MACROSS PLUS ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACK [Priced-down Reissue]

This review is more biased than usual, as this was the first Yoko Kanno album I ever bought, back in 1996, and it's hugely sentimental for me. It was instantly captivating, and since then I've immediately bought (or tried to buy) anything Kanno has been involved with. Kanno had composed a number of Japan-only video game soundtracks before Macross Plus, but this was the soundtrack that first made the world notice her. It was distributed in English-speaking countries and I bought it off the shelf in Melbourne without knowing anything about it except that it was anime-related. As a budding fan in what was effectively the pre-internet days, anything anime-related stood out. While Voices became the most-well known track on this album, it was Kanno's eclecticism that really impressed me. The way she switched between different musical styles, sometimes within the same song, taking two sounds that seem like they would clash but making them meld perfectly, was a rare gift. In a lot of anime OSTs, it's jarring when the orchestral score is interrupted by a modern pop song (Michiru Oshima's original Fullmetal Alchemist soundtrack is a notorious example). But in Kanno's musical world, it all fits. It all sounds like it belongs together. I still have that first copy of Macross Plus Original Soundtrack I. The fact that it's still in print speaks to its quality and longevity.