What's the best music from Japan you've heard in the past six months?

A

arcaNa

Snakes + Ladders
Nagisa Ni Te - Songs For A Simple moment
...lovely,fragile psychedelic folk type stuff...
(a collection of early rare/unreleased tracks,i think)

...i've tried to get my head around Acid Mother's Temple and related projects aswell,but just can't feel it...they just sound like prog-psych-freakout light to me...and i know people keep raving on about them,but just can't see it at all... (would be much happier going back in time and dig out the REAL stuff from the seventies than listening to this)
---->but that said, that Masaki Batoh's (of Ghost?) reissue,"Collected works 1995-1996",really got me and have made me curious to seek out other Ghost records... he uses a lot of lush acoustic instruments on it,like hurdy gurdy and mandolin... there's a great little version of "World Of Pain",(which in his japanese accent sounds more like "Word of Lain",sweet!),and Can's "Yoo Doo Right",which is amazing- he totally got the rhythm right,the understanding of the rhythm,i mean...(read somewhere that Jaki Liebezeit,i think it was,heard Batoh's version and commented something similar,like:"yeah,this man really understand the groove"!)
 
O

Octopus?

Well-known member
arcaNa...which Acid Mothers have you heard? Being a convert myself I find their take on psychedelic rock fresh and unique, more taking their unabashed love of a pre-existing genre and building on it than just regurgitating Hawkwind riffs over and over again.

That's not to claim that AMT isn't derivative sometimes as I could definitely see their constant in-jokey references to 60's rock getting on some people's nerves. And any artist that releases lord only knows how many discs a month has got to lose something in the quality control department, but I've found the consistency of their discs to be quite impressive.

"La Novia", "Born To Be Wild In The U.S.A." and "Univers Zen A Zero A Zero" are all pretty exceptional releases in my books, and some of the side projects like Tsurubami twist elements of the Acid Mothers sound around in interesting ways.

Definitely in agreement with you on the Batoh, though. Great disc!
 
A

AshRa

Well-known member
Boredoms, Ghost and AMT have all been rockin the stereo full-time recently (listened to OOIOO Kila Kila Kila again today - fantastic!) but the best music outta Japan i've heard in the last 6 months is...

http://www.ymck.net/e/sound.html - God i'm such a sucker for Nintendo-pop, especially with titles like "Does John Coltrane Dream of a Merry-go-round?"!! ;)
 
A

ambrose

Well-known member
m-flo


the best, by virtue of being the only music ive heard from japan in he past 6 months, apart from one other thing which was worse....

and m-flo are wicked!
check the album "astromantic"
 
C

chantler

Member
sayasource - return to a source. this disc is delightful. saya playing five or six tracks solo with just guitar accompaniment and then an extended piano improv (?) from tori kudo and then a track with them together. i don't care for tori's piano playing here... but saya's tracks are gorgeous. i play this much more than the tenniscoats CD - we are everyone. (even though i think its ace as well).

i'm not feeling the boredoms disc. probably should give it another try... it just doesn't sound as appropriately unhinged as vcns.
 
E

Eric

Mr Moraigero
Well the Boredoms thing ...

Frankly I found the new Boredoms a little boring. It's not that I can't get with their new direction but I found it pretty unfocused despite all the hype ...

Recent nice stuff out of Japan for me: new L?K?O? mix record, nice Okinawan punk band Bleach. The new ex-Girl is pretty good too. The guitarist I just found out is Keiko ex of "Super Junkey Monkey", a long-dead Tokyo band. Also dead is Take of Dub Sonic, Disco Romancer etc ... RIP 9/27.
 
A

appleblim

Well-known member
kimitaka matsumae

compilation courtesy of max tundra, who discovered him online....he wrote some demos for the Nord Lead synth! absolutely stunning stuff....writes music for the Cartoon Network too...utterly synthetic, a million ideas in every tune....cool remix of telex 'moscow diskow' too!
 
M

mms

sometimes
appleblim said:
kimitaka matsumae

compilation courtesy of max tundra, who discovered him online....he wrote some demos for the Nord Lead synth! absolutely stunning stuff....writes music for the Cartoon Network too...utterly synthetic, a million ideas in every tune....cool remix of telex 'moscow diskow' too!
Click to expand...


i used to see max tundra absolutley everywhere i wentin london at one point. i saw him at the tube station i used to live opposite once so i invited him over to my house for a nice cup of tea :)
 
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