Ryo Okumoto Set to Unleash Monster Solo Album
"The Myth of the Mostrophus" is the keyboard wizard's first solo release in 20 years and it delivers on the promise of progressive rock goodness.
Thank you for spending part of your day with Michael’s Record Collection. The story in this week’s issue was originally planned for next week, but due to a postponed interview meant for this week, I had to juggle some stuff. That interview got rescheduled but not in a way that will allow me to send out both issues just one day before the release dates for the albums I’m discussing. This is just part of music newsletter / podcast life and all you can do is shrug and move on.
So, although it’s earlier than intended, I am bringing you the story of The Myth of the Mostrophus, a monster prog rock album by Spock’s Beard/ProgJect keyboardist Ryo Okumoto. His first solo record in 20 years, Ryo nailed it this time out with a cohesive record that features a variety of styles without becoming disjointed or inconsistent, the way 2002’s good-but-uneven Coming Through turned out. Let’s get to the earlier-than-intended story.
Some things in life are worth waiting for, and that certainly applies to The Myth of the Mostrophus, the first solo album by keyboardist Ryo Okumoto (Spock’s Beard, ProgJect) in two decades. His last solo release, 2002’s Coming Through, itself was put out more than 20 years after his previous album — Makin’ Rock, which featured Toto’s Jeff Porcaro and Steve Lukather.
So, long gaps between records have become the norm for Okumoto after initially releasing his debut, Solid Gold, and Makin’ Rock just months apart in 1980.
“Every other 20 years I do a solo album. I have to stop doing this,” Okumoto said, laughing.
That shouldn’t be a problem moving forward, as Okumoto said he has a three-album deal with Inside Out Music, which kicks off with the upcoming July 29 release of The Myth of the Mostrophus, a six-song album that somehow combines prog, jazz, fusion, rock, and acoustic styles and pulls them together into a cohesive record. The album enlists the help of all of Okumoto’s bandmates from both Spock’s Beard and ProgJect, plus such accomplished musicians as Steve Hackett, Marc Bonilla, Randy McStine, Living Colour bassist Doug Wimbish, Mirko de Maio (The Flower Kings), and cellist Raphael Weinroth-Brown (Leprous), among others. The record was mixed and mastered by Rich Mouser, who is well known for his work with Spock’s Beard, Neal Morse, and Transatlantic, and it is available on CD, digital, regular vinyl (two LPs), red transparent vinyl (2 LPs), and in various special editions that include autographed items if ordered through Ryo’s website.
The seeds for this album have been around for a long time. Some of the material is 20 years old. But the impetus to get something done came after Okumoto saw a performance by I Am the Manic Whale a couple of years ago during a streaming fusion festival he was involved with, and he was impressed with the work of vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Michael Whiteman.
“I was on it and his band was on it, and after my performance I was watching,” Okumoto said. “I saw Michael and I said, ‘Oh my God, he’s very talented.’ So, I texted him right away when I was watching.”
Ryo asked Whiteman if he would be interested in writing a song together and he agreed.
“Then I sent him a demo of 30 songs and he started writing,” said Ryo. “And he put together the lyrics. He’s talented. He sings, plays bass, guitar, keyboards, and drums. Well. Very well. So, he added all kinds of stuff and sent me back the demos one by one. I said, ‘Oh my goodness. I think I’ve got an album.’ We started like two years ago and for those two years I worked on this album every single day.”
The demo tracks with Whiteman on vocals are being released on a special CD that can be bundled with various formats of The Myth of the Mostrophus. The bonus CD gives fans a chance to own a disc full of bonus material that shows the original tracks from which the final album was developed.
Okumoto did some rearranging of Whiteman’s demos and spent six months to a year putting the songs into their final shape. But that still left a lot of work to be done in terms of recording.
“Now what? Who’s going to play? Who’s going to sing? That’s how we started,” Okumoto said. “Two songs — the first song (“Mirror Mirror”) and the sixth song (“The Myth of the Mostrophus”) — I wrote for Spock’s Beard. So I just called everybody (in the band).”
