Combinaison Spaciale

AMG Review of Combinaison Spaciale

David Serra
All Music Guide

Combinaison Spaciale is a different look into Pizzicato Five. The record is coined as "Pizzicato Five in dub." While all of the tunes are dubbed, they are not all in the dub style. The record kicks off with a four-minute interview in Japanese with the band. The record turns to a '60s TV variety sound with organs and horns. There is a nice wash over the whole track, sounding as if they are in orbit. Many great transformations of the original songs exist throughout this EP. The sounds move from the Serge Gainsbourg cover of "Contact Percolator Mix," with its slinky swing echno with a Middle Eastern feel, to the breakbeated, Hawaiian guitar, and Tipsy flavor of "Good Samoan Attorney Mix." The highlights are the two versions of "Ice Cream Meltin' Mellow Marin Mixes" by Sunahara Yoshinori. These tracks have a hip-hop flavor with flowing ap on top. There are dub guitar up-beats accentuated by keyboards, marimba, and steel drums. The female singing vocals always takes it to the next level, mixing in with the feel of the ap. Combinaison Spaciale closes out featuring Kume Daisaku brilliantly on the organ backed by a lush arrangement of strings and harp. All of the remixes are a great, new perspective on a consistently decent band.