Japan'archives mailorderDoronco Gumo CS “Man Star” Selection Rec
Excellent ltd cassetten sometiems sounds abit like MSHB with
Colin Molter : Trumpet & Vocal
Doronco : Bass & Vocal
HIiragi Fukuda Guitar & Vocal
Mako Hasegawa : Drums
Reina Higa : Melodica & Vocal
Itsuki Suizu : Melodica & Vocal
Hainezumi Nishimiya : Banjo & Vocal
Osamu Karita : Cowbell & Scream
$10
Toshiro Mayuzumi 7 inch EP “Only on Mondays ost ” Super Fuji
The movie Japanese title is “GETSUYOBI-NO YUKA” , released in 1964,
directed by Koh Nakahira with Mariko Kaga actress. She was and still is a very famous actress in Japan but what hardly anyone knows is that while she was still a young nymphet when she recorded her only album in 1971 when she was 28 years old.
$18
Keitaro Miho 7 inch EP “La Cloche ost” Super Fuji
The movie Japanese title is “KANE 鐘” 1966, directed by Yukio Aoshima.
Cannes Film Festival awarded in 1967
Music by Keitaro Miho, a renowned musician also famlous as a car racer, his influences are a mix of scatting, Bossa Nova & the theme sounds a bit like like Nino Rota.
only a few $18
Andrew Chalk & Jean Noël Rebilly LP “L’état Intermédiaire” Faraway press
only a few copies available, even better if you can order directly from Faraway Press
18 €
Tetuzi Akiyama – Michel Henritzi LP (1 sided) “Broken Blues” Rekem
Reissue of an ultra-limited cdr that popped out quietly on absurd in 2007, this record finds Tetuzi Akiyama and Michel Henritzi joining strengths for a singular set of guitar music recorded at the Alchemy Music Store in Osaka.Captured during the heyday of stylised and pensive improvisation, the music here breaks protocol by avoiding some of the more polite mannerisms of the genre. What starts as a coarse yet beautiful duet of sparse melodic fragments, soon brings into fold the systematic undoing of the bodies of the two guitars themselves. Putting drills, hammers, nails, screws and saws into good use, and with maximum amplification, the two artists manage to bridge the distance between the freely atonal sketches of post-Derek Bailey guitar music and the Fluxus tradition of more overtly disruptive actions. In the process, they craft a singular work that, through raw tactile means, channels some of the violence and expressiveness that runs deep throughout the long tradition of guitar music.
Edition of 192 hand-stamped numbered copies
Only a few $ 15
Masao Yagi EP 7inch 33 rpm “Bad Girl, Yoko” Super Fuju Discs
A marvelous jazz session from 1966 :
Sadao Watanabe, Terumasa Hino, Masahiko Togashi, Masanaga
Harada, Masao Yagi, Hozan Yamamoto
Alto Sax:Sadao Watanabe
Trumpet:Terumasa Hino
Bass:Masanaga Harada
Drum:Masahiko Togashi
Piano:Masao Yagi
Bamboo Flute:Hozan Yamamoto
$19
Terumasa Hino Quintet CD “OST Hakucho No Sugeki” Super Fuji
$19
Strobe Talbot LP “Funland” Moone Records
second edition, opaque blue vinyl featuring morphing hologram, comes in a silscreened jacket
Stunning edition for a lovely album, this is not japanese but we both love the album and people behind this label.
“Strobe Talbot started as it is now—a trio of Jad Fair, Mick Hobbs, and Benb Gallaher. They were younger in the past (this is typical), but their interpersonal and musical chemistry is very much the same as it was when at their outset. Generally, Benb gambols atop and plotzes upon the drums, Mick enjoys oblique and uniquely appealing rapport with all ilk of spronging stringed things, and Jad issues de facto proclamations with winsome verve from atop the plinth thereby provided. “
$30 only a few
East Bionic Symphonia 2 LP “Improvisation 1976” Cyclope
Second LP is one sided
Packaged as two separate albums each with a silk screened die-cut cover.
