Calin with Fantastic Plastic Machine : Samba de Minha Namoradinha

Fantastic Plastic Machine is the stage name for Tomoyuki Tanaka, a Japanese musician and DJ, who put together a series of critically acclaimed albums in the late 90's and early 2000's. He is one of the progenitors of the Shibuya-kei movement, which is sort of an electronic take on easy listening.

I believe Calin is the singer, but I could find nothing about her.

The tune kicks off with a scat on a jumpy little melody. It sounds very circular, but it's very groovy, and it reappears a few times throughout the song, which is good, because it's fun. There follows an organ-based jam over a samba beat percolating under some pretty, poppy Japanese lyrics. It's a light, fun little record, and is great to play in the car on a sunny day with your windows rolled down.

In the background you can hear a guy popping in with a quick, familiar-sounding 'mahna mahna'. That's a nod to a tune called 'Samba Mah Nà' from Piero Umiliani's soundtrack to Svezia, Inferno e Paradiso, which is itself a variation on Piero's classic, "Mah Nà Mah Nà". In case you were wondering.

This particular song comes from a compilation Shibuya-kei music, the awkwardly named Sushi 3003 from 1996.  It's full of other groovy, electropop gems and is a solid buy if you like this sort of thing.

[You can listen to Calin with Fantastic Plastic Machine's "Samba de Minha Namoradinha" by navigating to the post "Song063" and clicking or right-clicking on the title or the link.]

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