Search "japan" 217 Items

Light in the Attic Records proudly presents Even the Forest Hums: Ukrainian Sonic Archives 1971-1996—the first comprehensive collection of Ukrainian music recorded prior to, and immediately following, the Ussr’s collapse. From subtly dissenting Soviet-era singles to DIY recordings from Kyiv’s vibrant underground scene, the compilation chronicles the development of Ukraine’s rich musical landscape through rare folk, rock, jazz, and electronic recordings.

“This record is a labor of love and a long time coming,” says label owner Matt Sullivan. Over the course of the last five years, Sullivan, alongside producers David Mas ("dbgo”), Mark “Frosty” McNeill, and Ukrainian label Shukai Records worked tirelessly to compile a carefully curated, chronological playlist. But behind the scenes, ongoing war & politics would shape the evolution of the tracklist, which originally featured both Ukrainian and Russian artists. “We found ourselves in the midst of a larger political issue; what began as a broader overview of a sonically underrepresented region suddenly became quite the controversial project,” Sullivan continues, “so we decided to pivot and focus only on Ukrainian music. There were times when it felt impossible to bring this project to fruition, so to be sharing it with the world today is truly humbling and long overdue.”

Guiding listeners through the physical editions of the album are insightful liner notes and track-by-track details by Vitalii “Bard” Bardetskyi—a Kyiv-based filmmaker, DJ, and writer. The 2xLP is housed in a beautiful gatefold package showcasing Ukrainian artist Maria Prymachenko’s beloved and iconic folk paintings. The vinyl edition features a 20-page booklet with artist photos & liner notes in both English and Ukrainian, pressed on Clear Blue Sky & Sunflower Yellow wax; the CD edition features bonus content housed in a deluxe, 64-page hardbound book.

Light in the Attic will donate a portion of proceeds directly to Livyj Bereh, a Kyiv-based volunteer group working to rebuild in the regions affected by ongoing war in Ukraine.

“Music has always pulled Ukrainians out of the abyss,” writes Vitalii “Bard” Bardetskyi in his liner notes for Even the Forest Hums: Ukrainian Sonic Archives 1971-1996. “When there is no hope for the future, there is still music. At such moments, the whole nation resonates under a groove. Music, breaking through the concrete of various colonial systems, is an incredible, often illogical, way to preserve dignity.”

While the songs collected in Even the Forest Hums were recorded during periods of immense societal and political upheaval—and certainly reflect the resilience of the Ukrainian people—they are rooted in the universal spirit of exploration: from post-war teenagers seeking fresh rhythms and artists experimenting with DIY recording technologies to an entire nation being introduced to decades-worth of previously-embargoed albums. Yet, until now, it has been nearly impossible for anyone outside Ukraine to explore the country’s flourishing music scene for themselves.

Much of this can be attributed to Soviet-era restrictions. Music, much like any other commodity, was tightly controlled before the fall of communism. “Only state-authorized performers who had gone through hellish rounds of the permit system could record at the few monopolistic, state-run studios,” explains Bardetskyi. While many of these compositions were released and performed to mass audiences, however, they weren’t necessarily what they seemed. “Some of the artists managed, even under difficult ideological circumstances, to build a whole aesthetic platform which was essentially anti-Soviet.”

Bands could slide under the radar by changing the lyrics of rock songs to reflect Soviet ideals or by performing traditional folk music with subtle outside influences. “This resulted in a whole scene that combined central-eastern Ukrainian vocal polyphony, Carpathian rhythms, and overseas grooves,” writes Bardetskyi, who refers to this era of music as “Mustache Funk.”

Examples featured in Even the Forest Hums... include 1971’s “Bunny” by Kobza. While the folk-rock group was known for their polyphonic vocals, this particular composition is an instrumental waltz, which blends elements of traditional Ukrainian music with progressive rock, British beat, and jazz-rock. Another example of “Mustache Funk” comes from the latter half of the decade, with the Caribbean-influenced “Remembrance” by Vodohrai. While the group—which included some of the best jazz musicians in the country—had a multitude of traditional hits, inspired jams like this one could, for a lucky few, occasionally be heard live.

While the 70s proved to be a golden age for Ukrainian music (complete with pop stars, large-scale tours, and legions of adoring fans), the excitement was short-lived. “The Soviet system finally understood that funkified beats quite strongly contradict[ed] [its] principles,” notes Bardetskyi, who adds that by the 80s, “The once prolific scene was almost completely colonized, appropriated, and largely Russified; the state radio and TV waves were occupied by banal VIAs and cheezy schlager singers.”

With tighter restrictions, however, came the rise of the underground. While the decade leading up to Ukraine’s independence was marked by great turmoil—including the political reform of Perestroika in the Ussr and the Chernobyl disaster—it also marked a time of incredible creativity.

Mirroring global trends, the first half of the decade found many composers and producers experimenting with electronic music. Among them was Vadym Khrapachov, whose scores have appeared in over 100 films. His moody, Moroder-esque “Dance” (written for Roman Balaian’s iconic 1983 film, Flights in Dreams and Reality) is notable in that it was recorded on the Ussr’s only existing British EMS Synthi 100 synthesizer.

Producer Kyrylo Stetsenko, meanwhile, was reimagining traditional songs for the dancefloor. Among them is 1980’s “Play, the Violin, Play,” by Ukrainian pop star Tetiana Kocherhina. Stetsenko, who produced the album for Kocherhina, created a hypnotic remix of the folk tune that was fit for a disco. Stetsenko is also featured here with 1987’s “Oh, how, how?,” in which he transforms a melancholic ballad by Natalia Gura into a synth-forward, breakbeat jam.

As the fall of communism approached, the scene continued to diversify—particularly as music from around the world became increasingly available. Kyiv, in particular, became an epicenter of creativity. In the early days, bands like Krok offered a preview of what was to come. Described by Bardetskyi as “The first real Kyiv supergroup,” Krok was led by guitarist Volodymyr Khodzytskyi and featured musicians from local Beat bands. In addition to backing the biggest pop acts of the day, the versatile collective explored a spectrum of styles in their own recordings, including fusion and electro-funk. They are represented here with the mellow “Breath of Night Kyiv.”

By the late 80s, Kyiv “was buzzing like a beehive,” recalls Bardetskyi. “It was a period of very active socialization and exchange of musical information and ideas; local musicians evolved with supersonic speed, absorbing decades of the world's musical background and transforming it into their sound.” While rock bands comprised much of this era’s first wave, artists continued to expand their repertoire as new influences pervaded the scene. The global rise of DIY recording technology and electronic instrumentation, meanwhile, also contributed to the growing sonic landscape.

Highlights from this period include the avant-garde improvisations of violinist Valentina Goncharova. Recordings like 1989’s “Silence” were created by a series of layered tracks and custom pickups. Similarly, composer Iury Lech paints a warm ambient soundscape with 1990’s “Barreras.” On the other end of the spectrum is the industrial “90” by Radiodelo (the project of Ivan Moskalenko—aka DJ Derbastler), which combines frenetic drum machine beats and haunting, reverb-soaked instrumentation. Post-punk was also thriving, with acts like Yarn (a large, loosely based collective) dominating the scene. “The interests of [Yarn’s] members extended all the way to medieval chamber music, which would clearly be noticeable in ‘Viella,’” writes Bardetskyi. The track features two of Yarn’s co-founding members: multi-instrumentalist and graphic designer Oleksander Yurchenko (who became a significant figure in modern Ukrainian music) and Ivan Moskalenko. Yurchenko is also represented here as part of Omi, a parallel project by the chart-topping electronic group, Blemish. 1994’s dramatic “Transference” (which features contributions by legendary Japanese musician Ryuichi Sakamoto and American singer-songwriter Diamanda Galas) serves up horror-movie-soundtrack vibes, particularly with the addition of eerie vocalizations.

Cukor Bila Smert’ (which translates to “Sugar White Death”) were also major players in the Kyiv underground. Interestingly, Bardetskyi notes, “In the reality of the general dominance of post-punk, the aesthetic message of Cukor Bila Smert’ was countercultural to the countercultural process itself.” For their contribution to the compilation, the experimental quartet provides 1995’s “Cool, Shining.”

In the years following Ukraine’s independence, Kyiv’s underground scene continued to flourish, particularly as Western trends became more accessible and Ukrainians found themselves at the forefront of their own cultural output. While the country’s music would largely evolve in new directions throughout the 90s, the final entry on Even the Forest Hums... provides a glimpse at what the future held. The album closes with 1996’s “Lion,” by Belarusian transplant German Popov, whose project, Marble Sleeves, was “one of the few Kyiv formations that tried to master jungle/drum-n-bass,” per Bardetskyi.