Labels are silk screened on one side and handwritten & numbered on reverse. ltd to 200
During the mid-1970s, a group of art students at the Bigakko school in Tokyo, working under Takehisa Kosugi, the renowned Fluxus composer, violinist, and member of Group Ongaku and The Taj-Mahal Travellers, came together as the free improvisation collective East Bionic Symphonia. They recorded a single album – their graduation project, released in 1976 under the title Recorded Live, before going their separate ways. While largely overlooked at the time, it now stands as one of the great artifacts of the Japanese sonic avant-garde, in part because of its remarkable sounds and influence, and in part because of the later significance of the voices within. The collective reformed during the 1980’s under the moniker Marginal Consort – playing and recording extensively, but until now, it has been widely accepted that Recorded Live was the only existing document of their early efforts. We are thrilled to announce a release of further recordings, made during the months following the creation of their long heralded LP.
The East Bionic Symphonia is a founding cornerstone of the Japanese movements of Noise and improvised music. The seed the ensemble helped plant, cut a path through the years to follow – its influence stretching across the globe. They were singular – seeming to effortlessly break every rule in the book,eradicating signifier and association, blending electronic and acoustic sound, in ways that few had. They demand little need for comparison or cross reference. Had its members done nothing since, their contribution to history would still be significant. Some – Hiroshi Shii, Kaoru Okabe, Masaharu Minegishi, Tatuo Hattori, and Tomonao Koshikawa, are little known beyond their work within the ensemble and Marginal Consort. Others went on to make deep and diverse contributions to the landscape of avant-garde and experimental sound. Chie Mukai and Masami Tada have both become legendary for their solo work, the guitarist Kazuo Imai is widely celebrated for his unparalleled approach as an improviser, as well as for his work with Barre Phillips, Arthur Doyle, Han Bennink, and countless others. Yasushi Ozawa is equally noted for his work as the bassist in Keiji Haino’s Fushitsusha project.
SOLD OUT
Timo Van Luijk – Kris Vanderstraeten LP “Arrêt au Lac Chimère” La Scie Dorée
Lac Chimère is a lake in Mensono, where many unknown and untouched sound creatures reside. They sometimes form musical gatherings in which their sounds float in ether. This album consists of field recordings captured at the very moment while making an accidental stop at the lake.
Edition of 300 copies, white vinyl
$19
Timo Van Luijk – Frederik Croene LP “Fortune de Mer” La Scie Dorée
In 9 sequences ‘Fortune de Mer’ describes the power and beauty of dramatic fate, the irreversible. Like a clause of force majeure, an unforeseen one way trip to the desperate bottom. After losing the long battle nothing is left, only acceptance and resignation.
Edition of 300 copies, Cover image by Victor Hugo
$19
Timo Van Luijk & Mark Harwood LP “Vang Cicular” Penultimate Press
Vang Circular is the first outing from Timo van Luijk (La Scie Dorée / Af Ursin, Elodie) and Mark Harwood (Penultimate Press / Astor). Employing vibes, mellotron, natural reader, an iron ant, synth, metal pipes, slide guitar and a double bass these audacious souls conjure a wonky musical vision that gently peels away the familiar. The results are a surprising synthesis of the two individuals somewhat oppositional agendas. From the farthest reaches of the galaxy to the highest celestial plane the core of this haunted and bewitching release exists as a spectre at the edge of time.
Recorded over a weekend at Kulta Saha studio, Belgium in the summer of 2017 Vang Circular lands in a reverse board sleeve in an edition of 273 copies.
$20
handmade mini LP style gatefold package with an insert. Letterpress and debossed imagery on a heavy card sleeve. Don’t forget they are all handmade, one by one
$18
Andrew Chalk LP ‘The River That Flows Into The Sands” Faraway Press
(originally released in 2005).
Heavyweight card sleeve with tipped-on images in an exact facsimilie of the original CD package.Every copy features unique and original monotype artwork-printed by hand at Faraway Press. No two copies are alike. 180 g clear vinyl with full-colour labels.
Limited edition of 300 copies only
Terumasa Hino Quintet 7 inch 33rpm “Snake Hip Extented Play” Super Fuji
The original version of “Snake Hip” popular as the highest peak of jazz funk and jazz rock in Japan . This is the soundtrack of the 1970 movie “Hakuchu no Syugeki”.
