Takeharu Ishimoto

After listening to "The World Ends With You" the other day, I wondered what the rest of you think of its composer, Takeharu Ishimoto.

It seems to me that, with the departure of many former Squeenix staff composers for the greener fields of freelancing (which presumably means they become more expensive), Ishimoto has become the go-to man for the Square side of things. With TWEWY, Before Crisis, Last Order, and Crisis Core under his belt, and Dissidia to come, he's put out a lot of content for the company over the last year or two, and I've heard rumors that he's to score the new KH mobile games as well.

What do you all think of this? I hesitate to start a thread just to hate on the guy, but I have to say that none of his work has connected with me. He's a tremendously gifted arranger and synth programmer/operator, but his original compositions just feel empty to me--lots of atmospheric, industrial, grunge and such sounds, but very little substance.

Anyone care to comment, or to confirm/deny those rumors?

Jam it back in, in the dark.

For some reason, I thought that Ishimoto had programmed KH1 as well, hence my comment about him being a good synth programmer/operator. And I did enjoy some of his arrangements in Crisis Core, which were easily the finest part of the album. Most of all, I wanted to find something positive to say about the guy, since my impression has been overwhelmingly negative.

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