselves have similar sound across the musics

But i agree i also miss solo songs, the only ones we ve got recently are the Sayuri song, Hana no Uta, and the sao insert songs.
 
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Sorry, I wasn't trying to say there were no harmonies on this album, my fault, I guess I meant patterns in harmonies and progressions that are so very noticable to me in later works.

I added liner-notes to the first post. Does anyone have them properly translated? Couldn't find anything on the site.
 
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The thing with FICTION to me is how I don't hear the same harmonies/cadences/progressions/phrases/kajiura-tricks that in more current tracks instantly make me roll my eyes with how common/played out they are. I don't know if they are simply not here, or maybe are but not as obvious/in your face or maybe I'm just listening to FICTION in super nostalgia mode...

Edit: for better clarity. I hope.

Yes, I agree completely. This album has the raw emotion and power that YK was known for before 2008-ish when she became a Kala-slave and SAO-slave.
Even the songs i don't like on this album are still good (lullaby)

The YK I knew and loved was someone in control of her own musical direciton. Even though she claims it was still true now in her recent interviews, its clear that her original source of inspiration has waned.
 
The thing with FICTION to me is how I don't hear the same harmonies/cadences/progressions/phrases/kajiura-tricks that in more current tracks instantly make me roll my eyes with how common/played out they are. I don't know if they are simply not here, or maybe are but not as obvious/in your face or maybe I'm just listening to FICTION in super nostalgia mode...

Edit: for better clarity. I hope.
Nope, it’s not just your nostalgia. I don’t know music theory, but The harmonies in this album sound much richer and somehow unique as well. In the la mini live, you can hear a distinct difference between the .hack and sao tracks. The early 2000s were an incredible time for Kajiura; the music she produced for noir and .hack had a really strong identity and either one easily could have been a standalone release given some extra work. It’s timeless.

Sao by comparison is already old and played out.
 
My favorites are Cynical World, Fiction, Zodiacal Sign and Vanity. Especially Vanity. I really like Open Your Heart, but the way the singer sings it makes it sound like she's out of tune even though she's not, and I always kind of wonder why YK didn't find an Italian singer to sing Canta Per Me, since she found English speakers to sing all the English songs.
An interesting story about Lullaby: for a project in my computer music class last year, I had to write a song. Just for fun, I decided to take the lyrics of a YK song that I didn't yet know (I own the US release of Fiction, which doesn't include Lullaby) and compose my own melody and accompaniment. Having done that, I then tried listening to the song for the first time, and I believe it to be the one and only YK composition that I don't like. But I only heard half of it once (my mom didn't like it either and told me to turn it off) so maybe I should reconsider.
 
In regards to the Fiction version of 'Lullaby': right there with you,Puddle Boots-- which is strange, since I usually like it when Kajiura gets a bit jazzy. Could be that I just don't think the style fits this particular song...in either case, this is the very small number of tracks from Kajiura-sensei that doesn't click for me personally. I'm glad for 'Cynical World', but the FJLive rendition is far superior--maybe I got spoiled cause I heard the live take first. The 'Aquarian Age' OST version of 'Awake' is the definitive one(reminds me of the climax to Mike Oldfield's 'Ommadawn,Pt. 1'--any other Oldfield fans out there feel the same?), so its retitled sibling doesn't compare the same for me. After I give it a re-listen in the next couple days(doing the 'Liminality' OST currently, but nearly ready for something else), I may have kinder things to say about the tracks that aren't coming to mind. While I don't think 'Fiction' is bad, it just didn't grab me like usual(of course, I said the same thing about Rush's 'Grace Under Pressure' many moons ago, before it snuck up on me and became one of my faves, so who knows).
 
I'm glad for 'Cynical World', but the FJLive rendition is far superior--maybe I got spoiled cause I heard the live take first.
Agreed on that, too. I recently got the 2008-2010 best live compilation, and Keiko on Cynical World is just about the most spectacular thing I've ever heard.
 
