V/A Tokyo Flashback 6 (PSF) cd 17.98
The venerable compilation series devoted to sampling the dark and demented delights of the Tokyo psychedelic underground returns! While the previous Tokyo Flashback number five (from 2005) included both quite a few veteran artists (Keiji Haino, Marble Sheep, Overhang Party, Kyoaku No Intention, White Out) as well as several hitherto unknown to us up-and-comers (Aural Fit, Hisato Higuchi, Suishou No Fune, etc.), this installment has only one or two acts among the dozen featured that we'd heard of before, so it's arguably all the more underground. Certainly the discerning folks at PSF must have done the rounds of the more obscure practice spaces and performance venues of Tokyo to find all these bands (or endured a lot of cd-r demo submissions).
First up is the quartet Ahousen, who, with dramatic vocals and agitated saxophone, sound something like a like a freaked out Maher Shalal Hash Baz. Next, things get a bit calmer and prettier with the accordion and trombone laced "The World Of Mirror" by Hanaoyouni, a outfit who like Ahousen have female vocals but use them in a more melodious fashion. Then, someone named Onna does the melancholic guitar/voice folk troubadour thing in the vein of Kan Mikami. That's followed by the spooky-but-lovely droning instrumental soundscape of the mysterious Yamashirube, entitled "Under Young Moon.Lost.". The next piece comes from a duo called S.A.R.O.D. (Safeness Audio Resource Of Dominant), featuring one of the guys from Aural Fit doing some heavy-duty "tone bending" alongside a drummer, and if you've heard Aural Fit, that we're telling you that is noisy, loud and grinding will be no surprise. Following that, there's a group called Retolt Mandala, who play a loose, skittering, abstract sort of psych-improv, and are a lot quieter than the S.A.R.O.D. guys. Next, the raggedly distorted guitar/guitar/drums trio Ainotamenishis lets loose with "Bad Dreams" and we can immediately hear the reason why they have an LP due out later this year on the Holy Mountain label, as they give us a Tokyo Flashback flashback. That brings us to something completely different: the plucking, squeaking, neo no wave of The Kinky Pigeon, who ask us to "EAT SHIT!!" as politely and artily as they can. Back into the more expected Flashback zone, the mellow (but for some serious bursts of distortion) sixties-ish psych-rock of the trio Yakouchu is quite nice, taking us on an extended 8 and a half minute trip... Ogikubo Connection are next, a "free style folk duo" with the Fukuoka Rinji of Overhang Party strumming and singing in anguished fashion accompanied by alto sax of Mochizuki Harutaka, doing a cover version of a song called "Staring At Blood" by the late Kaneko Jutok of Kousokuya. Then we get this disc's perhaps most properly Rallizes-y rockin' moment, with a blast from motorpsycho guitarist Kawaguchi Masami (ex-Miminokoto) and his power trio the New Rock Syndicate, called "Oblivion". And then finally this Flashback winds up with the gorgeous, plaintive acoustic folk track "A Moonlight Night" by singer/guitarist Genshi. Wow. Something here for everyone (well, everyone who would consider buying a Tokyo Flashback disc that is)! We imagine we'll be hearing more from many of these artists, and looking forward to it too.
As with all Tokyo Flashbacks, we're pretty sure all the tracks are exclusive to this disc. Info/photos/web addresses and suchlike stuff is included in the cd booklet for each artist.
MPEG Stream: AINOTAMENISHIS "Bad Dreams"
MPEG Stream: YAMASHIRUBE "Under Young Moon.Lost."
MPEG Stream: YAKOUCHU "Mugen"

V/A Tokyo Flashback 7 (PSF) cd 17.98
We've been enjoying PSF's series of "Tokyo Flashback" comps for almost two decades now, going all the way back to the first one in 1991! Every couple of years the Tokyo-based label puts out a fascinating new Flashback collection, documenting the most underground and otherworldly of psych units to mysteriously materialize in our plane of existence (er, specifically Tokyo, Japan) via seemingly occult means, perhaps called forth by the eternal vibrations of ancestral acts like High Rise, Fushitsusha, Ghost and White Heaven (all of whom appeared on early Tokyo Flashback volumes).
So here now is auspicious installment number seven, and it's conceived around the concept of live psychedelic improvisation, as put into practice (and recorded for posterity) one evening at the Koenji Show Boat club in Tokyo on May 31st, 2009. There's six lengthy tracks from six obscure acts, most of 'em totally new to us (all except for drone duo Hasegawa-Shizuo, whose new Utech album we reviewed last list). These improvs range from quiet droning blissouts to sheer ear-scraping skronk. Oh, and yes indeed, there's also one solid dose of amplifier-frying psychrock jamming, 'cause no Tokyo Flashback comp would be complete without some of THAT.
To get down to cases, on this Flashback you'll find squealing free jazz freakout from the energetic Derakushi; delicate and haunting organic drone by Le Son De L'Os, who unfurl the longest track here at close to 20 minutes, utilizing acoustic guitar, voice, and flute among other things; some onkyo styled skitter and silence, "whispered" by guitar/contrabass/percussion trio Bon No Kubo; avant garde exploration of traditional Japanese shakuhachi sounds, by the Sabu Orimo Unit; the unique spacious sonic ceremony of the aforementioned Hasegawa-Shizuo duo; and raging distortodelic garage rock in the grand tradition courtesy of power trio Touyounomajyo, chanelling the likes of Les Rallies.
The cd booklet includes info (in English as well as Japanese) on each artist, all of whom we'll be looking out for more music by, some of it no doubt to appear in future on PSF...
MPEG Stream: LE SON DE L'OS "Still Water"
MPEG Stream: SABU ORIMO UNIT "Inochi"
MPEG Stream: TOUYOUNOMAJYO "White Light Spear"

V/A Toshiba Express (Toshiba) cd 26.00
A great compilation of '70s Japanese psychedelic folk, loungey crooning, organ freakouts, wah wah guitars, and melodramatic pop from a variety of names you've probably never heard of, except perhaps for The Jacks, The Mops, and Cosmos Factory. No? Anyway, this is a collection of singles released by Japan's Toshiba label back when I, at least, was a little kid. Similar in spirit to the equally good "Love Peace And Poetry" comp of Latin American psychedelic music that we were always raving about.