Okumoto’s Spock’s Beard bandmates quickly agreed to play on the record and two of the album’s longer tracks were completed more or less as “Ryo’s Beard” — his regular band under the keyboardist’s direction on his songs.
“After those two songs, I had to find (musicians for) another four songs I had,” Okumoto said.
That more or less started with his bandmate in ProgJect, drummer Jonathan Mover.
“I had Simon Phillips on the last album and the one before was Jeff Porcaro. I need a freaking good drummer,” Ryo said. “And I said, ‘Oh, oh, I know Jonathan. We're playing together like every weekend. You know, why don't I ask him?’ He said, ‘Sure.’ He didn't know what he was getting into.”
Mover knows just about everyone in music and he helped Okumoto find the right players for his album, including Hackett and Wimbish. Once the players were picked, the songs came together.
Album opener “Mirror Mirror” is the most overtly Spock’s Beard-sounding song on the record. The nearly nine-minute track features former Spock’s Beard drummer and vocalist Nick D’Virgilio on lead vocals. Right away, the big difference from a typical Spock’s Beard album is a much larger emphasis on harmonies in the backing vocals, whereas Okumoto’s “main” band more often emphasizes counterpoint vocals. Fans of the Beard will enjoy Dave Meros’ meaty bass lines, Okumoto’s keyboard work, and Alan Morse’s distinctive lead guitar. There’s plenty of soaring parts that Spock’s fans are used to hearing, yet this song has its own identity and stands far enough apart to be its own thing.
“Turning Point” kicks off with Okumoto’s scorching organ playing as he shows off his early love of Deep Purple’s Machine Head album. The influence is easy to spot with his growling keyboard riff as he channels his inner Jon Lord. The song’s energy calms about a minute in and Michael Sadler (Saga, ProgJect) jumps in with his distinctive vocals. As he always does, Sadler puts everything he’s got into the way he sings the song. Whiteman did most of the vocal arrangements, and there are some interesting backing vocals that play well along the musical backdrop of the song.
“He did 70 percent of (the vocal arrangement) and I kicked in after that,” Okumoto said of his work with Whiteman.
The third track is “The Watchmaker (Time On His Side)” and it’s got a killer driving beat. The drums and bass give it a Genesis “Abacab” flavor but the keyboards sound closer to Keith Emerson with lead guitar flourishes that reminds me of Adrian Belew. The whole thing melts together and supports Whiteman’s vocal lines.
“Maximum Velocity” starts softly and gently with acoustic guitar, but with some searing Bonilla electric guitar leads soaring above everything. Two minutes in, it cranks up to 11, driven by Mover’s drumming before giving space for Okumoto to solo. The song takes the listener on a breathless ride of keyboard and guitar virtuosity, while still allowing the vocals, bass, and drum to shine in their own right.
Okumoto said that the intro was his idea even though it’s acoustic guitar. He writes songs on keyboards but with a twist.
“I’ve got a good guitar plugin,” he said. “I wrote everything and played it and replaced it with the other players. Marc Bonilla put a lot of stuff on it. He’s a really nasty, dirty, grimy player. I like him so much.”
The slowest track on the record is “Chrysalis,” a song metaphorically about the COVID-19 pandemic and featuring my favorite vocals from Whiteman on the record.
For “Chrysalis,” Okumoto wanted a bass player with a good feel for R&B, and although he works in bands with two extremely talented and accomplished bassists — Meros in Spock’s Beard and Matt Dorsey in ProgJect — he needed something a little different, stylistically. Mover suggested Wimbish from Living Colour and his bass playing blew Ryo away.
“Damn, who the fuck is this guy? Man, but he can play. Wow, what a bass player. Incredible bass player,” Okumoto said of his reaction to hearing Wimbish.