Though this compilation only scratches the surface of Ukraine’s vast and diverse music scene, Even the Forest Hums offers an in-depth overview of a significant period in the country’s cultural history and unites a number of influential figures in the same collection for the first time. As Ukrainian artist Oleksandr Schegel writes in the foreword, “This is our Ukrainian treasure. It is impossible to lose and impossible to win.”

Light in the Attic Records proudly presents Even the Forest Hums: Ukrainian Sonic Archives 1971-1996—the first comprehensive collection of Ukrainian music recorded prior to, and immediately following, the Ussr’s collapse. From subtly dissenting Soviet-era singles to DIY recordings from Kyiv’s vibrant underground scene, the compilation chronicles the development of Ukraine’s rich musical landscape through rare folk, rock, jazz, and electronic recordings.

“This record is a labor of love and a long time coming,” says label owner Matt Sullivan. Over the course of the last five years, Sullivan, alongside producers David Mas ("dbgo”), Mark “Frosty” McNeill, and Ukrainian label Shukai Records worked tirelessly to compile a carefully curated, chronological playlist. But behind the scenes, ongoing war & politics would shape the evolution of the tracklist, which originally featured both Ukrainian and Russian artists. “We found ourselves in the midst of a larger political issue; what began as a broader overview of a sonically underrepresented region suddenly became quite the controversial project,” Sullivan continues, “so we decided to pivot and focus only on Ukrainian music. There were times when it felt impossible to bring this project to fruition, so to be sharing it with the world today is truly humbling and long overdue.”

Guiding listeners through the physical editions of the album are insightful liner notes and track-by-track details by Vitalii “Bard” Bardetskyi—a Kyiv-based filmmaker, DJ, and writer. The 2xLP is housed in a beautiful gatefold package showcasing Ukrainian artist Maria Prymachenko’s beloved and iconic folk paintings. The vinyl edition features a 20-page booklet with artist photos & liner notes in both English and Ukrainian, pressed on Clear Blue Sky & Sunflower Yellow wax; the CD edition features bonus content housed in a deluxe, 64-page hardbound book.

Light in the Attic will donate a portion of proceeds directly to Livyj Bereh, a Kyiv-based volunteer group working to rebuild in the regions affected by ongoing war in Ukraine.

“Music has always pulled Ukrainians out of the abyss,” writes Vitalii “Bard” Bardetskyi in his liner notes for Even the Forest Hums: Ukrainian Sonic Archives 1971-1996. “When there is no hope for the future, there is still music. At such moments, the whole nation resonates under a groove. Music, breaking through the concrete of various colonial systems, is an incredible, often illogical, way to preserve dignity.”

While the songs collected in Even the Forest Hums were recorded during periods of immense societal and political upheaval—and certainly reflect the resilience of the Ukrainian people—they are rooted in the universal spirit of exploration: from post-war teenagers seeking fresh rhythms and artists experimenting with DIY recording technologies to an entire nation being introduced to decades-worth of previously-embargoed albums. Yet, until now, it has been nearly impossible for anyone outside Ukraine to explore the country’s flourishing music scene for themselves.

Much of this can be attributed to Soviet-era restrictions. Music, much like any other commodity, was tightly controlled before the fall of communism. “Only state-authorized performers who had gone through hellish rounds of the permit system could record at the few monopolistic, state-run studios,” explains Bardetskyi. While many of these compositions were released and performed to mass audiences, however, they weren’t necessarily what they seemed. “Some of the artists managed, even under difficult ideological circumstances, to build a whole aesthetic platform which was essentially anti-Soviet.”

Bands could slide under the radar by changing the lyrics of rock songs to reflect Soviet ideals or by performing traditional folk music with subtle outside influences. “This resulted in a whole scene that combined central-eastern Ukrainian vocal polyphony, Carpathian rhythms, and overseas grooves,” writes Bardetskyi, who refers to this era of music as “Mustache Funk.”

Examples featured in Even the Forest Hums... include 1971’s “Bunny” by Kobza. While the folk-rock group was known for their polyphonic vocals, this particular composition is an instrumental waltz, which blends elements of traditional Ukrainian music with progressive rock, British beat, and jazz-rock. Another example of “Mustache Funk” comes from the latter half of the decade, with the Caribbean-influenced “Remembrance” by Vodohrai. While the group—which included some of the best jazz musicians in the country—had a multitude of traditional hits, inspired jams like this one could, for a lucky few, occasionally be heard live.

While the 70s proved to be a golden age for Ukrainian music (complete with pop stars, large-scale tours, and legions of adoring fans), the excitement was short-lived. “The Soviet system finally understood that funkified beats quite strongly contradict[ed] [its] principles,” notes Bardetskyi, who adds that by the 80s, “The once prolific scene was almost completely colonized, appropriated, and largely Russified; the state radio and TV waves were occupied by banal VIAs and cheezy schlager singers.”

With tighter restrictions, however, came the rise of the underground. While the decade leading up to Ukraine’s independence was marked by great turmoil—including the political reform of Perestroika in the Ussr and the Chernobyl disaster—it also marked a time of incredible creativity.

Mirroring global trends, the first half of the decade found many composers and producers experimenting with electronic music. Among them was Vadym Khrapachov, whose scores have appeared in over 100 films. His moody, Moroder-esque “Dance” (written for Roman Balaian’s iconic 1983 film, Flights in Dreams and Reality) is notable in that it was recorded on the Ussr’s only existing British EMS Synthi 100 synthesizer.

Producer Kyrylo Stetsenko, meanwhile, was reimagining traditional songs for the dancefloor. Among them is 1980’s “Play, the Violin, Play,” by Ukrainian pop star Tetiana Kocherhina. Stetsenko, who produced the album for Kocherhina, created a hypnotic remix of the folk tune that was fit for a disco. Stetsenko is also featured here with 1987’s “Oh, how, how?,” in which he transforms a melancholic ballad by Natalia Gura into a synth-forward, breakbeat jam.

As the fall of communism approached, the scene continued to diversify—particularly as music from around the world became increasingly available. Kyiv, in particular, became an epicenter of creativity. In the early days, bands like Krok offered a preview of what was to come. Described by Bardetskyi as “The first real Kyiv supergroup,” Krok was led by guitarist Volodymyr Khodzytskyi and featured musicians from local Beat bands. In addition to backing the biggest pop acts of the day, the versatile collective explored a spectrum of styles in their own recordings, including fusion and electro-funk. They are represented here with the mellow “Breath of Night Kyiv.”

By the late 80s, Kyiv “was buzzing like a beehive,” recalls Bardetskyi. “It was a period of very active socialization and exchange of musical information and ideas; local musicians evolved with supersonic speed, absorbing decades of the world's musical background and transforming it into their sound.” While rock bands comprised much of this era’s first wave, artists continued to expand their repertoire as new influences pervaded the scene. The global rise of DIY recording technology and electronic instrumentation, meanwhile, also contributed to the growing sonic landscape.

Highlights from this period include the avant-garde improvisations of violinist Valentina Goncharova. Recordings like 1989’s “Silence” were created by a series of layered tracks and custom pickups. Similarly, composer Iury Lech paints a warm ambient soundscape with 1990’s “Barreras.” On the other end of the spectrum is the industrial “90” by Radiodelo (the project of Ivan Moskalenko—aka DJ Derbastler), which combines frenetic drum machine beats and haunting, reverb-soaked instrumentation. Post-punk was also thriving, with acts like Yarn (a large, loosely based collective) dominating the scene. “The interests of [Yarn’s] members extended all the way to medieval chamber music, which would clearly be noticeable in ‘Viella,’” writes Bardetskyi. The track features two of Yarn’s co-founding members: multi-instrumentalist and graphic designer Oleksander Yurchenko (who became a significant figure in modern Ukrainian music) and Ivan Moskalenko. Yurchenko is also represented here as part of Omi, a parallel project by the chart-topping electronic group, Blemish. 1994’s dramatic “Transference” (which features contributions by legendary Japanese musician Ryuichi Sakamoto and American singer-songwriter Diamanda Galas) serves up horror-movie-soundtrack vibes, particularly with the addition of eerie vocalizations.

Cukor Bila Smert’ (which translates to “Sugar White Death”) were also major players in the Kyiv underground. Interestingly, Bardetskyi notes, “In the reality of the general dominance of post-punk, the aesthetic message of Cukor Bila Smert’ was countercultural to the countercultural process itself.” For their contribution to the compilation, the experimental quartet provides 1995’s “Cool, Shining.”

In the years following Ukraine’s independence, Kyiv’s underground scene continued to flourish, particularly as Western trends became more accessible and Ukrainians found themselves at the forefront of their own cultural output. While the country’s music would largely evolve in new directions throughout the 90s, the final entry on Even the Forest Hums... provides a glimpse at what the future held. The album closes with 1996’s “Lion,” by Belarusian transplant German Popov, whose project, Marble Sleeves, was “one of the few Kyiv formations that tried to master jungle/drum-n-bass,” per Bardetskyi.