V/A Undecided (PSF) cd 22.00
Six of Japan's most out-there solo sonic performers each get a ten-minute-or-so track apiece on this new PSF compilation, Undecided. It's subtitled "JMSA Presents Wave from Free Music" but since that's about all it says here in English, your guess is as good as ours as to what that means exactly, although we surmise that the pieces here were recorded live at some festival. The six idiosyncratic voices contributing to this compilation are: Keiji Haino grinding out a dissonant hurdy gurdy drone, Imai Kazuo meditating on some very quiet guitar, Ohkuchi Junichiro playing some dreamy, abstract piano, Satoh Michihiro plucking his traditional tsugaruzyamisen, Otomo Yoshihide making a severe noise racket with turntables and guitar, and Urabe Masayoshi taking this disc's final step into the void with alto sax and breath. While the extremes represented here -- from the gentle sounds of Junichiro's piano to the scraping din of Haino's hurdy gurdy and who knows what else -- means that this doesn't exactly flow that well from track to track, the contents of this disc represent a fine sampler of the work of these very individual individuals. And the cd booklet is filled with beautiful black and white photography of the performers along with Japanese-language text.
MPEG Stream: KEIJI HAINO "Undecided track 1"
MPEG Stream: OHKUCHI JUNICHIRO "Undecided track 3"

V/A Various Alchemists On... (Alchemy) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This limited edition compilation of the current roster of Osaka's Alchemy Records includes a small 2001 desk calendar featuring images of the artists. Longtime artists include: GENBAKU ONANIES (veteran punk rockers); INCAPACITANTS (noise for bankers, Allan's favorite power electronics act); MASONNA (psychedelic phase shifts and oscillations); SOLMANIA (with a grinding "rock-ish" track, awesome!); SEIICHI YAMAMOTO (solo electric guitar from the guitarist of the Boredoms); HIJOKAIDAN ("The Undisputed King of Noise"); THE NIHILIST SPASM BAND (Canada's highly prolific improvisational group); MERZBOW ("The other Undisputed King of Noise" with a track of pulsing bass and breakbeats!); and JOJO HIROSHIGE (Alchemy kingpin and leader of Hijokaidan performing a quite touching song about love with a backdrop of grating feedback). New artists and lesser knowns are: CHRISTINE 23 ONNA (Maso of Masonna and Fusao of Angel in Heavy Syrup, pulsating exotic moog psychedelia!); MIKI SAWAGUCHI (Japanese porn godess, aka "Big Boobs"); TATSUYA KITAJIMA (folk artist, quite calm and unnerving cover of "All Along Watchtower"[sic]); and GARADAMA (dark folk music sung in English, not unlike Current 93's dark ballads, especially odd since their album on Alchemy is heavy-duty metal). As far as we can tell, all tracks are exclusive to this comp. A nice document of the current state of Alchemy Records and a great introduction to (or reintroduction to those who've forgotten) the Osaka noise scene! And, it's a calendar...
RealAudio clip: MERZBOW "Cannon Balls 2"
RealAudio clip: CHRISTINE 23 ONNA "Cool Bitch (Shiny Crystal Planet - Space Vixen Mix)"

VAGUSNERVE Lo Pan (Utech) cd 14.98
This fellow we know recently wrote an entertaining book called Get High Now, no not about drugs, but about other sorts of highs, non-drug related natural techniques to enjoy "sensory trips" and the like. Quite a few of them are sound-based (the book even references Ryoji Ikeda at one point) but in a major oversight, a recommendation to "listen to VagusNerve" was left out! 'Cause it's definitely a trip when you really settle into a session with VagusNerve on the stereo or better yet headphones - likewise of course with a lot of other drone musics too, why do you think we like the stuff so much? Loud enough, it'll either stimulate, or at least simulate, a high.
So, c'mon, get high now with Chinese guitar/laptop duo VagusNerve. Someone calling herself VAVABOND is the laptopper, and Li Jianhong (of D!O!D!O!D!) is the guitar player. We're already considerable fans of Li's solo psych/noise guitar excursions (his disc on aRCHIVE for instance, and a fantastic new one on PSF, Classic Of the Mountains And Seas) so we were excited when we found out he's half of VagusNerve. We were also interested to learn what exactly the lo pan of the title is. As the liner notes explain, it's a traditional Chinese mytho-technological device, a sort of Feng Shui compass. A rotating disc in a wooden base, with several concentric rings of Chinese characters to which the needle in the middle can point, indicating various arcane things.
VagusNerve are not actually using a lo pan to make this music, rather it's inspired by a dream Li had about a giant lo pan in a forest that could be used to summon UFOs! That's pretty much the title of the first track, in fact. And swarming cosmic UFOs looking for mystical feng shui advice definitely could be making some of the sounds heard here. It's nervous, very active drone musick, buzzing and zapping and crackling and chiming, featuring 3 long tracks (8:21, 21:05, 28:27). There's much moody sci-fi windiness, and what sounds like flocks of otherworldly birds crying to one another, amidst thick grinding whooshing sizzling drones, spinning and swirling. Feedback a la underwater whale calls, resonant "long wire" like vibrations, insectoid buzzings, and mechanical rhythms all feature in the the mix. It's a sonic delirium, wherein Urthona is jamming opaquely with KK Null, if that hypothetical comparison is of any help to you.
Definitely another cool Utech release, a label we've been raving about lately for many good reasons (Horseback, Gog, Aluk Todolo, Blood Fountain...). Regarding Li Jianhong, hopefully we'll be reviewing that new PSF disc of his very soon. And, by the way, he also made several appearances on that An Anthology Of Chinese Experimental Music box set we listed last time.
MPEG Stream: "In The Summer Of 2006 Li Made A Dream About A Lopan And A UFO."
MPEG Stream: "No Doubt. The Lo Pan Is A Universe."

VAJRA Live (PSF) cd 17.98

VAJRA Mandala Cat Last (PSF) cd 22.00
Modern psychedelic shamanistic troubadour and lord of fiery feedback howl Keiji Haino, along with legendary political folk radical Kan Mikami and veteran percussionist Toshiaki Ishitsuka (frequent Kazuki Tomokawa collaborator) comprise the so-called supergroup known as Vajra. Through several albums over the years, the improvisational trio has proven to continually evolve and remain as unclassifiable as any and all of their combined solo efforts. From the lyrically charged folk psychedelia of their early discs to the driven rhythmic force of their Ring album to the explosive sonic maelstrom and dynamism of Sichisiki: The Seventh Consciousness (an album not to be missed, Hainophiles!); a new album from Vajra carries with it a sense of newness and excitement. It demands you come without predilection and prejudice. Formed in the early nineties, the trio has grown to complement each others' unique languages. With Mandala Cat Last, they have inadvertantly metamorphosed themselves into a taut unit, rich in melody and musically cohesive. Their improvisations seem so natural and intentional, the fact that they are improvised doesn't even register as a technical aside. A short but sweet forty minutes, these six pieces are, like much of Mikami's oeuvre, tenebrous and graphic with that touch of mysticism only Haino can deliver. The opening cut, "The Sky Looks Green To Me", slowly builds a feral vocal interaction between Mikami and Haino. The disquieting and chilling vocal cries of the moving "Monkeys Don't Pray" are paired with haunting waves of distorted atmospherics and sparse percussive fits. An acapella break in the center of the album (from a revisited passage off of Mikami & Haino's Heisei recordings) is reciprocated by a warm instrumental closing hymn. Really beautiful, and though the lyrics are in Japanese, there are translations in the accompanying lyric sheets (and it turns out one of the songs has lyrics about Japanese cola!) -- which aren't totally necessary as the music, including Mikami's impassioned wails, transcends language and is quite engaging in its own right!
RealAudio clip: "Monkeys Don't Pray"
RealAudio clip: "The Sky Looks Green To Me"

VAJRA Ring (PSF) cd 22.00
2nd disc from Japanese avant-scene-masters Keiji Haino, Kan Mikami, and Toshiaki Ishitsuka.

