Japanese Progressive Rock presented by DamoX

Here's another monster of Pass Records.


(From their official website)

GUNJOGACRAYON, who have been supporting Japanese underground music scene under the obscure and mysterious veil, were formed as a four- or five-piece outfit around a guitarist Tadashi KUMIHARA and a keyboardist Fumio OHMORI in the late 1970s. Their peculiar soundscape with violently scattered piano sounds, weird and tricky voices or a sticky guitar psychedelia could amaze and perplex(!) lots of reviewers and audience. They are famous for not only the sound as above mentioned but also the rarity of their studio works (surprisingly they have released only three official albums for over 30 years). Ryuichi "Professor" SAKAMOTO does approve Tadashi's avantgarde guitar technique and took charge of the dub-mix of "35" in their debut album.

GUNJOGACRAYON currently keep active with four members; Tadashi KUMIHARA (guitars), Atsushi MIYAKAWA (drums), Takashi MAEDA (bass) and Yuji SONODA (voices, sax, movement).


GUNJOGACRAYON EP (1980)

Not showy or colourful but fruitful and tasty - for GUNJOGACRAYON's debut EP this phrase should be so fit, shouldn't it?

What an interesting and impressive style - around 1980 in Japan was such a musical style I'm very surpirised and amazed indeed. GUNJOGACRAYON is a four-piece (in the beginning five-piece) outfit formed around the violent guitarist Tadashi KUMIHARA and free-form keyboard player Fumio OHMORI (having already left).

Their unique musical style is they have a steady rhythm section (a bassist Takashi MAEDA and a drummer Atsushi MIYAKAWA) on the basis, the aggressive melodymakers as above mentioned, and the avantgarde and eccentric stage performance and voices by Yuji SONODA, called as a MOVER. Here is a wonderful balance and harmony between the two strict pacesetters and the three crazy pacebreakers - oh no joke! It's so difficult for me to explain this balance itself, but you will not feel uncomfortable with listening to their sounds through this album.

Tadashi's guitar solo is always aggressive, heavy, bloody, gaudy, and hatefully flexible. And Fumio's keyboard is hopping, chaotic, fuzzy, and hastily agile as a squirrel. Exactly at a quick thought they have no relation to the word "strict" or "steady", but I consider the really avantgarde gang should calculate this balance by nature. Therefore such a mysterious combination can be sometimes ambient, sometimes danceable, and sometimes freaky.

Furthermore, whatever their substyle should be, you can feel the same atmosphere in them. In this EP they played with stoner, heavily slash, march-like, ambient, or funky style - you can be immersed in their comfortable mismatch as if their ensemble be completely musically correct.

Anyway, Ryuichi "Professor" SAKAMOTO love Tadashi's guitar play and he voluntarily took charge of dub-mix of the fourth track 35. You can understand easily without my review, that's it!


Tadashi KUMIHARA - an aggressive guitar player!

Thank you for reading this blog. 

Edited by DamoXt7942 - October 19 2009 at 03:00

A powerfully avantgarde Japanese-underground outfit has come here!



KATRA TURANA landed suddenly down on Tokyo underground rock scene as one of obscure Japanese avantgarde outfits in 1980. Their ensemble consisted of some acoustic instruments based on a violin and a piano. On stage they used various rubbishy stuffs as percussion and cooked avantgarde musical dinner with folk, chanson, jazz, and rock essence. And after all, their symbol was Atsushi HIROIKE, the vocalist and the performer disguised as a woman with powerful "feminine" voices. His early life, spent in the "antique" house of his grandparents, should influence much on his musical style and policy.

In 1982, from a Japanese indie label Telegraph Records, KATRA TURANA released the eponymous debut album - featuring as many elements as on stage - that could be approved by lots of avantgarde freaks or reviewers. What a shame they could not get away from underground, and disappeared without notice after releasing the second album "Kimera" (1986).


Katra Turana (1982)

An amazing jack-in-the-box from Japan.