Though this compilation only scratches the surface of Ukraine’s vast and diverse music scene, Even the Forest Hums offers an in-depth overview of a significant period in the country’s cultural history and unites a number of influential figures in the same collection for the first time. As Ukrainian artist Oleksandr Schegel writes in the foreword, “This is our Ukrainian treasure. It is impossible to lose and impossible to win.”

Middle Eastern psych, funk, disco, and Japanese folk and pop, converge to create a mesmerising new sound on "Kokoro", Sababa 5 and Yurika"s collaborative debut album for Batov Records, collecting four acclaimed singles and four brand new songs.

Presenting the third thematic volume on the “Aquapelagos" series - a collection of split LPs where selected artists offer their own take into water surrounded cultures and communities. After the initial release of the Anthology compilation Aquapelago in 2022 (Discrepant ,Crep91) and the split LP Atlantico by Lagoss & Banha da Cobra (Keroxen, Krxn027) as well as the direct collaboration LP Índico by Mike Cooper & Pierre Bastien we proudly introduce an the third volume in the series in the shape of no other than two inspiring artists, Vica Pacheco and Pak Yan Lau. Two different sound journeys inspired by the majestic and peaceful Pacific Ocean, the vastest, largest and deepest ocean of our planet. Vica Pacheco’s composition takes a calm meditation approach where water flutes and synths brush shoulders to cre-ate a ever expanding mind journey whereas Pak Yan Lau’s ambitions Neo classical piece, The Ocean in Us, talks about that grand overwhelming feeling, that vast space deep under, on the bottom of the Pacific. Both compositions were recorded and created with the particular wet acoustics of the Tank in Santa Cruz de Tenerife in mind. From Philip Hayward and Matt Hill’s liner notes: ‘’The Pacific is a complex space, comprising a third of the Earth’s surface. A cascade of islands runs along its eastern flank, down from the Kamchatka peninsula, through Japan, Taiwan, The Philippines, Melanesia and on to Australasia. In its watery heart the islands of Micronesia and Polynesia stretch across huge distances, north-east to the Hawaiian archipelago, south east to Rapa Nui and south west to Aotearoa and Chatham island. Closer to the shores of the Amer-icas lie Tierra del Fuego, the Galapagos Islands, Haida Gwaii and the Aleutians. This is a space that resists easy char-acterisation. The Pacific laps the shores of Japan and Chile, the beaches of Australia’s East Coast and the cold, damp coasts of British Colombia and Alaska alike. Indeed, the space is so vast that it is a world in itself and one rarely navi-gated in its entirety. In this manner, strands of genres and the songs that reflect them are components in an intricate mesh of associations.‘’ Philip Hayward and Matt Hill, April 2022

Fabiano de Nascimento, a popular Brazilian guitarist in Japan, and Shin Sasakubo, a guitarist from Chichibu, Japan, who has been linked with South American music and other parts of the world, are releasing on LP a guitar duo recording that started when they performed together live in Japan. The three-day recording began four days after Fabiano do Nascimento and Shin Sasakubo's first concert together. Sharing the same space and time, the two guitarists, with their different styles and origins, explored sounds, let them resonate and repel, and engaged in a dialogue and exchange of ideas that shaped this music.

Middle Eastern psych, funk, disco, and Japanese folk and pop, converge to create a mesmerising new sound on "Kokoro", Sababa 5 and Yurika"s collaborative debut album for Batov Records, collecting four acclaimed singles and four brand new songs.

Arisa Nakano is a talented young Japanese actress who recently appeared in Wim Wenders' latest film Perfect Days, which was nominated for Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards. She sings Sachiko Kanenobu's song 'Blue Fish' which is also played in the film, and P-vine have the honour of releasing the cover as a 7" single. Produced by Seiichi Yamamoto, also known as a former member of the Boredoms, her dignified singing voice combined with Yamamoto's sound arrangement creates a musical chemical reaction.

Middle Eastern psych, funk, disco, and Japanese folk and pop, converge to create a mesmerising new sound on "Kokoro", Sababa 5 and Yurika"s collaborative debut album for Batov Records, collecting four acclaimed singles and four brand new songs.

With this new album, Bonye & Klyde open themselves up to a delicate and inspired poetry, tinged with French chanson, folk, jazz...The exploration of new, light-hearted horizons will offer the listener a set of multi-faceted stories, some complex, some singular, some raw.But one thing's for sure, these tales won't leave you unmoved... a breath of fresh air on French folk!Let yourself be carried away in this beautiful escape...

The birth of Japan’s nascent acid folk scene was rooted in the messy and invigorating political climate of the late 1960s. It is a story of Dadaists, communists, pharmacists and cult leaders, led by a young generation of upstart students, artists and dreamers hellbent on turning their world upside down.

Born on the campuses of Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka, and centred around newly formed independent label and left-wing stronghold URC, this uniquely Japanese form of folk expression provided an outlet for musicians who were tired of aping Western sounds and instead found ways to sing in Japanese and integrate traditional forms in new ways.

At the forefront of this movement was Yellow Magic Orchestra’s Haroumi Hosono, a polymath innovator whose band Happy End released the first Japanese language rock album, and whose influence would go on to be felt across Japanese music for decades. Alongside, and informed by the Kansai scene’s Takashi Nishioka and Happy End collaborator Ken Narita, they experimented with cadences and accents of the Japanese language to open the door for others to experiment with their own forms of psychedelic folk too.

Some, like Nishioka, were more inspired by Dadaism than drugs, while others, like Kazuhisa Okubo, would ultimately find work as a chemist, having founded two further folk groups that flirted with varying levels of success. Obstinately uncommercial, relentlessly creative, the music featured on Time Capsule’s Nippon Acid Folk represents a broad church of influences.

Perhaps the wildest addition to this congregation however was Hiroki Tamaki, a classically-trained violinist and committed iconoclast, whose synth-prog odysseys hinted at his obsession with the divine. Subsumed by the teachings of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, he penned an album in praise of the infamous religious leader of which two superbly mind-bending tracks are featured on this compilation.

Charting the decade from 1970 to 1980 as the dreams of political and spiritual liberation seeded in the ‘60s turned to dust, Nippon Acid Folk surveys a little explored corner of Japanese music history, but one which ultimately laid the foundations for an independent music industry, launching the careers of Hosono and others in the process.

Nippon Acid Folk 1970-1980 is pressed on 12” vinyl and represents the start of Time Capsule’s deep dive into Japan’s rich history of folk and psychedelic soul music.

YĪN YĪN, the highly touted Dutch quartet from Maastricht, returns with a sonically expansive third album Mount Matsu. Recorded collectively in their own studio in the Belgian countryside, the album is a kaleidoscope of sounds and influences, occupying a no man's land between Khruangbin and Kraftwerk, surf music and Southeast Asian psychedelia, Stax soul and mutant 80s disco, City pop and Japanese instrumental folk (sōkyoku). Mount Matsu sees YĪN YĪN at their most mature and adventurous stage yet. Infectious pentatonic melodicism calling for multiple rewinds.

Dōji Morita, who debuted in 1975 with the single "Sayonara Boku no Tomodachi / Mabushii Natsu," was a unique and enigmatic presence in Japanese folk scene with her characteristic sunglasses and curly hair. Starting with "good Bye" in the same year, she went on to release a series of masterpiece albums, including "Mother Sky: Can You Fly Alone in the Sad Blue Sky?" (1976) and "a Boy" (1977).

This album is a live recording from the spring of 1978, during the peak of Mori's career, when she appeared on the popular FM Tokyo radio program "Pioneer Sound Approach." With a selection of her best songs, delicate singing and playing, and valuable on-stage banter, this is a must-have live album not only for fans but for anyone. Despite its brevity, this album captures the richness of her career.

This is a live recording from 1976 of Japan's legendary female singer, Yoshiko Sai. Sai made her debut with the album "Mangekyo" in 1975. In July 1976, she released her second album "Mikko," which is still highly regarded as a classic worldwide. This recording captures a long live performance just before the album's release. In 2008, a live recording collection titled "live 1976/79" which was released on CD from P-vine, featuring seven tracks from this day's recording. However, this release features the complete performance of all 17 songs for the first time, including all the songs from the album "Mikkou," as well as unreleased tracks and cover songs!

After taking a hiatus from her music career in 1979, Yoshiko Sai made a comeback to the music scene with her album "Taklamakan" in 2008. However, she did not resume her live performances until the following year. Later she performed live in Tokyo in 2014 and 2015 but each time only once. This live album features a recording of her performance at a "Midnight Heavy Rock Party vol.2" held at Shibuya Mount Rainier Hall in 2014. Jojo Hiroshige and Futoshi Okano from Hijokaidan and other representative alternative musicians from Japan played as her backing band, making it a legendary performance where Yoshiko Sai miraculously made her comeback. This live recording has never been publicly released before, and P-vine is honored to be able to share this wonderful recording with her fans around the world.