Performed by Terumasa Hino Quintet
Terumasa Hino : trumpet (A fine trumpeter influenced by Freddie Hubbard and Miles Davis, Terumasa Hino has long been considered as one of the best Japanese jazz musician.
Takeru Muraoka : tenor sax
Hiromasa Suzuki : el-piano
Kunimitsu Inaba : bass
Motohiko Hino : drums
$19
Style To kill EP 7 inch 33 rpm OST Super Fuji
Branded to Kill is a 1967 Japanese yakuza film directed by Seijun Suzuki and starring Joe Shishido, Koji Nanbara and Annu Mari.
This soundtrack composed by Naozumi Yamamoto (he was also a conductor and a long time collabor of Suzuki) has unique and bold sounds like harpsichord and harmonica, as well as accordion and viola.
Vocal : Atsushi Yamatoya
Music : Naozumi Yamamoto (1932-2002)
$19
Kawaguchi Masami | Toshimitsu Akiko
情趣演歌 [Enka Mood Collection ]
Split 10 inch LP ltd to 250, comes in a silkscreened gatefold jacket with obi (blue, pink, brick red) insert + postcards…
Liner notes by Alan Cummings
Silk-screening by Alan Sherry
4th volume in the enka series, we’re happy to announce the release of this new one :
a split with 2 longtime friends and music associates since the late 1990’s.
Masami Kawaguchi has been an influential figure in the Japanese underground scene for 2 decades, playing with bands such Miminokoto, Broomdusters, Los Doroncos and more recently with his New Rock Syndicate. He’s also known as a major & regular Keiji Haino’s collaborator in Aihiyo and more recently in Hardy Soul. He’s one of the greats of modern Japanese psychedelic rock and more recently he recorded the beautiful “The mad guitar sings” album on Black Petal which is a dark solo take on Masami’s signature sound, balancing between late night-early morning comedown blues and black luminescent storm-song. On this release Masami covers 2 different songs, delivering a personal & bleak version of a great enka standard (if not the prototype of the enka song) and a fiery cover of a weird and rather unknown song.
Toshimitsu Akiko is better known under her maiden name of Terashima Akiko and she led a band called Doodles for more than 15 years. She and Kawaguchi Masami teamed up together for a short time as Homemade and after releasing a cassette, the first Doodles CDR was released on Masami’s Purifiva imprint and later a CD on Alchemy records. Doodles played plodding, haunted psych-rock, with storms of guitar distortion hovering on the horizon, and sweet, sad vocals quivering deeply soul-ward. More recently she mostly plays music as a duo named Aminome that could be heard as a Doodles follow up with slightly rounded corners.
On this release Akiko plays guitar, drums & accordion, covers these enka songs with her timeless & forlorn voice, picking up any human with a heart.
Release date : September 20
Price : 17 euros or $20
Including airmail :
France : 20€ en lettre (colissimo suivi + 2€)
Europe : 24€ with airmail or $29
Rest of the world : 26€ or $31
Phew LP “voice Hardcore” Mesh Key
Limited vinyl edition with beautiful, silver foil stamped covers and double-sided, full color inserts. Comes with mp3 download card.
Living legend Phew follows up her brilliant Light Sleep album with another masterwork – Voice Hardcore – comprised entirely of her iconic, instantly recognizable voice, twisted, folded and layered over six mesmerizing tracks.
“A woozy, opiate-soaked stumble into a sparse dreamworld” – The Wire Magazine
$22
Chie Mukai + Justin Simon LP 45 rpm single sided ” 日 月” Mesh-Key
Limited edition of 300 copies. Each record comes folded inside thick Italian pastel paper, and each copy has been individually hand-decorated with a design in sumi ink by Simon. The jackets and two-sided inserts were silkscreened at The Circadian Press.
Composer and musician, best known for her underground improv-folk group Ché-SHIZU (PSF). Mukai has been an active improvisersince 1975, when she joined the East Bionic Symphonia group under Takehisa Kosugi in Tokyo. She has since collaborated with Keiji Haino, John Duncan, Agata Morio and many others. Her primary instrument is the bowed Chinese er-hu, but she also plays piano and percussion. Lovely, poetic, far too short but essential.
$22
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