Monthly Archives: December 2025

Andrew Chalk + Coleclough + Hitoshi Kojo CD book

Minazuki (Andrew Chalk + Jonathan Coleclough + Hitoshi Kojo) CD + book (16 x 22 cm) From dust to stars – Omninemento

From Dust to Stars centres on a shared time of music-making in June 2006 at Andrew Chalk’s studio in Hull, northern England—a time that later formed the core of a work shaped over the ensuing years through Kojo’s editing.
In Chalk’s wooden studio—its atmosphere shaped by soft humidity and gentle resonance—the three musicians let the music emerge at the pace of their breathing. What unfolded shared qualities with none of their solo works, yet carried traces of each: Chalk’s strings carried a warm wavering that embraced the resonance of the wood; Coleclough subtly altered the density of the air; Kojo, centring his interplay with Chalk’s strings, folded in overtones and found-object sounds that responded to the flow of the session.

British and Japanese sensibilities surface in equal measure. Pieces shaped by an East Asian sense of time-interval contain a wavering that could not have arisen from British musicians alone, while sustained tones conveying the subtle blending of grey skies and light carry a colouration distinct from Japanese performers. When melodies appear, the two elements blend into an unplaceable, mythical folk music.

Each track bears a name associated with rain—echoing the nuanced vocabularies that both Japan and northern England possess for describing rainfall. Through additional recording in Switzerland (2009) and final editing and mastering in Belgium (2025) by Kojo, the influences of three places and many years are gently interwoven into the music.

From the twenty images included in the photobook, eight were selected and printed by Kojo,
using hand-applied sensitiser, exposure, bleaching, and catechin toning.

Ltd to 100

25€

Mitsuhisa Sakaguchi LP

Mitsuhisa Sakaguchi : sensitive – An’archives

LP ltd to 300, black vinyl, 2 color silkscreened jacket with obi (Dark green, dark red & green)

Printed by Alan Sherry

Release date : Dec 12th, 2025

Notes by Jon Dale

Digital on Sakaguchi Bandcamp : https://enjyaqu.bandcamp.com/

You can stream one track there : https://soundcloud.com/user-250085008/metatoxic

An’archives is proud to present [sensitive], a new album, and the first solo vinyl release, by Japanese keyboardist and synth player, Mitsuhisa Sakaguchi. A deftly assembled suite of glistening electronic tonalities, [sensitive] is the latest in a lengthy run of excellent, idiosyncratic albums by Sakaguchi. A low-key yet productive artist, Sakaguchi has released banks of solo titles via his own Bandcamp page, and is also an in-demand improvisor for electronics: see, for example, recent collaborations with Yoshiki Ichihara (TO(R)RI INFRANTA, Ftarri, 2025), Tatsuhisa Yamamoto (non equal mad, self-released, 2020), and the [-] trio with Yamamoto and Uchihashi Kazuhisa (self-titled, Modern Obscure, 2023).

[sensitive] is a startling album for many reasons, not least its rich attention to detail. Sakaguchi’s ear is sensitized to the complexity of electronic sonority, something he’s developed through decades of performance and improvisation, though he’s not limited to that language. “I mainly use multiple synthesizers and process the sounds with effects,” he clarifies, detailing his approach to his music. “I also use a lot of acoustic sounds such as field recordings and percussion; sometimes I also use sounds such as prepared piano.”

Indeed, you can hear this see-sawing balance between the electronic and acoustic written across [sensitive] – see the activated cymbals that twist and stutter through the first half of “metatoxic”, which are soon replaced by a similar stream of burbling synth-flow. The opening “sensitive rot” folds field recordings into Sakaguchi’s electronic kit to such a degree that the differing forms dissolve into each other; on “green shrine”, the field recordings are more present, yet still poetically framed, taken as they are “from the mountains of my hometown, Yawata City, Kyoto,” Sakaguchi explains.

The tender balance achieved by Sakaguchi as he moves between practices, tonalities and temporalities helps manifest the guiding conceptual force behind [sensitive], where Sakaguchi explores a cleansing reverie. “What I wanted to portray with this album was to create an album of sounds that shattered and reassembled my current ‘sense’ and ‘toxins’,” he nods, “along with the ‘nature’ around me. Electronic sounds, our bodies, the environment around us, and nature all blend.”

From there, Sakaguchi attempts a transformation, or transmutation – an alchemical process of exchange. “I am attempting to explore whether it might be possible for the sounds to come closer to each other,” he concludes, “or perhaps even to interchange places.” On the five pieces that comprise [sensitive], you can hear this fusing and exchange. Inhabiting similar spaces as the music of Nuno Canavarro, Asmus Tietchens, Omit, and other like-minded visionaries, [sensitive] traverses curious, quixotic terrain between electronic composition, electro-acoustics, and improvisation.

25€

Taj Mahal Travellers CD

Taj Mahal Travellers CD July15, 1972 – Showboat

Formed in 1969 by “six meta-music creators & one electronic engineer”, this group leaded by Takehisa Kosugi created stunning cosmic music which was always entirely improvised.

What a great and still stunning album, time flies as I’ve been playing this one for almost 3 decades.

Only a few copies available, comes in a nice and heavy gatefold paperjacket

25€