Following the release of the first volume of the Koto: Tapestry series, Cinedelic completes the series of 3 with the release of the remaining two valuable albums. 'Tapestry: Koto' is a 3-album series produced by Nippon Columbia in the mid-1970s dedicated to one of the main instruments of Japanese traditional music: Koto. The beauty of the trilogy curated by composer Kiyoshi Yamaya, whose chapters are respectively dedicated to Sea, Hillside and Country, lies in the fact that they are a modern translation of tradition using newer and more avant-garde sound idioms, integrating the koto with jazz musicians. An original mix, a 'crossover’ that allows for the awakening and the consequential spread of traditional music in larger contexts. The extreme accuracy of the marvellous recordings is also remarkable. The performers on this fabulous album are: Toshiko Yonekawa - learned to play the koto at an early age, performing in a public concert as early as 8 years old. For three years, from 1941 to 1944, she won prizes as the best performer in the Japanese Cultural Federation's competition for traditional trios. She also received an award from the Prime Minister. Many other important recognitions followed, until she became president of the Reichokai and executive director of the Sankyoku Association. In 1996, she was appointed Living National Treasure. As a koto player, her best-known characteristics are her extreme precision of intonation and rhythm and the unparalleled beauty of her sound. Kiyoshi Yamaya - born March 1932. He attended the Kunitachi College of Music. Between 1956 and 1960, he performed with 'Nobuo Hara and His Sharps & Flats' (clarinet, saxophone, etc.) and was responsible for composition and arrangement. In 1959, he formed the 'Modern Jazz Three Association' with Norio Maeda and Keitaro Miho, which contributed to the improvement of the level of composition and arrangement in Japanese jazz. In 1965, he became conductor of the 'Tokyo Union Orchestra' and received the Japan Record Award's Arrangement Award. His name appears on more than 100 albums. An unmissable session for those seeking new sounds. Original masters licensed by Nippon Columbia for the first ever reissue. Includes OBI and insert.

Alien Transistor announces a reissue of Such December, the fourth album by Japanese indie folk-pop artist, Gratin Carnival. Listeners might already know Gratin Carnival from their appearance on the Alien Parade Japan compilation of indie pop groups working with brass and woodwind. Gratin Carnival's "Just Watching" was one of the many highlights of that compilation, and its gentle bossa-folk glide reappears on Such December. Originally released in 2020, Such December captures beautifully the happy-sad charm of Gratin Carnival. The project of Koreyuki Mitsunaga, Gratin Carnival started in 2011; Mitsunaga had been home recording for some time and decided on the name as an umbrella for his music-making. Mitsunaga's main instruments are guitar, which he uses to great effect throughout, his gorgeous acoustic playing reminiscent of players like Ueno Takashi of Tenniscoats or João Gilberto, and alto saxophone and clarinet. Those three instruments make up the core of Gratin Carnival's sound, along with Mitsunaga's charmingly doleful singing. Recording at his parents' home, with a four-track cassette recorder and a MacBook, Mitsunaga created Such December during 2020, though the songs on it stretch back to 2016. As with plenty of musicians from the Japanese underground, Mitsunaga is involved in other music, too -- he's been working with The Otoasobi Project, which performs music in collaboration with individuals with learning disabilities, and their families; and he's also involved in improvised music. With Such December, though, you get to hear Mitsunaga's music at its most personal and individual, ten songs of still, gorgeously poised indie folk-pop, where the swooning clang of six strings meets the breathy bliss of woodwind and brass.

The second installment in Japanese singer-songwriter Saho Terao’s reimagining of Japanese folk songs! In Terao’s hands, the traditional music of Japan takes on completely new forms, transforming from lullabies to pop songs; from children’s play songs to somber piano ballads; from work songs to folk arias.

Across 16 tracks, Terao serves as both performer and archivist, chronicling music that’s being threatened by an aging population and youth gathering in urban centers. She preserves the melodies and lyrics perfectly, but modernizes many of these songs, occasionally giving them lush band arrangements that only a musician of her caliber could pull off.

“Tori ni Naritaiya” (lit. I want to be a bird), a song from Shiga prefecture with lyrics that are almost incomprehensible to a modern Japanese speaker, is given a west coast jazz spin, with a hard bop bass line that Mingus himself would have been proud of. “Nakunaiyo” (lit. Don’t Cry) a lullaby from the Amami Islands, sees Terao’s modern sensibilities meld perfectly with more traditional arrangements. The intro, in which Terao sings a capella over hand claps in a call and response between herself and a male choir. You can’t help but imagine that this is how this song has been performed for centuries, and when the rhythm section comes crashing in, the marriage of traditional melody and modern arrangements is complete.

The study of folk music often paints it as music of the past - stuck in the form that it was practiced in at its conception. But folk music, more so than any other genre, should evolve with the people and their music. Terao brings the traditional music of Japan to the 21st century, using her voice and arrangements to breathe life into music that faces the threat of extinction. Released on vinyl for the first time ever, Saho Terao’s My Favorite Children’s Songs 2 is an album you absolutely must not miss.

Perhaps more than any other musician of her generation, Japanese singer-songwriter Saho Terao has pursued the perfect “song”. In the 16 years since her debut album, Terao has made songs ranging from Joni-mitchell inspired folk ballads to pop renditions of traditional Japanese lullabies. Saho Terao’s ninth original studio album, Kita e Mukau (Going North) is a celebration of her history, but sounds fresh from beginning to end.

The diverse cast of supporting musicians should be familiar to fans of Terao, with musicians such as Reizaburo Adachi (ds, sax.), Wataru Iga (b.) (who form the three piece band Fuyu ni Wakarete along with Terao), Shuta Hasunuma (arr.), U-zhaan (Tabla), Mahito The People (gt.), Wakana Ikeda (fl.), and more appearing on the record. Although Terao’s soothing voice and piano playing form the basis of each of the songs, the arrangements are at times times fun and upbeat, at times bordering on avant-garde, and at times so beautiful that you’ll find yourself teary-eyed.

At first listen, the relaxed atmosphere and laid back beat of title track “Kita e Mukau” (“Going North”), devoted to Terao’s late father, makes it feel like a song perfect for a cloudy day. But repeated listens reveal the kind of stirring allegories that other words can’t do justice. The emotional power imbued in the song is concealed at first glance by a modern arrangement, but careful listeners will be rewarded with an emotional gut punch of a song. “Asadoya Yunta” is a folk song from the islands of Okinawa that’s been covered extensively, including versions by Ryuichi Sakamoto, Yuta Orisaka, and Haruomi Hosono. But where the YMO members turn the tune into tropical electronica, and Orisaka turns it on its head with his psych folk interpretation, Terao keeps it simple. Perhaps it’s her extensive experience covering traditional folk songs in her Favorite Children’s Songs series, but Terao’s sparse piano accompaniment highlights the beautiful melody and her own voice. Despite the plethora of covers by some of Japan’s best musicians, Terao succeeds in making the song her own, while somehow keeping to its folkloric roots.

But perhaps the best example of Terao’s musicianship is in the album closer, “Yumagure (electric guitar version)”. The song was originally included on Ai no Himitsu (2009), and it’s a shining example of contemporary folk. Played over a simple piano arrangement, the song received high praise for its use of everyday imagery (“At twilight, I’ll gaze at the blurry moon”). But over a decade after its initial recording, Terao revisited the song, enlisting the help of Gezan’s Mahito the People on guitar. Mahito’s playing is delicate, coiling and intermingling with the melody and piano, and making expert use of reverb to create an atmosphere altogether different from the original.

What Kita e Mukau accomplishes may not be the perfect “song”, but it unifies the often disparate parts of Terao’s discography into one cohesive project. Pressed on black wax, this record from one of Japan’s foremost singer-songwriters is sure to be one of the essential releases of 2023.

Known as one of the greatest fingerstyle guitarists of his generation, the late Isato Nakagawa’s “Solar Wind” is getting a long awaited analog reissue!

With incredible technical talent and an ear for beautiful melodies, Nakagawa was a pioneer of Japan’s fingerstyle guitar scene, mentoring world-renown guitarists such as Kotaro Oshio and Masaaki Kishibe. Originally released over two decades ago, ‘Solar Wind’ saw Nakagawa at the height of his powers, a guitarist confident in both his compositional skills and unrivaled technical ability. Of course, this talent is disguised, with melodies often so simple they could be from lullabies. Yet at times, his talent is on full display, with moving harmonies so complex it seems impossible that he’s playing with only two hands. Whether you want to sit down and study the music of a master, or simply sit back and listen to beautiful guitar melodies, this album is perfect. Reissued on vinyl for the first time ever with an obi strip, this album has never looked or sounded this good! Don’t miss Isato Nakagawa’s Solar Wind, only from P-vine Records.

