The answer is: definitely! If you don’t believe me right away, then here is some info on Orbital Chickens.
Of course we are not talking about a band with the silly name Orbital Chicken, right? Instead, the topic is Bump of Chicken’s 7th album, Orbital Period. It was released in December 2007. This technically isn’t the latest album from the band, because they released a compilation (with some new tracks on it) titled Present From You in June. But that doesn’t count.
Bump of Chicken was always is the God of soft melodies, that’s a fact, no one can deny that, but with Orbital Period they raised the bar even higher. There are 18 tracks on the album, but there are some instrumental silliness (as always) and a comment track, which is pretty much superfluous if you ask me; still we get 15 superb tracks. But don’t think any bad about the band, because the intrumentals aren’t just your usual “filler” tracks, they really hold the album concept together, that’s a rare thing, so we have to appreciate it.
This was only the tip of the iceberg, because the albums holds some powerful tracks on top of the cool instrumentals, such as “Mayday”, “Karma”, “Supernova”, “Sainoujin Ouenka”… actually I can list out the whole album, but that would be pointless, because if you hear any of these songs you just have to hear the others and eventually you will keep repeating the entire album over and over again in your player.
Orbital Period is Bump of Chicken’s best album (at least in my opinion). Of course, they had some pretty cool albums in the past (I love those also), but overall this is the most well-composed piece in the band’s history. I doubt that they can out-do themselves in the future and make a more mature and magnificent album, but that’s for the future to tell.
This is a masterpiece, that wretched comment track is the only negative thing about the album.
9.9/10
Check out the PV for “Mayday” (メーデー) by Bump of Chicken:
[v]GnAhE-IIQvI[/v]
By j!mi on October 2, 2008 at 2:10 pm
I whole heartedly agree. This is Bump at the very top of their game. It’s true, this album is chalk full of amazing tracks; but what really pushes it above and beyond is how well they all fit together. It’s like you’re experiencing an epic adventure of astronomical proportions. There’s the high energy rock, the slower, more nuanced melodies and everything inbetween; all the while they’re guiding you through it like a master story teller. They don’t force the music upon you but let you experience and submerse yourself into it.
How they’re gonna top Orbital Period seems unfathomable because it is a masterpiece, pure and simple.
By Shay on October 2, 2008 at 8:06 pm
I second (or is it third) what you said. I agree that Orbital Period is the top of the top. I of course like Jupiter a lot too, but that’s probably just because that was my personal introduction to Bump of Chicken, the first album I heard =) The overall composition is really great on Orbital Period.
By arcadia on October 4, 2008 at 3:35 pm
Orbital Period is excellent just like Jupiter or Living Dead. Their songs can be listened to a million times.
I don’t understand Japanese but why is the comment track a negative thing ? I think it’s fun !
By Psycho_Dad on October 5, 2008 at 12:01 am
arcadia: The comment track is not bad because of the content, it’s bad because it’s there. For the 1st time it was OK, but on the 40th time I listened to it I was frustrated. It’s a good thing that they’re want to “spoil” their fans with these kind of things, but they could do the same thing by uploading some silly video of themselves on youtube. Or! They can do a funny music track like the one was featured as the secret last track on Jupiter, In My Heart / In My Nikke, I love that :D, but to comment tracks… “‘I’d have to say na-nay-no my brother!” :D
By Jimi on October 21, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Im with shay; jupiter was my intro to bump too and is definitely right up there with orbital. Tentai Kansoku is one of my favorite songs of all time