Nujabes

Japanese producer Jun "Nujabes" Seba mixed soul, jazz, downtempo and ambient music on Metaphorical Music (2003). Half of the album is ruined by mediocre rappers. The drumming solo in Horn in the Middle and the relaxed Mediterranean guitar pattern of Lady Brown stand out despite the rapping. The bulk of the album, however, is represented by the instrumentals, which sometimes border on new-age music and on soporific muzak (the eight-minute Peaceland being the worst offender), but occasionally deliver intriguing ideas: the quasi-classical piano-based Kumomi, the looping nostalgia of Beat Laments The World, the sax solo in the jazzy Letter From Yokosuka, and especially Summer Gypsy, a hybrid of post-rock and drum'n'bass.

He became famous with the soundtrack to the anime "Samurai Champloo" (2004).

Modal Soul (2005) includes more vocal experiments, even soul crooning in Ordinary Joe, the poppy singalong Luv (Sic) Part 3 (perhaps his most popular song) and the incursion into house music of World's End Rhapsody. There are good doses of jazz-hop with vocals (The Sign, Thank You and Flowers), there is one decent rap (by Substantial in Eclipse), and then there are a handful of atmospheric instrumentals, of transcendent jazz-hop trance: Reflection Eternal, a cross of hip-hop and new-age piano sonata, the ethereal Sea of Cloud, and the serene seven-minute Horizon.

Spiritual State (2011) was released posthumously and contains too much filler next to the Japanese flavor lively Gone Are the Days (jazz and piano saxophone wed to a trotting beat) the catchy melody of Far Fowls, and the tranquil quasi-zen Spiritual State.

Jun Seba died in 2010 in a car accident.