- Sakamoto's "audio diary" after cancer treatment is the most foreboding, but also one of the most beautiful, in a towering catalogue of music.
- 12 is a document of dislocation and disorientation from one of the most accomplished and revered musicians of the 20th century. It's a blank slate, a wash of brand new sound, a restart after his second treatment for a life-threatening disease, which left him to admit that, "From now on, I will be living alongside cancer." Ryuichi Sakamoto wrote and recorded these 12 tracks between 2021 and 2022 while convalescing after surgery. He recorded the music in temporary lodgings instead of the comfort of a familiar home or studio, which lends it an ephemeral blankness. The first sound on 12 is not Sakamoto's twinkling ivories or one of his trademark hooks, but the low drone of a synth. It sounds desolate and groaning, the envelope adjusting into something slightly more positive over its gripping six minutes—a simplicity and profundity usually found only in Sakamoto's solo piano work.
When I saw Sakamoto perform a solo piano show in Los Angeles in 2019, I was struck by the power he seemed to contain in his fingers. It wasn't just the iconic compositions, but rather a certain gravitas in the way his hands moved across the keys, the weight—or lack of it—in each press. Sure, I'm describing any talented piano player, but it's remarkable the attention and respect Sakamoto commands from across the musical spectrum—ravers, rockers, classical enthusiasts, jazz heads. There's a reason for that. And so, while it isn't exactly the focus of 12, the first time the piano appears at the beginning of the second track, it feels like the clouds parting.
When the ivories come in on "20211130," it's also tentative reprieve. The high notes cautiously feel out the space in the sustained synth around them. On 12, the tracks are named after the day they were recorded and presented in roughly chronological order. With Sakamoto himself calling it an "audio diary," it's an abstract journey of rediscovery, as the piano becomes more melodic, more sonorous as the album progresses. Those high, trilling notes on "20220123," and the way the way they decay into the synth behind them, is stunning every time. You can feel him wrestle with mortality and an uncertain future. "20220202" is one of the darkest pieces Sakamoto has ever laid to tape, an exploration of texture and sustain that calls back to Bowie-Eno experiments like "Warszawa."
Beginning with "20220302," subtitled "sarabande," 12 becomes lighter and the fog lifts, as Sakamoto starts composing in a recognizable form again. The songs are shorter and more focused on piano. Still, I always come back to "sarabande," with its elegant melody that drips with both regret and resignation. It's the rare piece of music that recognizes the pain and drudgery of life, along with the beauty in that—the distillation of the genius of a man who helped change the face of modern music, with all its electronic bells and whistles, back down to a classic piano form, the synthesizer barely audible in the background.
If this sounds like a lot to pin on a three-minute piano performance, then I'd suggest you aren't listening closely enough. With just a droning synth and a piano, Sakamoto has made a workaday logbook into something transcendent, partly because of its intimacy. Whether it's one of his major works is a question for future historians, but coming amidst an ongoing struggle with cancer, its bravery is defiant and splendid, the sound of an artist's soul laid bare. And if we've learned nothing else over the years, it's that Ryuichi Sakamoto is a beautiful soul, writing and producing some of the most beautiful music in the past 50 years. Even to listen to him learn, practice and explore is a joy like few others could ever offer.
Tracklist1. 20210310
02. 20211130
03. 20211201
04. 20220123
05. 20220202
06. 20220207
07. 20220214
08. 20220302 - sarabande
09. 20220302
10. 20220307
11. 20220404
12. 20220304