“Brilliant Hopes” is a fifth album from [.que] released on SCHOLE.
With the first SCHOLE release “drama” in 2013, [.que] established his style of music by harmonizing the refreshing comforting electronica elements with acoustic sounds and folk music. Then in 2014, he released a self-produced “Water’s Edge”, a semi-private album using various field recordings from his hometown. His musical essence from all until now is filled into this fifth album, and includes more tracks composed as a band music which is also a root of [.que] / Nao Kakimoto.
The album is produced by the label owner Akira Kosemura, by sublimating the various elements of music such as post rock and pops into a piece of work, which helped to polish more brighter on [.que]’s uniqueness and sense of music.
The journey begins bouncily with two songs and hear a glimpse of old and new style of his music; in “Joint” (track:3) a good theatrical guitar sound added by Affable Noise; “Anew” (track:4) is created with layers of sounds by [.que]’s characteristic emotional melodies and the rhythmical drums by Shota Mizuguchi (LOOP POOL, etc.), a guest drummer of this album; “Trivial Lie” (track:5) is a piano piece with a brilliant melody which flows and blends into atmosphere like a wave will create a warm feeling inside the melancholy; “Himitsu” (track:6) features unmo whom participated as a chorus for recent masterpiece “flora”, joins again as a lyricist and vocalist for this song, thus both song could be said as a sister-piece because of similarity in sense of translucence; “Lullaby” (track:7) features petitoto whom gives additional charm to the song with toy instruments and her voice; “Springlike” (track:8) expresses the fluttering flower petals on the trail playing in the spring light, with the danceable piano melodies by Akira Kosemura and [.que]; “Misty Moon” (track:9) is a collaborative work with Akira Kosemura, an impressive guitar riff played in the latter part of the song expresses as if a ray of light appears in the mistily night; After the two songs towards the epilogue, the story continues with [.que]’s early work “Will” (track:12) and “Never End” (track:13) puts a peaceful finale to the story and leads to a prologue to a next story.
This album is not only overview of [.que]’s history but his enthusiasm to break a new ground can be heard from the list of tracks.
SCHOLE’s familiar face, Hiroshi Iguchi worked as a recording engineer and mix mastering, and Shin Kikuchi in charge of photography and art direction.