Excellent works here, do not miss! TIP!

The sum to infinity of a sequence is the sum of an infinite number of terms in the sequence. It is only possible to compute this sum if the terms of a sequence converge to zero. “Sum To Infinity” is also the second release from Gamut Inc, the retro-futuristic ensemble around composers and curators Marion Wörle and Maciej Śledziecki.

This second album by Gamut Inc combines custom-built autonomous music machines with haunting classical synthesiser sounds to create a dense musical kaleidoscope.

The core of the album is formed by Risset rhythms – cyclic accelerations and decelerations, in which rhythmic layers repeatedly fade in and out, setting in motion a seemingly endless process of rhythmic movement. The motifs are taken from geometric and arithmetic series that create urgency and restlessness. The rigour of the construction is obscured by an orchestra whose timbres are reminiscent of a retro-futuristic indigenous ensemble. Gamut Inc translate strategies of electronic music like pulse-width modulation to music machines such as automated accordion, automated percussion or glockenspiels and create an intense atmosphere that is idiosyncratic, original and modern at the same time.

Gamut Inc build their music machines, play electronic music festivals internationally, curate the Aggregate festival for automated pipe organs and composes for film, radio drama, and theatre. Their first opera, “Rossums Universal Robots”, premiered in 2022. Since 2011, at the intersection of electronic club culture and experimental music, they have produced live music, music theatre, film and theatre scores (including for the Junge Staatstheater Berlin) with their specially developed musical robots. They composed for ensembles like the Rias chamber choir or the robot orchestra Logos Foundation and received invitations and commissions from international festivals and venues such as Sónar, CTM, Berghain, Sonic Acts, Technosphärenklänge or Numusic (no). Gamut Inc has received numerous scholarships, including the Villa Kamogawa scholarship from the Goethe Institute in Kyoto, Japan, 2022. Their first release, “Ex Machina” was produced exclusively with music robots and released in 2014 in cooperation with Bôłt Records.

Debuting on Electric Cowbell Records, comes the first full-length release from Tokyo’s “of Tropique!” A marvelous album full of wonderful and eclectic tropical-infused instrumental tunes. Teppei Kondo’s spirited vintage clarinet often takes centerstage, propelled by a pulsating rhythm section that includes guest spots from guitarist Rolando Bruno and percussionist Mutsumi Kobayashi from Japan’s premier neo-Cumbia group, Minyo Crusaders. The sound of the album is impossible to describe in words, it is lovely throughout, and has a playful, exotic vibe that echoes old cartoon and spaghetti Western soundtracks with a particular Afro-Caribbean flair. “Buster Goes West” is a fearless album filled with lots of turns and twists and a special magic like an imagined voyage through tropical islands where each shoreline reveals a zany new discovery that will leave you wonderstruck. Comes in clear resealable poly bag with Obi strip.

Akuphone is proud to present Fuji-Yuki’s last masterpiece, One Butoh. A musical immersion into the most exciting avant-garde dance style of the past century. Created in Japan in the 1960s by Tatsumi Hijikata, butō is the "dance of the obscure body". It broke with the traditions of classical Noh and Kabuki Theater, which, at the time, seemed outdated in the national context. Nourished by a European artistic avant-garde, butō stands out as a mirror of the socio-political turmoil of a post-World War II Japan. One Butoh resonates as a perfect acoustic introduction to this subversive art and propels the listener deep into his own soul.

Fuji-Yuki is a Japanese vocalist who uses her voice like an instrument. With special vocal techniques, glossolalia and electronic pedals, she creates a wide variety of sounds. Inspired by the spirits of Buddhism and Shintoism, she creatively transforms her vocals into an ambient drone or prayers resonating in a church-like space. Her live performances are always different, depending on the place and space they take place in. She is also known as the vocalist of the experimental band Sarry.

Aspidistrafly, the Singaporean duo comprising April Lee and producer Ricks Ang, return with Altar of Dreams, their first studio album in a decade.

While their last album A Little Fable introduced the world to their bucolic and wispy brand of folk songwriting, Altar of Dreams sees the duo – also the founders of Kitchen. Label – harness their experiences over the past decade to create a wholly new and inspired vision. In this new and third album, they drew upon a rich palette of shapes, sounds and movement: straddling between the visionary photography of Serge Lutens and Dora Maar, 80s Japanese ambient pop, musique concrète and the mournful strings of Béla Bartók.

The world in which Aspidistrafly once inhabited was foggy and awash in faded memory. A feeling of being suspended in time felt inescapable with each listen. In Altar of Dreams, the fog is clearing up. At nine songs under 35 minutes, the album possesses all the defining hallmarks of Aspidistrafly – poetic lyricism, cosmic introspection, lush strings, surrealism, tenderness and texture. But what was once seemingly inscrutable has now been explored with astounding clarity, the duo maneuvering through a space-time continuum with delicate leaps.

‘How To Find A Marblewing’, the opening track, is a heady sound collage of early internet sounds, film, anime, and chopped-and-screwed 90s J-pop. It’s a presence deeply embedded throughout the record, a method Lee describes as “a form of environmental/tape treatment”.

The compositions glimmer with sincerity, addressing all at once destruction, mystery, uncertainty, hopes and dreams. The resulting music is backed by an opulence only possible with a line-up of guest musicians. ‘The Voice of Flowers’ is stirring in its balance of flute, clarinet, tenor saxophone and piano, bolstered by a string quartet. Kitchen. Label artist haruka nakamura features on the track alongside Kyo Ichinose (who arranged the strings for the album) and wind instrumentalist Araki Shin.

‘Interlude: Chrysalises and Larvae’ takes the heavy path downward, adopting its name from the 1973 surrealist odyssey The Hourglass Sanatorium. It leads into ‘Companion to Owls’, a gothic pop paean to mortality inspired by the Book of Job.

Before the namesake centrepiece of the album, another interlude arrives in ‘A Ceremonial Ode’, both of which were stirred by a series of regal Shiseido ads from the 1980s starring model Sayoko Yamaguchi. ‘Altar of Dreams’ is haunted by the lucid dreams that once provided escapism for Lee. Its tranquility belies a simmering tension, just as how a lucid dream would offer control in the face of the unknown. “In one of them, I was floating in a vast darkness safe and secure, and then I fell into a turbulent mirage where I willingly allowed myself to be swept away further and further from reality, hoping that I would never wake up,” she says. “Needless to say I did, and ended up writing this song on one of these dead nights.”

If the title track replicates the feeling of falling deep into that spiral, ‘Silk and Satins’ is a direct analysis of the phenomenon. Warped frequencies collide with nature and television sound effects – the latter sourced from 80s Singaporean horror series Mystery – within an inter-dimensional music world. The track was made with featured artist Sugai KEN, whose own work is an endless scroll of intoxicating found sounds.

‘Quintessence’, the sweeping closing track, distills all the elements scattered across the album into a coda that beautifully refuses to resolve. At first an exercise in guitar looping, the song was then written without a beginning and end in mind. “I’d like to think of it as poetry that’s sung,” says Lee.

In Altar of Dreams, Aspidistrafly are renewed and hopeful. They’ve emerged from a decade spent reframing the world they see through vivid dreams and memories. Now, it’s all yours to experience.

Two songs recorded in 2007 at Kadena Studio One in Kadena, Okinawa, come back alive on 7" analog vinyl after 15 years. The recording is a miraculous session produced by Makoto Kubota and is surely precious being their very first performance in Japan. “Tumai Takahashi” is often sung in a set with “Yatcya guwa” but in this recording it is performed as a stand-alone song, which makes it very rare. The coupling song “Uya nu Kukuru” is a classic piece by Teihan China, Misako Oshiro's mentor. Misako Oshiro sings with Kanako Horiuchi, her top pupil, in a relaxed and lustrous voice.

Twin Cosmos is not only the name of the musical output of fraternal twins Morihito & Yasuhito Ito, but more philosophically, an album that encapsulates, “the universe of twins”.

The pair were born 1953 in Yokkaichi, Mie Prefecture. A port city 50 kilometres west of Nagoya, famous for its chemical plants. Despite their surroundings, they grew up in an environment that fostered learning and self-expression. From an early age, they began to carve out their own paths.

Morihito was fascinated with scientific endeavours, space travel and spirituality. His father, an electrician by trade - motivated him to build his own musical equipment. This led him to attend an acoustic engineering school in Tokyo from 1972-1974, after which, Morihito returned to Yokkaichi where he worked in the instrument and audio section of a department store. This helped him keep up to date with the latest equipment, while allowing him to simultaneously work on his own musical endeavours.

Morihito’s side of the ‘Double Action’ LP is a cohesive piece, which effortlessly drifts from one song to the next through samples of flowing water and rockets launching into space ,that were recorded while visiting his brother in the States. His music is carried by flowing vocal harmonies, guitar strums, and floating synths to create an eternal dreamlike ambiance.