Happy very late birthday to this masterpiece!! This is such good and rich album I don't think I'll ever get over it...a new world of music literally opened for me when I first heard it.....early 2000s Kajiura was so good, my favorites from it are open your heart, key of the twilight, salva nos but I love all of the album pretty much
 
When it comes to Kajiura, I've always been more interested in her soundtracks more so than her solo works. Fiction is one of those rare cases where I did buy the album from my local F.Y.E. (boy those were the days!) simply for the fact she was still so new to me I had only heard a few works. I want to say I got the album in 2005-ish? Boy it's been a long time I hardly remember but I just really loved it and listened to it so much. Fiction, and Cynical World always topped it for me.

I like Vanity enough because it has a really strong melody though I was always a bit puzzled by the lyrics correlating to love when vanity is usually conveyed as superficiality but I imagine she was going for the second definition in regards to futility.

Winter was always nice and gentle to get you in the mood of winter. Always liked the according backing.

Awakening - Ever since I heard the actual version from the Aquarian Age OST I've grown to like the fiction version less.

Red Rose - Didn't hear it until many years later because it was omitted from the U.S. album for...reasons...I guess... I really enjoy it. It's the Kajiura flare to it.

Fake Wings - Didn't notice much difference between the SIGN version and this. Like the SIGN OST plenty.

Key of the Twilight - It has been a while but I don't recall this on the American album either. That or I just didn't care because I already have the SIGN albums.

Lullaby - Omitted from the U.S. Album but it'd be pretty hard press to top the one featured in the Noir OST.

Zodical Sign - I like it enough it just seems like a slightly shorter take on the AQA OST version.

Echo - Another omission and don't think I've actually heard this song to be honest. Weird for some reason I've never sought it out.

Canta per Me - I hadn't heard the original version from Noir at the time so I liked it plenty. Today I think I lean a little more to the original but I think the remix with Lyons is fine.

Open Your Heart - I think I remember it mostly because it has the pipes instead of the sax.

Salva Nos - Similar to CPM I hadn't heard the original so this really was my introduction to it. It was the last track on the album and a really great way to close it out. This is a bit bigger and boisterous which I like.
 
Vanity remains one of my favorite Kajiura songs, and actually, all of her Noir work is impeccable imo. This is when I got into her music, so of course I'm very nostalgic about it, but it doesn't sound dated at all or samey and I think that's proof of how solid this album is.
 
Nostalgia goggles; everyone has them,what's important is knowing where you've put them. Appreciating that so many here seem to know that on this thread! For me, Fiction is a late listen,only getting it a few months ago along with the 'My OTOME' OSTs, Kalafina's 'After Eden', and both Fiction Junction Yuuka albums. 'Fiction' got lost in the shuffle, and was less interested in re-workings of stuff I was acquainted with. So I gave it a few good listens a week or so ago. While I'm no longer dismissive of it, and there's good stuff on it('Red Rose' in particular!), I'm of the opinion that everything else that I've heard so far from this time-frame affects me more, including the two Saeko Chiba albums(uneven though they may be, just when you're ready to write some of the tracks as so-so pop, Kajiura-sensei will suddenly kick some of them tracks into high orbit). It may boil down to this; with Fiction, I know what to expect, and somehow said expectations don't get surpassed like usual.
But let me say this about the 'Fiction' version of 'Salva Nos': it's very Shirley Walker, so much so that I keep thinking about a 'Noir' crossover with 'Batman: The Animated Series'(this, of course, would be amazingly cool!). Or how about this: this version of 'Salva Nos' should be used for--dare I say it?--a live-action movie adaptation(I know, when has there ever been a good live-action anime adaptation, but we can still dream...)! My nostalgia goggles are firmly placed on 'Noir',it still is #3 in my All-Time Favorite Anime list, and it introduced me to Kajiura-sensei's music. The OST 'Salva Nos' will forever be the definitive one for me, but even so, 'Fiction's version of 'Salva Nos' kicks names and takes...well, you know the rest.
 
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