Kenji Ozawa

From Hkadb

Kenji Ozawa began his professional music career along with Keigo Oyamada, aka Cornelius, in cult favorite Flipper's Guitar. After a two year gap following the band's breakup, Ozawa resurfaced to high expectations with his first solo album, Inu wa hoeru ga kyaraban wa susumu in 1993 (released in 1997 under the title Dogs). Featuring a simple lineup of guitar, bass, piano, and drums, strong musicianship, and a straightforward melodic sound drawing on classic American pop music, Ozawa's first record after Flipper's psychedelic hodgepodge Dr. Head's World Tower was a refreshing and prescient prelude to the pop scene that would develop in Japan in the '90s. Gobbled up by hordes of hungry hipsters, the record reestablished Ozawa as a trendsetter as well as a top seller. Ozawa followed his debut album with a succession of rap and club music collaborations, including the hit single "Konya wa boogie back" with the Beastie Boy-channeling Scha Dara Parr, and for a period of time was seemingly everywhere anything cool was happening in music. Ozawa's second solo album, Life, was released in 1994. Poppier and even more accessible, Life was straight Motown flavored bubblegum, and appealed not only to the Ozawa fanboys but to a broad cross-section of the music listening public, posting even stronger sales than its predecessor. Kyutai no kanaderu ongaku, Ozawa's third album, was released in 1996. Abandoning the pop of his first two records, Ozawa worked the jazz combo format skilfully, mining a sophisticated, relaxed stylistic vein. After several more singles, Ozawa again went silent until 2002, when he released his fourth record, Eclectic. An Ozawa-style reworking of contemporary R&B, the record was seen as a classic, and further cemented his status as a musician of stature and stylistic pioneer. 2003 saw the release of Setsuna, a compilation of singles and rarities previously not included on any albums.