Happy Hour>> RDJ2 https://bit.ly/radiodj2 >> 22nd January 20:00EET (19:00CET) & 24th January 09:00EET (08:00CET) & 21:00EET (20:00CET), you can listen the album "Return Of The Dragon" by Koto, album released on December 03rd, 2021. Koto - Return of the Dragon is a Koto album. That is a factual statement, yet not what it feels like.
The "main" part of the album, only eight tracks, is split evenly between Michiel van der Kuy, who had previously been handed the Koto handle starting in the 90s, and Andreas Mohr, most famously known as Cyber Space. It seems he had been given a spot on the album as a "space music guy" in true ZYX-fashion, as they had done with Koto with van der Kuy before, resulting in this Koto. Two "bonus" tracks are included in the album, one by ZYX sound engineer Vadim Kulin and one featuring a plethora of producer names, including that of Luigi "Gigi" Di Agostino.
The tracks of the "main" album seem fairly ordinary Spacesynth, with van der Kuy presenting tracks with at least more effort than many entries on his previous album, Rygar's Sonorous, which doesn't mean much. The sound varies greatly between MvdK's tracks, from his signature sound to more closely inspired by KOTO and sometimes more dancey, like Bionic Brain.
Out of his tracks, Tron is the Poster Child for the album, presenting a great blend of his own Rygar style of melodies with many elements strongly reminiscent of the Original Koto tracks by Anfrando Maiola, probably what this Koto should always have been at its most optimal.
Mohr's tracks seem to not have that level of care to them, many being particularly mid, as in offering little variation of highs and lows to the melodies. As someone not too familiar with Cyber Space, the closest comparison in Spacesynth terms might be the more middling to worse tracks on Daylight albums from the 90s, rather than any form of Koto. This is despite the fact that Mohr has been known to be good at emulating a "Laserdance" style, for which ZYX let him publish a piece under that mantle on a Spacesynth collection one year.
The bonus tracks are the most unfitting for the album, with the first, Another Way, sounding as one would expect from the names behind it: Housey, loud and high-pitched, Even though Anfrando Maiola had previously attempted to use Koto for house music, none of his tries sounded like this kind of dance, only made worse by the fact that many of the high-pitched melodic elements go off-key and cause mild discomfort to the listeners. Kulin's track on the other hand is less aggressive but equally as un-Koto, its humming, buzzing and blooping synths more appropriate for the soundtrack of a Portal game than an Italo Disco spacesynth release. One wonders what these two tracks were put on here for other than to put the tracklist into the double digits.
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