Review Summary: Use the minimum, do the most
Why is an album like Transparent Things a 10/10 for me, comparable to the concept of a modern musical masterpiece? Let me explain, but it’s not a simple explanation, curious, because Transparent Things is logical, intelligent, challenging, yet also quite easy.
Let’s start from the beginning, January 23, 2006, when this album was first released as the second album by F&M and was the first one to gain popularity and critical success after their debut in Electro Karaoke in the Negative Style. Everyone compared it to Neu!, “A fun and silly krautrock adventure” or a revival of the past, and curiously enough, they are right. Transparent Things is truly playful, silly, innocent, reaching a youthful point. However, Transparent Things is also the embodiment of a band, representing what they want to do, where they stand. It showcases their prowess and superiority in not feeling lost in an album that is considered almost a debut after the experimental Electro Karaoke, which, apart from its title track, doesn’t have much in common with Transparent Things.
In Electro Karaoke, they felt strange, lost, but truly efficient and experimental. It was evident that they were going to be a curious and different band, without straying from a catchy and melodic style. However, I’m sure nobody expected something like Transparent Things, something so organic, krautrock, and “not very experimental” in a sense. It’s a curious move because the listener can’t really know if Fujiya & Miyagi will be krautrock or an experimental band with strange lo-fi hybrid rhythms until the first song of the album starts — until you begin to listen, and the beat of “Ankle Injuries” kicks in.
What? Does it start with a krautrock beat influenced by hybrid electronics and a bit of rock? Yes, and in fact, that’s the whole theme of the album: effective minimalist rhythms that make bodies move like no other album could, but with abstract, experimental, and not easily understandable lyrics at first glance.
Did Fujiya & Miyagi decide to be danceable but experimental at the same time? Is Fujiya & Miyagi an accessible band that is also not accessible at the same time? Yes, they are, and Transparent Things was just the starting point, a masterful and perfect starting point for a band. “Ankle Injuries” begins with a simple line: “Fujiya & Miyagi” repeated 26 times, a start, a welcome. It says: “Hey, listener, we are Fujiya & Miyagi, and if you want to know who we are, then keep listening.” You keep listening, and you encounter British references, a modern touch, old yet elegant, pleasant and incredibly catchy. Yes, they talk about things like certain adult magazine, urban things, something about “transparent things”, an abstract lyric based on objects, things, situations, just like the album’s name: “Ankle Injuries”, or other track names like “Collarbone”, “Photocopier”, “Cylinders”. All of them are things, objects, concepts, like “Sucker Punch”. Later, we’ll talk about the instrumentals, which are essentially long and masterful interludes that deviate from the album’s general idea: materialism, possession, and human situations. But hey, I mentioned all of this, which is extremely interesting and even philosophical to a certain extent, but Fujiya & Miyagi know very well that they don’t only want to be that. No, they make you dance with it. Fujiya & Miyagi can be silly, playful, generic but efficient, and also complex, experimental, reflective, philosophical, and equally efficient. It’s perfect, simply perfect.
“Photocopier” is one of the most illogical songs on the album for this very reason. It’s about things: things that are said, things that are done. It’s pure urbanism and avant-gardism. It takes the concept of things like a photocopier or things like food and makes them danceable. It takes the world, owns it, and does whatever it wants with it. “Sticky sticky, uh, uh” - basically, “Photocopier” is inviting you to stick with the band, to let yourself be stuck, to let yourself be carried away. Depicts the band in a sarcastic and humorous way, saying that they only pretended to be Japanese, just like what happened at one of their early concerts when they were mistaken for Japanese. And in the same song, they throw in the line "I'm just monkeying around with your furniture", meaning they’re just playing with things, with acquisition, with what is used in everyday life. Basically, F&M is telling you: “Hey, listener, just let me play with your things, with your concepts of things, and what you acquire, with what you are, even with your body, to make them transparent and danceable. Sound good to you?”
Yes, this is Transparent Things, basically transparent things, just like the next song, the one that shares the album’s name.
“Transparent Things” reminds us of what this is all about
: “I look through transparent things and I feel OK.” It can mean two things: the human need to see through things, situations, or even people to feel good about one’s surroundings, or something simpler: that when you see this album, you feel good when looking through “Photocopier”, “Collarbone”, “Sucker Punch”, or “Ankle Injuries”. That’s when you feel OK.
Then we have the two instrumentals: “Conductor 71” and “Cassettesingle”, both magnificent and with the same purpose: nostalgia, glimpses of a band that is at an extremely high point in only their second album. Repetitive, hypnotic, progressive melodies, well-produced, with clear references to Neu! or influences from the krautrock of the '70s and '71. It’s even more fitting that “Conductor 71” has “71” in its name, considering that the album’s name appears to be inspired by a novel released in early '72 and also late '71. What a coincidence.
The last two songs are excessively intriguing: "Cylinders" and a bonus track for USA called "Reeboks in Heaven." "Cylinders" is a beautiful ballad that combines the giving and withholding aspects of a relationship, the act of doing more or less, or even feeling. It mixes everything I mentioned earlier into a minimalist ballad with strong art-pop influences, excessively pleasing to the ears. It demonstrates that Fujiya & Miyagi are actually a quite diverse band within their own sound and style.
On the other hand, "Reeboks in Heaven" is... a curious death, literally. It portrays a deceased person asking their former aviation teacher if they still wear sneakers in heaven. Meanwhile, the protagonist boasts about their incredible ability to play golf in the sky. It's a humorous, rather silly ending, but excessively enjoyable.
F&M can be very nostalgic, and they have always been aware that they can be extravagant, elegant, or simply materialistic and foolish. However, they always demonstrate a great amount of culture and a sense of acquisition, even in heaven. Fujiya & Miyagi are showing off themselves while making you dance, feel silly, feel young, or feel like you’re in a strange world where philosophical abstractions become krautrock and disco.
Now, put everything I’ve said so far in one place, and you get something masterful, organic, and unique. And what’s the best way to represent something like that? Perfect spheres with a white background, just like the original album logo, or even like the American edition logo: a simple and straightforward belisha beacon, representing where they come from, what they’re about, and also hinting at how they will make you feel: a thread between nothingness, simplicity, philosophy, and dance.
Transparent Things is subjective, but for me, it’s a resounding success and one of the best albums of electronic-krautrock-dance-and a bit of modern rock. It employs elements seen before to create something new and uses transparent things to see through Fujiya & Miyagi.
Undoubtedly, it’s a stroke of genius.
