Testpattern -- Ryuuguu

 

One of the first Japanese folk tales that I learned about was through a picture book which told the story of "Urashima Taro"（浦島太郎）, a stalwart young boy who saves a sea turtle and for his troubles, he is taken to the wondrous undersea Palace of the Dragon King or Ryuuguu-jo（竜宮城）. Well, he loses track of the time and he pays dearly for it at the end.

I'm assuming that is indeed the inspiration behind techno duo Testpattern's "Ryuuguu" which is actually written as "Ryugu". A grand, shiny and inviting number that has me thinking of the palace as depicted through the imaginations of Fumio Ichimura（市村文夫）and Masao Hiruma（比留間雅夫）as a gleaming futuristic undersea city of silicon with tons of advanced technology and activity bursting everywhere. The palace would impress Captain Nemo and the Nautilus, let alone a lone Japanese fisherman.

I've written about Testpattern via two of their songs: "Techno Age" and "Crescent Moon", both from their lone 1982 album "Après-Midi". This time though, "Ryuuguu" was a part of a compilation album of technopop tunes called "Yen Manifesto Vol. 1" which was released in September 1983 under the production of Yellow Magic Orchestra's Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）and Yukihiro Takahashi（高橋幸宏）. Testpattern shared track space with Koji Ueno （上野耕路）and the band Interiors.