VAJRA Sichisiki (PSF) cd 22.00
3rd album from the amazing Japanese improv-folk-rock trio of Keiji Haino, Kan Mikami, and Toshiaki Ishitsuka. Fans of Keiji's crazy Fushitsusha guitar style should maybe start with this one.

VAJRA Sravaka (PSF) cd 22.00
4th effort from the Vajra supergroup (Keiji Haino, Kan Mikami, and Toshiaki Ishitsuka).

VAMPILLIA Alchemic Heart (Important) cd 14.98
So, what exactly is a "brutal orchestra"? That's what this Japanese band describes themselves as, and their brand of loud, dynamic, droning chamber prog with violins and piano vying with wordless vocals (and bass, and drums, and turntables, and electronics, and etc.) in an constantly swelling, cinematic onslaught is certainly orchestral, and kinda brutal (volume, noise, density) but also beautiful. So, OK, brutal orchestra it is. And making 'em even a bit more brutal than they might otherwise be, they've got special guest Merzbow bringing some additional noise n' distortion to the proceedings. Among other guests is, on vocals, Jarboe of the Swans (shades of her collab with Justin Broadrick a while back, as there's a Jesu-ishness to this, somewhat). Also apparently drummer Tatsuya Yoshida of Ruins fame appears here, and a few Boredoms related folks contribute too. So, some high powered personnel present, and put to use!
There's two loooong tracks on this album, one with Jarboe, the other with Merzbow, "Sea" (24:43) and "Land" (24:36), titled after things both of which unhappily have proven cruel and threatening to the beleaguered populace of Japan in recent days. Their elemental power is portended here, in the build-build-build ups of these ominous, abstract, slowly unfolding compositions, making this release fit in well with the doomdirge side of Important's avant roster, for sure.
May or may not be representative of Vampillia's usual sound, we've seen some YouTube videos that portray them as much more of a surreal, circus-y affair, a facepainted freakshow vibe of artrock absurdity. There's hints of that here, but the entirety of this has more of a coherent, atmospheric impact, almost like a Miasmah label release multiplied in intensity and amplification.
MPEG Stream: "Sea"
MPEG Stream: "Land"

VENOMOUS CONCEPT / 324 split (HG Fact) cd 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
2006 steel cage match, a brutal grind metal hardcore duel to the death between Japan's epic grindthrashers 324 and the old school Earache style supergroup Venomous Concept, feturing Shane And Danny from Napalm Death, Kevin from Brutal Truth and Buzz from the Melvins.
Cover artwork by Kevin Sharp.

VIOLENT ONSEN GEISHA U.S. Tour '95 (Japan Overseas) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Japanese noisician/stand up comedian V.O.G. toured the USA in 1995 and this cd preserves some of his finer performances, each in collaboration with American peers Smegma (a warm up for their later split-release with Merzbow?), Truman's Water, and the ubiquitous Thurston Moore.

WADA, YOSHI Earth Horns With Electronic Drone (Omega Point / EM) cd 22.00
Droooooooooooooone... Yep, it's another amazing archival release in the Yoshi Wada reissue campaign from Japan's wonderful EM label, in conjunction with their colleagues at avant-electronics specialists Omega Point. This one's from earlier in his career than the other Wada pieces previously documented in the series, but is no less droney! Recorded in 1974, and unreleased until now, Earth Horns With Electronic Drone is just that. Four players blowing into Wada-built "earth horns" (absurdly long alpenhorn style instruments, "constructed from ordinary plumbing materials and steam fittings"), resonating in an acoustic environment wherein the horns interact with an electronic feedback/looping system designed by Liz Phillips and Yoshi Wada that responds to and reinforces subtle alterations in the volume and pitch of the pipehorns. It's explained in the liner notes, but still a little difficult to understand. Somehow the pipehorn tones are recycled, extended, modulated and mixed, essentially enhanced by the electronics for extra droning effect, that much is obvious! The results are lovely, mesmeric... though, it's hard to come up with much of a description besides, do you like foghorns? Being in San Francisco, we know we do! This is like endless foghorns, mixed with answering whale calls. Or imagine the Himalayan horns of hyperventilating Tibetan monks, high on cough syrup, slowed down and stretched out. Screwed but not chopped.
Occasionally punctuated by what must be the coughs and echoing rustle of the close-to-dozing audience members in the gallery of the art museum where this took place, the pipehorns blow (and the electronics further generate) low, ever so slightly wavering tones that weave together forever... well, if not forever, for about three hours at the original performance!! Of which 77 minutes are presented here on the cd format. There's also the fancy, much more expensive triple vinyl version, which runs to 2 hours and 42 minutes! In metal parlance, that would be the "diehard" edition. But we only have three copies of that, and aren't too sure about whether we can ever get more. Still, even only 77 minutes of Earth Horns With Electronic Drone is a decent dose, with no flipping of sides also.
For those just now tuning in to the ritualistic, minimalistic, ultra-droned-out works of Wada, we'll refer you to our reviews of his three previous discs on EM for more info on this Fluxus-associated composer and sculptor. But you can certainly see from the vintage b&w photos on the sleeve, including one of Wada's ensemble accompanying a Merce Cunningham dance performance in Nassau Coliseum, that his pipehorns have an impressive physical dimension and shape suitable for display and demonstration in art galleries, or other public spaces. And on this recording you can certainly HEAR their impressive physical dimension and sound-shapes they make as well!
MPEG Stream: "Earth Horns With Electronic Drone [excerpt 1]"
MPEG Stream: "Earth Horns With Electronic Drone [excerpt 2]"