Wimbish adds a ton to the bottom end without overshadowing anyone else. Calling “Chrysalis” a ballad might conjure up the wrong sonic image. There’s a lot going on in it musically, and it picks up the pace to midtempo and gets louder, with Mellotron droning at times giving it a thick, full sound. The backing vocals near the end build things to a huge crescendo, before it slows and reintroduces some flute and gently fades out.
The album’s closing showpiece is the epic, 22-minute title track about a giant monster — the Mostrophus — devouring everything (and everyone) in its path. D’Virgilio and current Spock’s Beard, Enchant, and Pattern-Seeking Animals vocalist Ted Leonard each take turns on lead vocals and they duet together at times. While most lengthy progressive rock epics emphasize long passages of instrumental virtuosity — and there’s some of that here — this whole, giant composition is a song. It’s got a lot of lyrics, as Whiteman fleshed out the story of “The Myth of Mostrophus” based only on a title given to him by Okumoto. All the song lyrics on the album were written like that — from Ryo’s titles. “Mostrophus” is ultimately not as much about the monster, despite going into great detail about what it is and what it’s doing, but rather about the power of music.
Okumoto said that Whiteman didn’t write a lot of lyrics to cover a long instrumental piece they’d written, and they didn’t write a long instrumental song in order to include all the lyrics. Instead, he said, the song came together lyrically and musically at the same time.
The epic holds together well, revisits some themes along the way, and is both well-played by the Spock’s Beard musicians and well-sung by D’Virgilio and Leonard. Taken on their own, the lyrics are a bit campy, but no more than the kind of monster movie they’re based on, and the two vocalists sing them with enough conviction to make them fun, while the music dares you to think of it as anything other than a serious song.
Maybe the most impressive part of the epic title track is that Okumoto/Whiteman knocked it out of the park when it came to the “golden melody” that ultimately defeats the monster. I can’t help but sing along with it every single time.
The subject matter of “The Myth of the Mostrophus” isn’t new ground for Okumoto, who said he is a fan of monster movies. He also had an instrumental on Coming Through named “Godzilla vs. King Ghidarah.”
“Godzilla is so Japan,” Ryo said. “So famous.”
Graphic designer Thomas Ewerhard depicted the “Mostrophus” on the album cover but it’s really Godzilla.
“I sent him all different samples of monster pictures,” Okumoto said. “And there was one Godzilla on the bottom and he chose that. I love it. That’s so me.”
The title track never gives the listener time to be bored or to consider the length of the song at all. That’s the mark of a good epic in my book.
One of the most interesting things about this album is — despite using multiple guitarists, drummers, bassists, and singers — the songs hold together consistently. The way the instruments are recorded allow for the songs to sound as if the same players could be playing all of them. The fact that they’re all incredibly talented doesn’t hurt. Sure, there is no mistaking the Alan Morse guitar tone, but a lot of the leads are of that same “dirty” style Okumoto likes.
Hopefully the album will sell well. Okumoto, like many other artists I’ve interviewed in the last year and a half, said that only sales will dictate whether the material ever sees the light of day in a live setting. I can’t tell you how much I want to see a full band perform a 22-minute epic about a giant, man-eating monster.
Okumoto and Whiteman make a formidable writing team, and everyone who plays on the album is great at what they do. Despite all of that, there was plenty of margin for error on this record. However, The Myth of the Mostrophus is an absolute gem of an album and a worthy addition to the collection of any fan of progressive rock.
Tracklist:
Mirror Mirror
Turning Point
The Watchmaker (Time On His Side)
Maximum Velocity
Chrysalis
The Myth of the Mostrophus
To order the album where it will benefit Ryo the most, or to find out more about him and his career, visit his official website or his Facebook page.
To see the entire interview with Ryo Okumoto, check out the video below or download Episode 70 of the Michael’s Record Collection podcast on any major podcast platform (Apple, Google, Amazon, Spotify, Pandora, Goodpods, Podchaser, etc.). In addition to talking about the songs and the making of this album, Ryo discussed his early musical influences, how he ended up in Spock’s Beard and ProgJect, and more.
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