KATRA TURANA, one of avantgarde rock outfits in Japan in the 1980s, is known neither all around the world nor only in Japan. As we Japanese know, in those days almost all of anti-establishment or anti-mainstream artists should be immersed underground, and today some of them can see the light - namely, the other cannot be discharged from the underground. KATRA TURANA is one of the outfits still underground and almost unrealized on this ground. A singer, a performer, and the frontman Atsushi HIROIKE always disguised himself as a beautiful woman, performed like a crazy lady, and sang with mischievous feminine voices on stage. Surely your first listening to his voices can deceive you into realizing him as a female singer. And yep, this album itself is exactly a theatre, and lots of instruments are the casts on stage - of course, Atsushi's beautiful and weird vocal is the heroine.

In the first track Yorokobashiki Ichinichi (One day with pleasure), a plaintive violin solo and "her" graceful voices can open the theatre curtain. Well the Katra Theatre gets started. And Ensuikei Table (Conical table) is an absolutely dreamy drama! A musical chime solo is inevitably comfortable and streaming violin sounds following this are more graceful and dramatic. Atsushi's voices are mischievously cute but solemnly quiet, without any weirdness in this song. In the middle part, even warped and twisted piano and percussion cannot break the fantasia - some avantgarde spice added, though. However don't be cheated please - after this "her" aggressiveness should growl at you. All instruments including voices are avantgarde soundmakers (soundbreakers?) in Kyo No Sampo Wa Kiri Ga Nai (Today's walk is endless). "Her" voices thrown into chaos are like a part of percussion and you may not feel unnatural. At least I, cannot help feeling as though "her" voices should change "his" ones. Fuka (Hatch) is the last short song on A-side of LP - with very cute voices and a leisurely violin solo, and heavy percussion poppin' up somewhere. Exact opposite of Fuka is the B-side opening track Hontaiji Telephone Ryokitan, a dramatic and slightly sad piano solo with a tidy piccolo, a windy and spicy violin and Oriental percussion is very impressive. Ryokitan is "a bizzare tale" in English - how do you feel? Just as this atmosphere, can you feel? Atsushi's shout is exactly a cry of a goat hahaha - eerie eerie eerie he says certainly! The next Kame No Fue, Kyoryu No Fue (Pipe of tortoise, pipe of dinasour) is again a plaintive song - by flexible and take-it-easy violin sounds and pretty pipe shots, and cutie named Atsushi. From the middle the air should go weird gradually...the painful repetition of the pipe and the eerie violin scatter, with exotic percussion rubbish...they cannot get away still either. The last March is exactly the last stage of the theatre - the loudly exaggerated end of the show! There you can taste bitter-sweet left, I'm sure.

A wonderful stage you can enjoy. Sorry as I always say but splendid time is guaranteed for all!


Thank you for reading this blog. 

Katra Turanaは12inchのThe Endが、一番好きな作品です。斎藤千尋さんが抜けて、大胆に沖縄民謡風のアレンジが加えられるようになり、ポップさもアップした時期の方が性格的にあいまする。

From the most peaceful city Hiroshima a wonderful shot by Japanese Scotsman!



(From his MySpace website;)
Formed in 2001 by Paul Thomsen Kirk, an ex-pat Scotsman/long-term resident of Japan. AKATOMBO is an audio/visual project which, to date, has released two full-length CD albums, “trace elements” on the London-based SWIM~label (wm24), curated by Colin Newman,(Wire/Githead), & Malka Spigel, (Minimal Compact/Githead); and the most recent audio/visual extravaganza , “Unconfirmed Reports”, Hand-Held Recordings, (HHR 01), the videos of which have had numerous screenings at notable Independent Film Festivals dotted around the globe, (over 12 countries & counting). The full-length audio CD w/ bonus dvd-r is AVAILABLE NOW on the Hand-Held Recordings imprint, of Hiroshima, Japan.



Unconfirmed Reports (2008)

Burned ruins stretched as far as my ears can hear...

AKATOMBO is the moniker of an "auditorily and visually" experimental solo project by Paul Thomsen Kirk, a Scots resident in Japan.