WADA, YOSHI Lament For The Rise And Fall Of Elephantine Crocodile (EM Records) cd 21.00
EM Records of Japan is a label from which we *always* are eager to hear more, specializing as they do in the most odd, obscure, awesome reissues EVER. Without them, we wouldn't have such a great selection of musical saw cds here at Aquarius. Or '70s New Age weirdness. Or psychedelic surf music soundtracks. Or (most recently) steel drum jazz funk!
While the steel drum jazz funk might have appealed mostly to the more eccentric crate digging DJ types, we know that THIS release is gonna really take off here. That's 'cause it's all about the DRONE. And y'all love drone we know.
Yoshi Wada is a Japanese artist who relocated to New York City in the late '60s and (just like another Japanese expatriate, Yoko Ono) got heavily involved with the conceptual art movement known as Fluxus. Doing sculpture, performance, and sound installations, he rubbed elbows with the likes of minimalist maverick LaMonte Young, studying with both him and Indian vocal guru Pandit Pran Nath. That's very evident on this album, the intriguingly titled Lament For The Rise And Fall Of The Elephantine Crocodile, which was originally released on vinyl in 1982 by the avant garde label India Navigation (responsible for important Dreyblatt and Niblock documents as well). Wada only made two records, of which this one is considered his most significant, not to mention rarest.
There's two long tracks here (over a half-hour each). Both are utter drooooooooooone nirvana. Track one, "Singing" (31:06), is ALL voice, Wada giving long guttural throat-bleatings (waaaaah waaaaaah ooooooooo....) that he builds into a gorgeous, rising and falling soundscape of overtones and drones. He recorded it in an empty swimming pool for extra bass and natural echoing effect... the results are serene yet joyous, somehow liturgical, suggestive of blissful monkish raptures. Wada certainly got into it, actually spending the night before this recording *sleeping* alone in the pool, and (he says) almost experiencing auditory hallucinations due to the resonant acoustics of the space.
The second track, side two of the original LP, is a continuation of the first with even MORE drone. Entitled "Bagpipe" (33:17), it adds to Wada's vocal intonations the sound of experimental homebuilt reed instruments of Wada's own devising, "adapted bagpipes with sympathy" made of plumbing tubes, powered by an air compressor. Improvising with voice and "bagpipe", this piece is much louder, denser, and grindingly trance-like than the far more delicate first track. The two instruments he used are pictured on this cd's back cover. One is called The Elephantine Crocodile, and another The Alligator. Both are Partch-like sound-making sculptural objects in their own right. They're carefully tuned to take advantage of higher octave harmonics and microtonal partials and other things that we'd need more study of music theory to understand exactly, but obviously with which Wada is fully conversant. What we do know for sure is that with his voice and unusual instruments he's conjured a deeply psychedelic and meditative dronescape that we're darn glad EM (in conjunction with another cool Japanese label, Omega Point) have seen fit to unearth and reissue!!
If you like drones, this not only a worthy historical document, but also would be a fantastic listen even if it had just been recorded yesterday. In fact, it compares interestingly to another drone release reviewed this list, Schmickler and Chisholm's Amazing Daze. But Wada achieved these drones without the aid of electronics or computers. About the only complaint we could make about it is the rather abrupt ending! We realize that it can't go on forever (as much as we'd like it to) but its sudden cessation (instead of a gradual fade out) can harsh one's mellow... though if you're like us you'll listen to this going to sleep at night and won't ever make it conscious to the end anyway.
This has been digitally remastered from the original tapes, with the two pieces restored to their original intended lengths (they'd been edited down to fit on the LP release). And as usual, it gets a fabulous EM packaging job, complete with vintage b&w photos and extensive 1982 and 2007 liner notes in both English and Japanese, written by Wada himself. This one is definitely up there in the pantheon of EM essentials, and that's saying a lot.
MPEG Stream: "Singing"
MPEG Stream: "Bagpipe"

WADA, YOSHI Off The Wall (EM Records / Omega Point) cd 21.00
We have to thank Japan's EM Records - actually, we've been doing that a lot lately - but this time we have to thank 'em for turning us on to the celestial soundworlds of dronologist Yoshi Wada. If you've read our reviews of EM's two previous Wada reissues, you know he's a Japanese sculptor/composer who made his way to New York City in the late '60s, delving into the Fluxus conceptual art movement and hanging out with folks like pioneering minimalist LaMonte Young. In 1982, Wada issued an LP entitled Lament For The Rise And Fall Of Elephantine Crocodile, featuring his voice and homebuilt instruments. When it was reissued on EM last year, we were bowled over by its unique deep drone soundings. EM's second Wada reissue, The Appointed Cloud, from 1987, was equally amazing.
Happily, there's more Wada releases in the vaults than we'd thought. Now EM has brought out a cd version this one, Off The Wall, which was originally released on vinyl in 1985 by the German free improv label FMP. Dubbed a "majestic minimalist monsterpiece" by EM, it consists of two long tracks (over twenty minutes each), a part one and part two of the same performance, which features the bagpipe blowing of Yoshi Wada and colleague Wayne Hankin, along with the "adapted organ" (pipe organ put together by Wada) played by Marilyn Bogerd, and the percussion of Andreas Schmidt-Neri.
EM have also added a bonus cut - this third (and even longer than either of the others, at 27:14) track, "Die Konsonanten Pfeifen", was recorded in Berlin in 1983 and originally issued as a cassette. Again, Wada and Hankin play the bagpipes, this time accompanied by percussion (tympani, tam tam, and cymbal) from one Kevin Newhoff, which kicks in, with a hiccup, near about the halfway point, providing steady, ominous pulsations that bring to mind some of the portentous mood of Strauss's "Also Sprach Zarathustra".
Bagpipes, that's right, this is bagpipe music. But it doesn't sound much like Scotland's The Black Watch. Maybe if the Royal Highland Regiment were marching to 20th century avant-classical. Keening endlessly, the twin bagpipes of Wada and Hankin weave exotic-sounding tones and overtones together in slowly shifting, shimmering patterns, that seem to keep one step head of your sensory apparatus, so that you realize there's something new going on in the piece only after you've been hearing it already for a few moments. The effect of these modulations is quite mesmeric, almost meditative, New Age with an edge, like Phill Niblock meets Terry Riley, taken to a Far Eastern extreme. The multiple instrumental voices blend into one total drone, yet upon examination each has its own wending and winding part to play. The usual repetition of "minimalist" music isn't so mechanically evident here, Wada's drones floating high into the expanses of space, combining with the rumbling earth-bound drums to achieve a sort of ceremonial aspect and dramatic impact.
Yes, thank you EM! This is packaged in the usual excellent EM fashion, in a tri-fold sleeve with original liner notes in both English and Japanese translation, also b&w photographs, and a full-color reproduction of the original graphic score for "Off The Wall".
MPEG Stream: "Off The Wall I"
MPEG Stream: "Die Konsonanten Pfeifen"