In contrast, Yasuhito gravitated towards philosophy and the arts and in 1976 followed his Englsih teachers’ advice and moved to the ‘foreign world’ of the United States. It’s here that he further explored his interests in Christianity, sadomasochism and poetry. He was exposed to artists like John Cage and Sun Ra, as well as a variety of ‘Do It Yourself’ recording techniques that enabled him to record remotely.

Using samples, poetry, and an original approach to traditional folk & rock songs, he recorded his side of the LP. The outcome being provocative, dark and confronting realisations, which solely used English lyrics to represent his experiences in the ‘Western world’. In 1980, Yasuhito was wooed back to Japan by his brother and the prospect of a combined record release.

The self-released album ‘Double Action’, was completed at Victor studios in Japan. Without a distribution network, the release was sold mostly to family and friends and fell into obscurity. Despite not reaching commercial success, the pair have continued to make music over the past four decades, crediting it as their driving force in life. This 2022 release includes an insert with archival images & liner notes in both English & Japanese.

“Madam the Whisper” is the lead single lifted from Ide Kensuke’s second album Contact From Exne Kedy And The Poltergeists. It is paired with “Landline Boogie” on this new limited edition 7” inch release on P-vine records.

Fans of the melody-driven snarl of Shintaro Sakamoto records and the Japanese folk-rock traditions of Happy End will surely find much to like in the crunching leads of “Madam the Whisper”. Always shape-shifting to avoid being boxed into a sound, the opposing tension in the guitars of “Landline Boogie” finds Ide’s reaching for the falsetto, and his catchy multi-layered vocals draw pleasing comparisons to of Montreal and Ezra Furman.

Following the »Minna Miteru« compilation, released in 2020, Morr Music announces a sequel, dedicated to Japanese indie music, overflowing with surprises and welcome discoveries. Like its predecessor, »Minna Miteru 2« is compiled by Saya of Tenniscoats, with the support of Markus Acher (The Notwist). It’s also another part of the Minna Miteru universe, alongside retrospective albums by The Andersens (»There Is A Sound«, 2020) and yumbo (»The Fruit Of Errata«, 2021). Taken together, these albums suggest a scene in rude health, sharing a unique vibration. If its predecessor circled around Tenniscoats and their close friends, the second volume, though featuring a collaboration between Tenniscoats and Deerhoof as oneone, reaches far further afield, drawing from music old and new, far and wide. Consistent across »Minna Miteru 2« is a sense of wonder and a cheerful unpredictability: you never quite know what you’ll hear next. There are some gorgeous indie pop songs here, like Yuko Kono’s »Ginger« or HOSE’s »Baseball«, but there are other sounds too, like Kariu Kenji’s blue-hued electro-pop, or the wheezing pipe-organ ambient of Fuji||||||||||ta: »Minna Miteru 2« hints at new kinds of beauty. Some of the more widely known names here contribute typically gorgeous melodies – Kama Aina’s »Wedding Song«, from 2005’s »Hawaii Hawaii« CD, is a reflective tune that combines a country-ish lilt with hints of slack-key guitar. Shugo Tokumaru’s »5 A.M.« is a delirious psychedelic pop mantra, drawn from his excellent 2005 album, »L.S.T.«. Many of the revelations, though, come from artists and groups relatively unknown outside Japan. The lovely, disorienting glitch-folk of Wasurerogusa features Aki Tsuyuko, perhaps best known for her albums on Thrill Jockey and Jim O’Rourke’s Moikai label, collaborating with psych-folk legends Eddie Marcon. There’s also the delightful synth-pop of Jonathan Conditioner; the electronic dreamscape of Chaplin, whose opening »Out Cont« runs along several parallel paths at once; the twinkling, acoustic jangle at the heart of mmm’s luscious »Blue«; and a curious collection of miniatures, from acts like tenshinkun, Daisuke Tanabe and Nnmie, that embrace a childlike curiosity, essaying a kind of toytown pop-tronica. The twenty-six songs on »Minna Miteru 2« repeatedly catch you unawares, upending your expectations and signaling both the breadth and depth of the Japanese indie underground. It’s a compilation of play and pleasure, but also of bold experiment smuggled into the everyday through pop music’s welcoming moods, magically creating a new world for the listener, spun out of the air and woven in between your ears.

“I went mourning without the sun; I am a companion to owls.”

In the autumn/winter of 2010, Singapore-based April Lee and Ricks Ang of Aspidistrafly (also founders of Kitchen. Label) embarked on the recording of their second album A Little Fable in Japan in collaboration with several artists. Fascinated by the patina of time and themes of folklore, A Little Fable narrates a surrealist procession of tales, twelve compositions simmering one into the other lyrically and picturesquely. This album sees the duo returning to a warm, organic palette of closely-whispered vocals, fingerpicked guitar, string arrangements and their trademark texture-focused arrangements. Featuring guest collaborators Kyo Ichinose, Seigen Tokuzawa, haruka nakamura, Junya Yanagidaira (ironomi), honagayoko, Akira Kosemura, Janis Crunch and more.

A dusty bottom drawer of forgotten memoirs is unlocked, and the album opens with a mourning, solitary cello while a harmonium drone forebodes an oscillating motif of glockenspiel tones, or sprinkled stars if you will. In Landscape With A Fairy, a tale of loss and longing during the earliest dawn mist – the world in its daily transition – is daubed in the hues of intensified sunlight, foliage or shadows, only to be diffused and faded by time, not unlike Andrei Tarkovsky’s polaroids of the Russian countryside. April Lee’s intimate vocals and acoustic guitar gently break the silence of a cold morning, backed by graceful string flourishes arranged by Kyo Ichinose. Kitchen. Label’s very own haruka nakamura and Junya Yanagidaira (ironomi) add harmonizing colors of the guitar and piano respectively.

Tracing the mysterious migration routes of nocturnal animals, Homeward Waltz skips home along a breadcrumbed-path with ephemeral glimpses of forest sights, ornamented by violins and other curious sounds before fulminating into a amorphous guitar drone, as Seigen Tokuzawa’s improvised cello strokes drift and wander with split-second apparitions in the night sky. Sounds of wooden creaks and early morning spoon-in-coffee stirrings permeate the spontaneous atmosphere of Cocina. honagayoko’s quaint and chopped piano phrases waltz with spliced vocals and flute.

Emerging from the darkened foliage into a vast, cryptic hemisphere, the second half of the album teeters on the frailty and transitoriness of the world. A Little Fable’s voyage reaches a turning point by SEA OF Glass. Ricks Ang constructs a prolonged arpeggio of sonorous looping guitar motifs that float in and out of focus, reverberating almost like a narcotic percussion across tumultuous oceans. Now distanced and gauzy, sounds of surging waves open Countless White Moons in a misty indefiniteness, yet held together charmingly by Akira Kosemura’s luminous piano. The elusive narration in Language OF Flowers tells of a deliberate escape from the passage of time with a folkloric enchantress who wordlessly casts her spells. In Gensei, April Lee relates an unspoken anguish in her tender, wavering vibrato while Janis Crunch’s somber piano and chorus vocals loom like a harbinger of death. The last chapter Twinkling Fall, the second track to feature haruka nakamura, now shuts the drawer of secrets, dissipated monochrome colours restored once again to full bloom.

A Little Fable is available on CD and the digital format on 15th December 2011. The physical CD copy comes in a 48-page artbook edition (21 x 15cm) featuring photographs and collages by April Lee and Miu Nozaka, with styling by Rika M. Orrery, who have, from their expeditions during the making of this album, directed a dream sequence around the encompassing atmosphere of a secluded hilltop cottage, a forest hued in the splendor of autumn and distant, rocky shores.

Aspidistrafly, the Singaporean duo comprising April Lee and producer Ricks Ang, return with Altar of Dreams, their first studio album in a decade.

While their last album A Little Fable introduced the world to their bucolic and wispy brand of folk songwriting, Altar of Dreams sees the duo – also the founders of Kitchen. Label – harness their experiences over the past decade to create a wholly new and inspired vision. In this new and third album, they drew upon a rich palette of shapes, sounds and movement: straddling between the visionary photography of Serge Lutens and Dora Maar, 80s Japanese ambient pop, musique concrète and the mournful strings of Béla Bartók.

The world in which Aspidistrafly once inhabited was foggy and awash in faded memory. A feeling of being suspended in time felt inescapable with each listen. In Altar of Dreams, the fog is clearing up. At nine songs under 35 minutes, the album possesses all the defining hallmarks of Aspidistrafly – poetic lyricism, cosmic introspection, lush strings, surrealism, tenderness and texture. But what was once seemingly inscrutable has now been explored with astounding clarity, the duo maneuvering through a space-time continuum with delicate leaps.

