Creepy music: Boogiepop Phantom

Series: Boogiepop Phantom
Year: 2000 Japan, 2002 America
Album: Boogiepop Phantom Original Soundtrack
Artist: Various



This week's theme is:



'CREEPY MUSIC'

Before I introduce my example, Boogiepop Phantom, let us experiment with the use of music to create a mood.

First, imagine yourself on a tropical beach.



This music is playing. It feels you're at the start of a rom com, doesn't it? Now let's change tracks.

This would be a different type of movie. Not such an idyllic holiday any more.

In any artistic profession, atmosphere is an integral part of the story. Music influences and reinforces the atmosphere to communicate to the audience what is happening or will happen.

Now, what type of atmosphere would you be in if this started playing?



This is from the soundtrack of Boogiepop Phantom, a show with so silly a name it would have to come from Japan. Most people's first experience of anime would have been with Sailor Moon or Dragon Ball Z, which would give them the idea that anime is basically kids' cartoons with big eyed girls or big muscled guys. This is innacurate. Boogiepop Phantom is to Sailor Moon as Twin Peaks is to Hannah Montana.

Boogiepop Phantom begins on typical night in an unnamed Japanese city. Then a pillar of light shoots into the sky. The next morning, everything looks a little… it's hard to put your finger on it. Unclear?

But that's not the beginning of the story. Before that, highschool sophomore Masami Saotome and 3rd year Minako Yurihara sold a mysterious drug to their classmates. Soon people start disappearing, but that's not unusual. Then on the night of the pillar of light, they disappear too, but not completely. Some people say they've seen Saotome's ghost.

But that still isn't the whole story. Five years before that, the city was terrorised by a serial killer called the 'Fear Ghoul', who targeted strong-willed girls. At the same time in a hospital, a psychiatrist tests another mysterious drug on her patients. On is a pregnant woman who gets a near-deadly fever, and, after giving birth, can't remember her own baby.

But none of this explains the urban legend of Boogiepop, the Angel of Death, a beautiful boy that kills girls painlessly before their beauty starts to rot.



So, unclear is a pretty accurate term for Boogiepop Phantom. The series endeavours to befuddle you on every level. The story is told out of order, often from the character's limited memories (and sometimes memories that aren't the character's). One scene from a character's perspective may happen from another character's perspective, veiling and unveiling certain events. Even the visuals follow, with the edges of the screen blurred out and everything given a dull tinge as if we're seeing through an old camera.

The music follows suit. The music in the video above, Unstability by Hidenobu Ito, at first sounds as if the audio is corrupted. The sick music box of your youth jams and skips as if your very memory is scratched. This music plays when the narrator of the first episode sees the ghostly image of the boy she loved in junior high, Saotome. The music presents Saotome's ghost as a living glitch in reality.

The definition of 'Creepy' isn't limited to "oh God there's a killer behind me". There are other, subtler ways, such as the "something's going on that I can't understand and I can't tell whether it's horrible or just weird". Here is an example combined with video: Fruits, made by Ultra Digital Inc., to the track Happy End by Flare. This video was made in homage to the series and came as an extra in the second volume.



Finally, the climax piece. This is not where the killer is unmasked, a loved one found dead or the last living character fights for their life. That is not this kind of series. This is where a light is shone on past events, and things start to make a little (well, fractional) more sense. M. Y. K. N.'s track Angel in the Dark, a title that complements the Angel of Death Boogiepop, begins with what sounds like a chorus of wavering voices. Then as it builds with more instruments, including Oriental strings and a mournful flute, the fog begins to lift. Beneath it are voices chanting indecipherable lyrics. It never really resolves, but feels like an epiphany in the mystery of the series. Listen.



I hope I have piqued your interest in Boogiepop Phantom. If you want to listen to more of the soundtrack, whitecries223 has been so kind as to upload all the tracks.

As a discussion topic, what music makes you break out in a cold sweat?