WADA, YOSHI The Appointed Cloud (EM Records) cd 21.00
In reality, this was recorded live at the Great Hall of New York Hall of Science in New York, November 8th 1987. But listening to it, you could easily imagine it being part of some mysterious & portentous religious ritual, enacted high on the slopes of some vast Himalayan mountain by horn-blowing, drum-beating Tibetan monks... these monks perhaps being part of an aktion under the direction of dramatic drone artist Hermann Nitsch. Seriously. Well it's not Nitsch, it's Yoshi Wada, and there were no monks involved, but we're sure it was an impressive performance to witness in its own right. Certainly to hear, which thanks to EM Records, we all now can.
This is the sequel to EM's previous reissue, some months ago, of Yoshi Wada's first album, Lament For The Rise And Fall Of Elephantine Crocodile. While that 1982 LP may have more rare record collector cachet, and be more historically significant chronologically speaking, we have to say that this one is at least as amazing. As we explained in our review of Lament, Wada is a Japanese visual artist and sound sculptor who relocated to New York in the '60s, where he aligned himself with the Fluxus conceptual art movement and definitely got deep into dronology. (He now lives in San Francisco, and for more information on his career, check out the June '08 issue of The Wire, #292, which features an interview with Wada conducted by AQ's own Jim Haynes.)
The Appointed Cloud, a composition/sound installation "designed specifically for the acoustics of the cobalt blue cathedral of the Great Hall", utilized a massive Wada-designed soundmaking assemblage controlled by a computer interface, this unusual "pipe organ" constructed from compressed-air powered pipes, a suspended 20 foot long sheet of metal, and a steam pipe gong. In addition, Wada and the other musicians involved play timpani, tam tam, sirens, and a trio of keening bagpipes. All this in the majestic, modernistic stained-glass setting of the Great Hall.
As alluded to above, this is somewhat suggestive of Buddhist ritual, and reminds us of Nitsch's large-scale symphonics as well. Rather than give a minute by minute play by play of this piece's hour-long duration, we'd encourage you to experience it for yourself. Experience the thundering drum vibrations, the percussive rattle, the quiet gentle tones and hushed rustle that erupt into dense bagpiping drone squeals and resonating rumble... it's grand and gorgeous.
Physically this cd reish is up to EM's usual high standards, packaged in a gatefold sleeve with color photos, a reduced reproduction of the piece's graphic score, liner notes by Wada as well as the original program notes, in both English and Japanese. Soundwise, it's also up there with that first Wada disc among our favorite stuff that EM has yet released -- in other words, highly recommended!! Even moreso for those especially dronologically and/or 20th century classically inclined.
MPEG Stream: "excerpt 1"
MPEG Stream: "excerpt 2"

WELLS, BILL & MAHER SHALAL HASH BAZ Osaka Bridge (Karaoke Kalk) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
For a Scottish so-called jazz pianist, Bill Wells sure has lots of indie-rock cred, having had help at times in making his dreamy, mellow music from members of Belle and Sebastian and The Pastels, fellow Glaswegians to be sure. But with this new Osaka Bridge album he taps into the willfully naive soundworld of one of our very favorite underground Japanese psych-pop ensembles, the one and only Maher Shalal Hash Baz, teaming up with them presumably thanks to their shared connection with The Pastels' Geographic label.
The music here is mostly written by Wells, but when filtered through the playing of his Japanese friends, it sounds so much like theirs. MSHB's childlike, almost Shaggsy musicianship semi-struggles playfully with Wells' compositions, making each track all the more beautiful for its fragility and simplicity of execution. Their approach, however lacking in musical chops, is perfect for what we know of Wells' penchant for melodious sound-sketches. In collaboration with MSHB, this is slow, languid, rainy day music... even the poppiest moments have a bittersweet aura. MSHB's trademark wavering horns are in full not-quite-jazz mode, and some of this sort of sounds like a '60s or '70 TV show theme music in spots, like Love American Style or a sitcom or something -- but that's not a diss, it's really pretty. Even prettier, are the tracks featuring beautiful, sad singing from Reiko Kudo, wife of MSHB leader Tori Kudo. Exquisite.
MPEG Stream: "Liquorice Tics"
MPEG Stream: "Time Takes Me So Back"

WHITE STATIC DEMON Apparitions (Utech) cd 14.98
You would think Justin Broadrick had enough going on, playing in Jesu, Pale Sketcher, Final, Grey Machine, Blood Of Heroes, running his Avalanche label, but apparently there's always time for more, not that we're complaining, we're always up for more of Broadrick's noise, and noise is precisely what we get from his White Static Demon, a power electronics powerhouse, that tempers full bore white heat hiss with crumbling textures and dark melodic drones.
Two 20+ minute tracks, the first, a warped dronescape of processed electronic whirs and shimmers, pulsing and throbbing, a looped blur of gradually intensifying buzz drenched howl, underpinned by deep glitchy dubbed out thrums, before finally exploding into a super nova of Merzbowian white noise, a cascading wall of blinding skree and blown out crunch, but thankfully, this is no one dimensional noise record, instead, over the course of the rest of the track, the sound slips from superdistorted in-the-red buzz, to woozy weirdly melodic feedback drenched drift, to muted smoldering glitched out pulse, to tangled murky minimal click and shimmer, to corrosive hazy dronedirge crumble. And that's just the first track.
Number two also begins hushed and textural, a swirling muted convergence of various strands of glitch and crunch and rumble and whir, gradually building, the sound getting filthier and crustier, a wave of blackened grinding noise, underpinned by strange almost sci-fi sounding synth melodies, and unlike the first track, this one doesn't let up, it definitely cycles through various permutations of blown out buzz and caustic white noise, but it's pretty dense and intense, flitting from burnished and blackened to spectral and effulgent, total head splitting blasts of in-the-red upper register skree, colliding with avalanches of damaged low end, all wrapped in sheets of sinister hiss and sent careening into the heart of the sun, the sound a flash of deafening and blinding white light and sound, laced with barely there bits of melody, but for the most part, a serious planet busting, magnitude 10 burst of sheer electronic power.
Phew! Brutal, intense, heavy and noisy, and pretty fucking awesome, just maybe not for Broadrick dabblers, this one's most definitely for the iron eared, the stern of sonic constitution, and the power electronic elite!
MPEG Stream: "Endless Vacuum"
MPEG Stream: "Unforgiving Eidolon"

WORLD HERITAGE, THE Invitation To World Heritage (Magaibutsu) dvd + cd 17.98
Another Yoshida prog project!