‘How To Find A Marblewing’, the opening track, is a heady sound collage of early internet sounds, film, anime, and chopped-and-screwed 90s J-pop. It’s a presence deeply embedded throughout the record, a method Lee describes as “a form of environmental/tape treatment”.

The compositions glimmer with sincerity, addressing all at once destruction, mystery, uncertainty, hopes and dreams. The resulting music is backed by an opulence only possible with a line-up of guest musicians. ‘The Voice of Flowers’ is stirring in its balance of flute, clarinet, tenor saxophone and piano, bolstered by a string quartet. Kitchen. Label artist haruka nakamura features on the track alongside Kyo Ichinose (who arranged the strings for the album) and wind instrumentalist Araki Shin.

‘Interlude: Chrysalises and Larvae’ takes the heavy path downward, adopting its name from the 1973 surrealist odyssey The Hourglass Sanatorium. It leads into ‘Companion to Owls’, a gothic pop paean to mortality inspired by the Book of Job.

Before the namesake centrepiece of the album, another interlude arrives in ‘A Ceremonial Ode’, both of which were stirred by a series of regal Shiseido ads from the 1980s starring model Sayoko Yamaguchi. ‘Altar of Dreams’ is haunted by the lucid dreams that once provided escapism for Lee. Its tranquility belies a simmering tension, just as how a lucid dream would offer control in the face of the unknown. “In one of them, I was floating in a vast darkness safe and secure, and then I fell into a turbulent mirage where I willingly allowed myself to be swept away further and further from reality, hoping that I would never wake up,” she says. “Needless to say I did, and ended up writing this song on one of these dead nights.”

If the title track replicates the feeling of falling deep into that spiral, ‘Silk and Satins’ is a direct analysis of the phenomenon. Warped frequencies collide with nature and television sound effects – the latter sourced from 80s Singaporean horror series Mystery – within an inter-dimensional music world. The track was made with featured artist Sugai KEN, whose own work is an endless scroll of intoxicating found sounds.

‘Quintessence’, the sweeping closing track, distills all the elements scattered across the album into a coda that beautifully refuses to resolve. At first an exercise in guitar looping, the song was then written without a beginning and end in mind. “I’d like to think of it as poetry that’s sung,” says Lee.

In Altar of Dreams, Aspidistrafly are renewed and hopeful. They’ve emerged from a decade spent reframing the world they see through vivid dreams and memories. Now, it’s all yours to experience.

Aspidistrafly, the Singaporean duo comprising April Lee and producer Ricks Ang, return with Altar of Dreams, their first studio album in a decade.

While their last album A Little Fable introduced the world to their bucolic and wispy brand of folk songwriting, Altar of Dreams sees the duo – also the founders of Kitchen. Label – harness their experiences over the past decade to create a wholly new and inspired vision. In this new and third album, they drew upon a rich palette of shapes, sounds and movement: straddling between the visionary photography of Serge Lutens and Dora Maar, 80s Japanese ambient pop, musique concrète and the mournful strings of Béla Bartók.

The world in which Aspidistrafly once inhabited was foggy and awash in faded memory. A feeling of being suspended in time felt inescapable with each listen. In Altar of Dreams, the fog is clearing up. At nine songs under 35 minutes, the album possesses all the defining hallmarks of Aspidistrafly – poetic lyricism, cosmic introspection, lush strings, surrealism, tenderness and texture. But what was once seemingly inscrutable has now been explored with astounding clarity, the duo maneuvering through a space-time continuum with delicate leaps.

‘How To Find A Marblewing’, the opening track, is a heady sound collage of early internet sounds, film, anime, and chopped-and-screwed 90s J-pop. It’s a presence deeply embedded throughout the record, a method Lee describes as “a form of environmental/tape treatment”.

The compositions glimmer with sincerity, addressing all at once destruction, mystery, uncertainty, hopes and dreams. The resulting music is backed by an opulence only possible with a line-up of guest musicians. ‘The Voice of Flowers’ is stirring in its balance of flute, clarinet, tenor saxophone and piano, bolstered by a string quartet. Kitchen. Label artist haruka nakamura features on the track alongside Kyo Ichinose (who arranged the strings for the album) and wind instrumentalist Araki Shin.

‘Interlude: Chrysalises and Larvae’ takes the heavy path downward, adopting its name from the 1973 surrealist odyssey The Hourglass Sanatorium. It leads into ‘Companion to Owls’, a gothic pop paean to mortality inspired by the Book of Job.

Before the namesake centrepiece of the album, another interlude arrives in ‘A Ceremonial Ode’, both of which were stirred by a series of regal Shiseido ads from the 1980s starring model Sayoko Yamaguchi. ‘Altar of Dreams’ is haunted by the lucid dreams that once provided escapism for Lee. Its tranquility belies a simmering tension, just as how a lucid dream would offer control in the face of the unknown. “In one of them, I was floating in a vast darkness safe and secure, and then I fell into a turbulent mirage where I willingly allowed myself to be swept away further and further from reality, hoping that I would never wake up,” she says. “Needless to say I did, and ended up writing this song on one of these dead nights.”

If the title track replicates the feeling of falling deep into that spiral, ‘Silk and Satins’ is a direct analysis of the phenomenon. Warped frequencies collide with nature and television sound effects – the latter sourced from 80s Singaporean horror series Mystery – within an inter-dimensional music world. The track was made with featured artist Sugai KEN, whose own work is an endless scroll of intoxicating found sounds.

‘Quintessence’, the sweeping closing track, distills all the elements scattered across the album into a coda that beautifully refuses to resolve. At first an exercise in guitar looping, the song was then written without a beginning and end in mind. “I’d like to think of it as poetry that’s sung,” says Lee.

In Altar of Dreams, Aspidistrafly are renewed and hopeful. They’ve emerged from a decade spent reframing the world they see through vivid dreams and memories. Now, it’s all yours to experience.

Markus Acher (best known as singer of The Notwist) typically produces his own music under the name Rayon – this time, however, is a different story. Using his real name, he sends a signal re: the circumstances he recorded the music in - at home in his old apartment in Munich, in a private setting, in a time when there was hardly anything else available. Accordingly, and rather fittingly, the four songs represent a bridge to the outside world: Acher tore the doors to his balcony wide open, inviting the outside in , capturing its sound on tape: rain falling, engine noise of passing cars. And at the same time the songs pushed outward, into that sphere that remained off-limits to us for some time (“Like a plane they can go everywhere”).

The four tracks - arranged for harmonium, acoustic guitar, banjo, glockenspiel, percussion, a children's harp and vocals - were released digitally in 2021 via the Japanese independent platform Minna Kikeru, run by Saya (member of the duo Tenniscoats and Markus Acher's bandmate in Spirit Fest), among others. For two songs of «Like A Plane», Saya contributed vocal tracks as well.

Kuunatic is a thrilling Tokyo based tribal-psych trio bolstered by diverse global sonics and powerful female vocals. Drawing on the members' different musical and cultural perspectives, their music explores ritual drumming, pulsing bass lines, atmospheric keyboard sounds and Japanese traditional instruments. "Gate of Klüna" is Kuunatic's much awaited debut album. Produced by Tim DeWit (Gang Gang Dance) the record reveals a mesmerizing soundworld that transcends genres and hemispheres and succeeds in being both boldly experimental and wildly catchy.

Neil Young’s extensive tour with Crazy Horse in 1976 comes after the release of On The Beach in 1974 and two albums, Tonight’s The Night and Zuma, the following year. The first live appearances with the new Crazy Horse with Frank (Poncho) Sampedro replacing the deceased Dan Whitten consist of four shows in ten days in little clubs and bars in northern California, dubbed the “Rolling Zuma Revue.” An extensive world tour was booked, called “The Year Of The Horse,” beginning on March 3rd, 1976 in Nagoya. This was Young’s first visit to Japan and he played seven shows in Nagoya, Osaka, Fukuoka, and Tokyo.

On Maza Gusu, Mikado Koko transforms into Mother Goose, hissing Perrault's fairy tales from her native tongue in your ears. Her unsettling, regressive voice is backed up by a subtle and chilling electronic soundscape sprinkled with traditional Japanese instruments, creating a realm of sound that feels both weirdly familiar and deeply unknown. Mother Koko hurls you deep down the rabbit hole, back to your darkest childhood anguishes, before gently leading you by the hand to a joyful catharsis. As you slowly get used to its disturbing familiarity, Koko’s music feels like waking up in the pale morning light, shaky but relieved after a feverish dream.

In summer 2017 Mikado Koko started her solo career as a club music producer with the elements of Japanese traditional music. After many releases, remixes and compilations such as Seitō: In the Beginning, Woman Was the Sun (aku1016), she now focuses on avant-garde poetry reading related to feminism and gender equality.