The word "Akatombo", a red dragonfly in English, can remind us Japanese a wide field full of plants at sunset - wondeful memories of oldies and goodies in our childhood. However, I was very shocked at the gap between my anticipation and his "real" creation...in a good sense. The sounds created and built up by Paul's hands are so heavily dark, dry, depressive, and deadpan that absolutely could recall me not warm sunset but burned ruins after Atomic Bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Actually dunno why Paul should carry his project on in Hiroshima but suppose he might notify himself the tragedy and poverty of Hiroshiman people in the postwar days. (Isn't it correct huh?)

I can realize the ruinate atmosphere and burning-smelled air pollution especially in the fourth track Cypher, in the video clip of which a snowstorm in the station of Hiroshima Port shows though. I feel here are not solely depression in the mind of Hiroshiman broken by A-bomb but also strongly beats of their hungry spirit. Simultaneously can I find some hopeful future in this dark and dry electronica. On the contrary, I suggest the second Pragmatism might visualize the "pragmatic" black market on the ruins. Felt very painful both adults and children should try to survive the postwar. The fifth SSRI, a sort of anti-depressive agents, might make the people manic and maniac under ashes from A-bomb I imagine? Forgive my impression cold as ice in this album because I'm a Japanese, but at the same time I'm sure AKATOMBO Paul, "as a Japanese", can understand Japanese identity or heart.

As honestly I say, this terrific work can be appreciated highly as a proud Japanese production. Okay?


Anyway, this is a signature written by Paul himself, on a free postcard! GOOD JOB! :-)




Thank you for reading this blog. 

This LOVE LIVE LIFE + ONE was recommended by my Japanese progressive mate kazuhiro. Thanks kazusan!



In 1971, around the frontman Kosuke ICHIHARA (sax, flute), LOVE LIVE LIFE were formed as a free-form rock project. Each member was one of the most famous and talented Japanese (rock or jazz) session musicians in those days - Toshiaki YOKOTA (flute, sax), Kimio MIZUTANI (guitar), Takao FUJII (guitar), Hiro YANAGIDA (piano, Hammond organ), Chito KAWACHI (drums), Naomi KAWAHARA (percussion), and Masaoki TERAKAWA (bass). They had a strong ambition to produce an intensively improvised rock album like of the British jazz rock scene, and for this purpose they needed a strong, and simultaneously flexible vocalist. Very luckily they could recruit Akira FUSE, one of the most famous Japanese pop-ballad singers, as "PLUS ONE". LOVE LIVE LIFE + ONE's one and only album 'Love Will Make A Better You' has eclectic flavour with psychedelic, avantgarde, jazz and rock essences, that can be appreciated much all over the world.


Love Will Make A Better You - LOVE LIVE LIFE + ONE (1971)

Honestly! I cannot help keeping my eyes and mouth open, touching this album by my ears.

LOVE LIVE LIFE, a Japanese psychedelic rock project, was a hotchpotch ensemble of talented rock musicians. Indeed you can imagine where this project should go as soon as you find the members, but, as I'm sure it's much important, this terribly terrific album could be produced not by LOVE LIVE LIFE, but by LOVE LIVE LIFE + ONE. Namely, Akira FUSE the vocalist could activate this project more and more I wanna say. Basically Akira is one of famous pop singers in Japan - he can remind almost all of Japanese a beautiful & plaintive ballad "Cyclamen No Kaori (Flavour of a cyclamen)" in 1975 - and currently for us Japanese it's beyond all imagination he could shout in such a psychedelic project. As if Percy Faith play rock (sorry).

Joking aside, without any suspicion he was the lead-off man of this project, not only plus one. Listen from the beginning, and feel the first track The Question Mark by your skin. Akira's whisper "I'm a human being, I'm a human." can take us over our surrealistic pillow to another psychedelia. And here come aggressive battles between a dry & metallic guitar, a keen and crazy flute, and incoherent but strict drums. What can let them play not only ramblingly but steadily? I do suggest they should feel the air - by their eyes and their ears, and especially their mind, feeling. Call the air "the spiritual force". Understand enough. Of all instruments, I consider, particularly Kosuke ICHIHARA and Toshiaki YOKOTA's flute duo can boil their psychedelic spirit, with the crazily eccentric wave and stream. And Kimio MIZUTANI's shocking-breaking guitar sounds must knock us out completely. We can be enough pleased by only this song aka jack-in-the-sounds.