WRIGHT, PETER Pretty Mushroom Clouds (aRCHIVE) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We've raved about New Zealander Peter Wright in the past, numerous times, we've even now that we check back at past reviews, raved ABOUT raving about Peter Wright, but we really have no choice now but to do it again. For someone as prolific, and as talented as Wright, he seems to continually to fly well beneath the hipster radar.
Which is maybe good for us, but at the same time, it's hard not to root for someone who seems to effortlessly conjure up such beautiful sounds. But the thing is, we KNOW it's not effortless. The world is filled with folks who have a microphone and some effects, and think they can be soundscapers, field recordists, ARTISTS. And while that sort of spirit is to be applauded, the truth of the matter is, just like with anything, flying a jet, swimming the English Channel, playing the trumpet, racing Formula 1's, some people are just more talented than others. And Wright is just about as talented as they come.
Weaving field recordings into longform drones, creating soundscapes from found sounds and processed guitars, Wright manages to create dreamlike expanses of sonic wonder.
Take the first track here, the title track, it's hard not to imagine Pretty Little Mushroom Clouds. The sounds of birds, and wind, maybe branches rubbing against each other in the distance, while all around these sounds of nature, deep buzzing swells ebb and flow, dark, slightly ominous melodies, swell and recede, a super minimal pulse, a gorgeous cloud of shimmer drifting across verdant hills and blue blue sky. You can almost imagine, lush rolling hills, dotted with wildflowers, cute little houses, scattered copses of trees, birds soaring in the sky, while way off in the distance, huge black mushroom clouds blossom in the sky, but from here, they just look beautiful, the music capturing that moment before everything is turned to ash, a brief vacuum, where even the vilest of objects is transformed into a vivid picturesque sonic snapshot.
Over the rest of the record, the field recordings are much more subtle, relying more on the processed instrumentation, guitars are ground into muted walls reverberating buzz, rife with disembodied melodies, streaks of high end and bits of rumbling drone, some tracks are massive and pitched down, the sound of drifting beneath miles of ice in the Arctic Circle, everything glowing some unearthly blue, all the sounds muted and warbled, others are nearly ebullient, like the perfectly titled "The Devil Wears Sunroof", which from the sound of it we can only assume is a nod to Matthew Bower and his Ur-drone unit, all glistening high end shimmer, and long stretches of buzzing upper register guitar. The final track finds Wright taking all of his various sounds and assembling them into a super hypnotic, strangely heavy looped take on, well, Loop actually, a repeated riff, a static groove, totally mesmerizing and space-y, eventually building to a full on blast of almost Japanoise, before petering out, leaving just the sound of an airport terminal or a train station, or a huge sparsely filled performance space as it's revealed to be, when the crowd finally offers up some applause, for what may have been a live performance, or may have been just a random bit of live crowd sound sampled and woven into Wright's mysterious sonic sprawl.
As always, amazing packaging from aRCHIVE. Six panel full color glossy gatefold, the cd affixed to a nub on the middle panel, while around the jacket, an outer sleeve of printed vellum. Super nice.
Limited to 500 copies, single one time pressing.
MPEG Stream: "Pretty Mushroom Clouds"
MPEG Stream: "The Devil Wears Sunroof"

WRK s/t (V2 Archief) cd 15.98
A collaborative effort between likeminded Japanese hyperminimalists Toshiya Tsunoda, Hiroyuki Iida, Jiro Shimizu, and m/s is an exercise in persistance, as pure tone sine-waves extend unwaveringly, high-speed digital glitch manipulation tumbles slowly into low-end rumbles, and speak-n-spell collages prove to be quite unnerving.

XENAKIS, IANNIS Persepolis + Remixes Edition 1 (Asphodel) 2cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
One of legendary 20th century new music composer Iannis Xenakis' most heralded works, "Persepolis" is here remixed by some of today's most adventurous musicians. Though the liner notes clumsily attempt some high brow hoo-ha internationalist theory about why the chosen remixers are appropriate for this project -- "Creative modernism is left with choosing between authoritarianism and religion. Hence, the inclusion of a second disc of remixes..." (hence? huh?) -- the obvious reason why these remixers appear is because, like Xenakis, they manipulate noise, musique concrete, and take experimental music to conceptual and sonic extremes. It makes aural sense; don't give me political wish-wash. Anyway, here's what we've written about Persepolis, which is on the first disc here:
Attention all you avantgarde electronic music fans! Important reissue alert! Iannis Xenakis' "Persepolis" was originally commissioned in 1971 as large-scale sound installation for the Shiraz-Persepolis Festival of the Arts in Iran. "Persepolis" -- Xenakis' longest electro-acoustic composition -- originally involved 8 channels of dense electro-acoustic material broadcast through the vast complex of the ruined Palaces of Persepolis along with a massive display of arclights, fireworks, and bonfires. Xenakis arranges slow tectonic rumbles and rough granular trebliness with extended passages of what could have been the bowed metal of Organum if Jackman et. al. were tumbling down a flight of stairs... "Persepolis" engages the visceral and the physical in a way that no other academic / musique concrete / electro-acoustic / minimalist piece has ever done before. It's frightening how powerful this piece of music is, even to one familiar with more recent massive electronic displays by MB, Merzbow, and Organum.
The remixers include: Ryoji Ikeda, Zbigniew Karkowski, Otomo Yoshihide, Francisco Lopez, Antimatter, Merzbow, Laminar, Ulf Lanheinrich, and more. A veritable noise fest. Construction site rumblings. Very difficult listening. If nothing else, this is a perfect introductory sampler of not only Xenakis but also some of AQ's favorite experimentalists. Nice price -- two discs for the price of one.
RealAudio clip: "Persepolis (Ryoji Ikeda remix)"
RealAudio clip: "Persepolis (Merzbow remix)"

XRATEDX / ZENI GEVA (Pandemonium) 7" 3.99
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
ZG: Japanese guttural proto metal sludge.
XrX: Noisey arythmic industrial tinged french noise rock.

YAMAMOTO, SEIICHI NOA (Alchemy) cd 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Solo album from Omoide Hatoba/Boredoms guitarist.