Tokyo based multi-instrumentalist / singer "Kantaro Ihara'', his music are mainly based on 70's ~ 80's Soul/pops/aor and there are some reputation that he could be new generations of Tatsuro Yamashita, P-vine is confident it is NOT hype. This 7 inch is cutted from his 1st full length "C" which has been released as a digital track so this is the first physical release from him. For fans of Japanese Pops, city pops, AOR etc...

Japanese import

Musicians and gaming nerds Gaijin Blues (Naphta and Playstation Yoga Music) continue to leave their controllers aside and pay respects to the greatest video games ever made...but this time they're going one step further into the adventure..with a full-length 8 track concept LP.
Inspired by Japanese Role Playing Games and a love of all things Super Nintendo and of course Japanese pop culture, Gaijin Blues brought you their debut EP in early 2019. After touring in the Far East and some serious hours playing games such as Dragon Quest V, Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI, VII and IX, the Shin Megami Tensei series and Phantasy Star IV, the boys concocted an EP of samples, live instrumentation and programming as a love note that you'd never find inside a game box...until now.
Gaijin Blues II takes you a step further. With this LP the guys have created their own fictional JRPG and then devised an end to end narrative with the music weaved around it all. You can buy the disk but what you don't get is a controller...you'll need to use your ears instead.
In the words of the creators themselves: "This is a sequel to a story you've never experienced. You are the protagonist who is coming back home to see his world completely changed by seemingly harmless technology. Each track is a chapter in this tale. Collect the items, gather a party and use your wit and imagination to find out the truth. Because technology usually comes at a price…"
This about as conceptual as it gets: where a brand new story matched with an audio narrative meet together in a fictional world. In terms of electronic music that doesn't happen often. Gaijin Blues II is a truly unique record whether you've ever owned a console or not.

Comes in large format duo-case with 60 page booklet. Osharaku is a traditional Japanese form of musical entertainment, featuring mainly voice, shamisen and percussion, with a repertoire of folk and popular songs, performed by farmers and fishermen for local audiences. This compilation, 28 tracks compiled by Riyo Mountains, is the fourth release in the EM Records/Riyo Mountains Japanese folk series. These recordings feature legendary Osharaku masters, recorded in their homes, brilliantly capturing the casual warmth and vitality characteristic of the style. Osharaku is unique in its use of shamisen, originally an “uptown” urban instrument, in a “downtown” non-urban setting. These joyous tracks, all recorded in the 1960s and 70s, are available as a 2CD set or a single 12” vinyl LP, with English translations and rare photos. Cover art by Shinsuke Takagi (Soi48).

Riyo Mountains are a Japanese folk song research team formed by Mood Yama and Takumi Saito. They are resident DJs at the renowned party "Soi48" at Be-Wave, Tokyo, featuring music from all over the world. They produced the Japanese folk song mix-CD series entitled "Riyo Mountains Mix" and also direct the reissue series of Japanese folk music on EM Records, including the releases "Yumi-kagura", "Sakai Ishinage Odori”, and "Kizaki Ondo”. Riyo Mountains have appeared as DJs at many events/programs including NTS (London) and Japanese Bon-Odori traditional dance festivals. Their articles about Japanese folk music are now published serially in the Japanese web magazine “boid".

“Kizaki Ondo” is a folk song from Nitta Kizaki town in Gunma, north of Tokyo. Played annually by local performers at the Bon-Odori traditional summer dance festival, it features unabashed lyrics about prostitution along with a rhythmic drive sure to appeal to fans of contemporary electronic genres as well as aficionados of traditional musics. The first track is a wildly echoing vocal version recorded in 1980, redolent of humid summer nights; the second track, recorded in 1981, is an instrumental version, both by the Kizaki Ondo Preservation Society. The other two tracks are extensions of tradition, with Tokyo-based producer Clark Naito’s 2018 revisions of “Kizaki Ondo”, providing trap-inspired interpretations, with a vocal version using the original lyrics, along with a sweet instrumental take. This release, the third edition of the EM Records Japanese folklore series, directed by Riyo Mountains, is available on LP & CD, with English lyrics and notes, and rare photos. Evocative cover art by Shinsuke Takagi (Soi48).

O YAMA O explores a certain domestic and democratic quality of everyday life, born through associations to folk music of Japan and a folding of myth, tradition, and routine; the non-spectacular and the sublime.

Formed of musician and artist Rie Nakajima and Cafe OTO co-founder Keiko Yamamoto, the group has performed since 2014 at venues and festivals such as noshowspace, Ikon Gallery, Wysing Arts Centre, Supernormal, Borealis Festival, Mayhem, and allEars Festival.

Nakajima’s performance often focuses on the use of found and kinetic objects, using modest items such as rice bowls, toys, clockwork, balloons and small motors as instruments to create a “micro orchestra”. Elements are layered into impressive and immersive atmospheres. Yamamoto alternatively floats and charges through this with body and voice; chanting, incanting, thundering, whispering, stamping on the floor.

Their debut album consolidates their musical conversations into keenly paced studio music, the duo working with additional instrumentation and a resolved focus on melody to provide vivid portraits of folkloric Japan in song.

They move between pop and the philosophical, defined by the overall space afforded to texture and movement. In small, delicate sound an intimate musical climate is established that reflects on life, telling stories of improvised clockwork, whispered dreams, small movements of the hand and the rhythm to be found in the shuffle of a deck of cards.
Grandly theatric and dramatic flourishes add solidity to these illustrations, operas driven by the swooping energy and power of Yamamoto’s voice can be playful or emotionally charged, particularly when the duo arrange themselves in ensemble with violinist Billy Steiger and percussionist Marie Roux. Production by David Cunningham creates the shadowy presence of a leftfield Flying Lizards dubwise depth that adds subtle strangeness to the atmosphere. The result is something raw, full-bodied; full of energy, grace and mystery.

* The long-awaited reissue with the first remastered sound source on vinyl * Contains 11 songs including 'Night Shade (Gong Cake mix)' which is only on vinyl * A long-awaited reissue album in which Makoto Kubota's first remastering tracks was cut by Toru Kotetsu, one of the Japanese leading cutting engineers

Original japanese pressing with OBI and insert! Cover with slight wear and yellowing!

Japanese promo copy. With insert.

A dreamlike dispatch from mid-80s Japan, the first and only Hallelujahs album is an entrancing and gentle work of psychedelic pop brilliance. In a series of informal studio sessions between 1985 and 1986, Shinji Shibayama (Nagisa Ni Te) gathered a group of friends, emerging luminaries from the burgeoning Kansai underground rock scene including Naoki Zushi (Hijokaidan, Spiral Stairs / 螺旋階段), Ken Ichi "Idiot" Takayama (Idiot O'Clock), and Chie Mukai (Ché-SHIZU ) to form what would become known as Hallelujahs. The result was a music of deep feeling and wonderment created through simple song craft and imbued with a sort of guileless magic. Their sole album presented a set of unvarnished songs, filled with vulnerable, intimate moments, caught on reel to reel, most often in single takes never to be repeated. The album was self-released in 1986 in a micro-edition of 300 copies. It was the first record by Shibayama's now revered ORG Records which would go on to introduce the world to the likes of Maher Shalal Hash Baz , Reiko Kudo as well as his own group, Nagisa Ni Te. With affinities to the sounds of the Rough Trade and Flying Nun labels, the Paisley Underground and Galaxie 500, the Hallelujahs' Eat Meat, Swear an Oath is an utterly unique masterpiece that remains a touchstone for generations of like spirited artists in Japan and around the world. Black Editions is proud to present this all-time classic in a deluxe vinyl edition, remastered from the original tapes and presented in a heavy tip-on jacket with textured paper, mounted high quality print, foil stamped finishes and spot colors. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI.

Japanese pressing without OBI but with insert! Cover with slight wear and yellowing!

Japanese pressing without OBI, with insert.

Japanese pressing with insert and OBI

Japanese pressing. OBI is missing.

Vinyl is close to NM. Japanese pressing. OBI is missing.

Japanese pressing without OBI, with insert. Copy close to VG+

Japanese pressing without OBI, with insert. Vinyl with foxing and marks. Cover close to VG+

Cover with OBI has tiny wear. With insert. Japanese pressing. slight stains on cover

The first Be With foray into the archives of revered German library institution Selected Sound is one of our favourites on the label - the super in-demand Japan from Victor Cavini, originally released in 1983. Rare and sought-after for many years now, this is one of those cult library LPs that never turn up. With Daibutsu the giant Buddha of Kamakura’s presence gracing the hefty front cover, this is a record bursting with dope samples for adventurous producers: it’s koto-funk madness! Victor Cavini was the library music pseudonym of prolific German composer and musician Gerhard Trede. He was known for exploring instruments and styles from around the world (he played over 50 different instruments himself) and Japan is his collection of 14 musical sketches painted with traditional Japanese wind and string instruments. These are the sounds of traditional Japanese folk music re-interpreted through Western ears, with the occassional contemporary twist.