After this song (that is, on B side of LP), Akira's voices are very cool but active. In the second track Running Free his voices are running like a cool wind on the turntable. The plaintive violin solo and the strong brass section can make his voices stronger and sharper.  The next eponymous track Love Will Make A Better You can be called as a "psychedelic funk" with as funky shouts as James Brown, as honestly I feel - his voices are so strong and aggressive that can force us to think so, in my humble opinion. His ability for a singer, not a pop artist, we can realize enough on listening to a mid-to-fast psychedelic rock ballad Shadow Of The Mind, as well as the previous track. Akira's bright and brilliant voices can be approved even with some special effects or altered tempo - he grasps the musical ground by his fantastic vocal cord. The last slow blues Facts About It All can make our sensuous stomach completely full - full stomach by a ballad singer with another way of singin'...wonderful!

Once again I say; PLUS ONE is so important.


Thank you for reading this blog.

Can anybody tell me the name of that metal band from Japan who played while being suspended up-side down? Mos Dis or something

Damo - I notice from the Date Course Pentagon Royal Garden page in ProgArchives that not all their albums are listed. The following is an example (I am unable to update this in the Archives but if someone were avble to do that, it would make it more complete).


Franz Kafka's Amerika

(P-Vine Records, PCD-18514/5) (Japan) (2-CD set)

---

Disc 1

1. Perfect Days for Jungle Cruise (21:50)
2. (It's a Small) World Music's World (6:54)
3. The Crying of Lot 49 (15:11)

Disc 2

1. Washington D.C. (8:20)
2. 1865 Richmond, VA (24:08)
3. Fox Trot (12:22)
4. Hoa-ky (13:26)

---

All music composed and arranged by Naruyoshi Kikuchi

Date Course Pentagon Royal Garden
Naruyoshi Kikuchi: conductor, CD-J, keyboard
Jason Shalton: guitar
Koki Takai: guitar
Yasuhiro Yoshigaki: drums
Nobuo Fujii: drums
Masaki Kurihara: bass
Kenta Tsugami: soprano saxophone
Gosekky: tenor saxophone
Masayasu Tzuboguchi: keyboard, synthesizer
Gen Ogimi: percussion
Masaki Yoshimi: tabla
Takero Sekijima: tuba
Taisei Aoki: trombone
Shiro Sasaki: trumpet

Produced by Naruyoshi Kikuchi
Recorded by Kenji Konishi at Sound Inn and aLive Recording Studio
Edited by Shigeki Nakamura at Andy's Studio
Mixed by Shigeki Nakamura (disc 1, track 1; disc 2, tracks 3 and 4) and Kenji Konishi (disc 1, tracks 2 and 3; disc 2, tracks 1 and 2)
Mastered by Osamu Shimojyu at On Air Mastering
Artwork by Sun An

Released in April 2007



There are other additional albums from the band, namely:

Date Course Pentagon Royal Garden. Musical from Chaos 2. CD + DVD. Columbia Music Entertainment, COZA-125-6, 2005.

Date Course Pentagon Royal Garden. Musical from Chaos 3: Hoa-ky. DVD. P-Vine, PVDV-34, 2007.

 Max Simmonds.- Born (28/12/76), was raised in New York City. In 2004 released his album debut "High Fidelity", a music masterpiece inspired in classic songs from the 80's and 90's. Featuring the hit "Plastic Passion" Simmonds reached positions in top charts in Europe, selling thousands of copies and becoming a rock revelation.

In 2009, after some time off, released his second album, "Vice", a retro, sexy and hard album, here's the promotional single "Devil's night".

BUY ALBUM AT

www.myspace.com/maxsimmonds

http://www.purevolume.com/maxsimmonds

Japan Rocks, sez me.

Hi Damo,