YAMAMOTO, TATSUHISA & MUNEOMI SENJU A Thousand Mountains (Doubtmusic) cd 24.00
To start with, we've always commended Japan's Doubtmusic label for the handsome packaging job that each one of their digipack cd releases invariably receives. This one, though, we'd probably be inclined to buy just 'cause of the especially cool cover art alone! Done by one Tomoo Gokita, the cover suggests an arched window in a brightly patterned wall, looking out on (a photo of) some majestic snow-capped alpine mountain (the Matterhorn, is it?). But in front of the "window", the corpse-painted visage of King Diamond pokes up unexpectedly, screaming at you... WITH, IF YOU LOOK CLOSELY, A MINIATURE HEAD IN HIS MOUTH. Quite confusionally cool, eh? But for what sort of music could this art be at all appropriate? Well, why not an electronics-augmented Japanese drums duo featuring someone who once played in the Boredoms/Vooredoms?! 'Cause that's what this is, with a vengeance.
Erstwhile Boredom Muneomi Senju (drums, percussion, electronics) teams up with Tasuhisa Yamamoto (drums, metals, percussion, gong, odaiko drums) for 7 tracks of mostly percussion-only soundscapery, from "primitive groove" to "wall of onkyo" in style, according to Doubtmusic's description, which also cites poly-rhythms and harmonic overtones as things you'll hear here, and we don't doubt it, these tracks are widely varied and always intriguing, certainly bizarre enough at times to merit the colorful, epic high weirdness of that awesome album cover art!
The likes of "Foggy In Aquarium" and "Coral Flirtation" feature calm, complex layers of percussive playing, free-jazzy but not really free, with lots of bells and chimes and liquid tricklings... tinklings and twinklings... lovely stuff! THEN, there's the erratic and effected thwap-and-snap of "Scattered Devils". Zany, zappy drum hits and other bits that sound sampled from some futuristic Carl Stalling cartoon score, cut-and-pasted with slaphappy abandon together with electronic textures, ultimately funking it up in fractured, spastic fashion that reminds us of another recent Doubtmusic release, Sim + Otomo's Monte Alto Estate. Perhaps 'cause this track was further remixed by guest producer Yuta Segawa, it's the most "computery" sounding cut on here, whereas the rest of this disc comes off as much more organic, without all that obvious digital tomfoolery (cool though we think it is). Organic, AND trancelike, such as with the ritualistic rainfall pitter patter percussion, swirling and circling, of "Correspon-dance", or the endless drum-roll and cymbal-shimmer of the 8 minute plus "Fricative Lights" - very Boredoms Super Rootsy, that one!
Now as we've always said, about the only "drum circle" we can stand is one that involves the Boredoms. But two drummers does not a drum circle make AND there's a Boredoms connection both sound- and personnel-wise here. So unless you HATE percussion, this is definitely an out-there experiment in rhythm(z) to check out. Speaking of drum circles, opener "Chronoscope Fatigue" and closer "Chronoscope Fatigue Variation" are the closest this duo come to that sort of thing here, and that's not that close, unless you're familiar with drum circles that make a practice of all falling down the stairs while they're jamming...
MPEG Stream: "Coral Flirtation"
MPEG Stream: "Scattered Devils"
MPEG Stream: "Fricative Lights"

YAMANTAKA, EYE Artist Music Journal, Edition 12 (Soundscreen Design) book 13.98
Wow. We're so stoked on this, a gorgeous book of artwork from Boredoms bandleader Eye Yamantaka, whose eyepoppingly colorful collages and multimedia art, as represented on most Boredoms and related releases, we have always loved.
So this is total eyecandy for us Eye fans, a 24 page, 8" x 8" softcover, saddle stitched book featuring not covers for records Eye has released (which is what we thought it was going to be), but actually all artwork for dozens of insane IMAGINARY bands (and formats!) he made up just for this project! We love it.
Each page features 2 or 3 different "releases", with both sleeve art and the disc itself pictured. So for instance there's Sunarchy's "Volume" 12" picture disc, Satori Disco's "Groovy1" 10" water blue disc, and Crackederic's "Yellp", which claims to be a 22 inch "Balloon disc". Yeah, that's right, some of them get really unlikely or impossible. How about Armed LyF's "Junk", a 12" rasta color no centerhole disc? Or VhV's "Steamed Bun" release, a 4" bun on 12" black disc? Or Age "2", supposedly a 1 inch black disc? And then there's Googloom's "Gog In" googles shape disc (what looks like two 7"s melted together side by side) and Googloom's "Gog Out", a 2" broken disc! Those aren't even the craziest ones.
In addition to enjoying the visuals, this of course puts our imaginations into overdrive wishing we could HEAR these bands too, wondering what they sound like. Some of them provide clues, we know that Donoid's 12" contains a Wang Chung cover ("Everybody Dub Tonight"), while D.A.M.'s "Don't Ask Me" 7" is apparently "South Fla. Hardcore", hence the mohawked skater depicted on the sleeve.
This is Number 12 in a series of music-related art and design "journals", so we might have to get some of the earlier entries in as well, in fact there's a Daniel Higgs one that's pretty cool (of course) and we do have a couple of those in stock. All the journals in the series are packaged in 10" record sleeves, as well. Super cool.

YAMASH'TA, STOMU Red Buddha (Spalax) cd 14.98

YAMASHTA'S, STOMU RED BUDDHA THEATRE The Man From The East (Esoteric) cd 21.00
Japanese early '70s fusion, a good one.

YAMATAKA, EYE Re...Remix? Remix Works By Yamataka Eye (Shock City) cd 36.00
Boredoms fans!! Bandleader Eye Yamataka, when not conducting the Boredoms themselves through thunderous drum-circle tranceouts, has a sideline in doing remixes for other artists, incorporating the same mega dosage of percussive craziness, throbbing rhythm, and swerve-y turntablist glitch that you'd find spilling forth from the most way-out Boredoms tracks. If you picked up Lindstrom's Contemporary Fix remix ep that we listed a couple weeks back you've heard a good example of Eye's handiwork. This Japan-only import disc brings together a dozen other of his best recent remix projects, the raw material coming from bands both known and unknown (to us). All of 'em -- except for Gong -- being Japanese bands we're pretty sure. Along with Gong, some of the names we do know: OOIOO, Wrench, DJ Pica Pica Pica (who IS Eye, right?), and Ken Ishii's Flare. And the names we don't: Walrus, Zeebra, Atami, Black Drop The Bomb, NXS, Boat, and one more we can't figure out (it's written in Japanese). Given the headspinning EYE extreme remix treatment, these artists' disparate tracks sound like they belong together on one disc for sure, he's put his surreal stamp on each of 'em big time. It's a colorful, energetic melange of tribal drumming, barnyard noises, faux ethnic exotica, techno beats, tape manipulations, guitar riffs, and heaps of psychedelic electronic effects.
MPEG Stream: DJ PICA PICA PICA "SPA"
MPEG Stream: GONG "Master Builder"

YANAGIDA, HIRO s/t (Skyf Zol) cd 15.98
Japanese seventies psych rock, wild and crazy, from... 1971. Cool! This is the first time we've encountered a reissue of this album, the follow-up to keyboardist Yanagida's well-regarded solo debut Milk Time. It features Kimo Mizutani (on some seriously *piercing* lead fuzz guitar!!) who was a member of legendary weird psych-prog acts Love Live Life +1 and Food Brain along with Yanagida. And also guesting on this album is Joey Smith of Speed, Glue & Shinki and Juan de la Cruz fame (his "doo wop" vocals on the pot-positive love song "My Dear Mary" are worth a chuckle).
This is really all over the place -- we're partial to the heavier instrumental numbers like "The Butcher" and "The Murder In The Midnight" but the gentler, poppier fare like "Always" and "Melancholy" or the flutey "The Skyscraper 42nd F" are enjoyable too. Overall this can be described as proggy, a bit bluesy, Hammond-grooving, and sorta wacky. And again we should mention that there's just a heckuva lot of that aforementioned high-end, ear-canal invading guitar tone from Mizutani. Sounds like a bug zapper, we're diggin' it! Oh, and based on the surface noise, we don't think this is a reissue from the master tapes...
MPEG Stream: "The Butcher"
MPEG Stream: "Fantasia"

YBO2 Greatest Hits Volume 1 (SSE Communications) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Before starting Ruins, Tatsuya Yoshida played in this unusual 80's avant-progrock band, along with K.K. Null of Zeni Geva, original Ruins bassist Hideki Kawamoto, and mainman (on bass, vocals, & keyboards) Kitamura Masashi. These two volumes collect the "greatest hits" from their many records--a bunch of weirdness, all dark, emotional, complex and heavy stuff, including an interpretation of a Paul Simon tune! Recommended to all fans of Ruins!

YBO2 Greatest Hits Volume 2 (SSE Communications) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Before starting Ruins, Tatsuya Yoshida played in this unusual 80's avant-progrock band, along with K.K. Null of Zeni Geva, original Ruins bassist Hideki Kawamoto, and mainman (on bass, vocals, & keyboards) Kitamura Masashi. These two volumes collect the "greatest hits" from their many records--a bunch of weirdness, all dark, emotional, complex and heavy stuff, including an interpretation of a Paul Simon tune! Recommended to all fans of Ruins!

YERMO s/t (Last Visible Dog) cd-r 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Another Celebrate Psi Phenomena expat (having shared a terrific split cd-r with MCMS, now out of print) finds their way to our pals Last Visible Dog. Yermo offer up a glorious wash of cascading upper register dreaminess, like the sound of rubbed champagne glasses, crystalline and delicate, over an mesmerising thrum that subtly oscillates, creating an hypnotic almost-rhythm. The whole thing slowly builds in intensity until it's a howling storm of feedback and buzz, dotted with thick bursts of jagged NOISE, all washing over you in a wave of thick warm sound. Fans of Total, Vibracathedral Orchestra, Sunroof!, the Dead C and the like bset start paying close attention to Yermo, 'cause they have yet to disappoint!
RealAudio clip: "-one-"

YONA-KIT (Skin Graft) cd 14.98
This is KK Null (Zeni Geva, Brise Glace), Jim O'Rourke (Gastr del Sol), Thymme Jones (Illusion of Safety) and Darin Gray (Dazzling Killmen).

YONA-KIT (Skin Graft) lp 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This is KK Null (Zeni Geva, Brise Glace), Jim O'Rourke (Gastr del Sol), Thymme Jones (Illusion of Safety) and Darin Gray (Dazzling Killmen).

YOSHIDA, TATSUYA A Million Years (Magaibutsu) cd 14.98
Ruins drummer Yoshida's third very strange solo album -- and when he does a solo album, it's really just him, drums, guitar, keyboard, voices, etc. (AND, he can play it all live, by himself.) This one starts off maybe kind of like This Heat trying to play the Simpsons theme, and just gets weirder.

YOSHIDA, TATSUYA Magaibutsu (Review Records) cd 14.98
Cool! A reissue of the long-out-of-print 1991 solo cd debut from Ruins drummer Tatsuya Yoshida, "Magaibutsu" (also the name of his own record label). Yoshida remixed it in 2001, and now there's six bonus tracks appended as well. And when Yoshida makes a solo album, it sure is: he's a one-man-band (literally, he can do most of this stuff live -- with headset microphone, drum kit, keyboard, and a guitar in his lap!) doing crazed compositions that are similar to Ruins fare but even more maniacal. Really. I (Allan) remember buying the original cd when it came out -- at the time I only had one Ruins cd, the magnificent "Stonehenge", and was eager to hear more from that (then) mysterious Japanese avant-rock bass and drums duo. I found "Magaibutsu" somewhere and bought it on the chance that it had something to do with the Ruins (nobody at the place where I bought it knew what it was, but the cover photo collage of, well, ruins, plus the cryptic song titles and Yoshida's at-the-time-unfamiliar-but-definitely-Japanese name made me think it might). When I got it home and put it on, the drums/keys/vocal onslaught of opening track "Joneoik" happily confirmed that it indeed had to be the work of the same crazed musical mastermind behind the Ruins. I was very pleased. And it remains probably one of the most weird and wonderful discs in my collection. Absolutely essential to all Ruins fans, if you don't have this already (or maybe even if you do, 'cause of the bonus tracks, which fit in well but maybe aren't essential in and of themselves), get this! Quirky and hectic songwriting a la Ruins, with of course Yoshida's incredible drumming and nonsensical vocal stylings. Despite the solo format, Yoshida uses a wider variety of instrumental textures than usually appear in Ruins songs -- there's quite a lot of his hockey-rink-sounding organ plinking out maddeningly repetitive and catchy riffs, plus astonishing multitracked vocals, scratchy guitar, and piano ivory tickling. So at points it's sparse and minimal, but at others super-dense and heavy. Magma was still a major influence (and Charles Hayward as well), along with what sounds like some faux-ethnic explorations in the vein of the Sun City Girls (especially notable on "Kasinuc"). Compared to Ruins, this is also more percussive and carnival-esque.
RealAudio clip: "Joneoik"
RealAudio clip: "Vonisch"
RealAudio clip: "Nessang"
RealAudio clip: "Ogatta"
RealAudio clip: "Ijocuff"

YOSHIDA, TATSUYA & KEIJI HAINO Until Water Grasps Flame (Noise Asia / Sonic Factory) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We mentioned this exciting collaborative release in last list's review of the Knead cd, and now we do indeed have a bunch of 'em in stock. Tatsuya Yoshida you know as the drummer for Japan's amazing Ruins, while Keiji Haino has for many years been the dark musical shaman of Tokyo with his out-rock group Fushitsusha. (He's also the cover star of this month's issue of The Wire, by chance.)
Unlike the Ruins + Haino summit known as Knead, "Until Water Grasps Flame" sees our heroes investigating a wider variety of sonic constructions, from spazzy jazz skronk to folkish improv.
Knead, by contrast, was pretty much a full-on noise rock blast a la Fushitsusha. There's some of that here ("At The Instant That One Thinks To Oneself 'No Way', What Percent Is Nostalgia?"), but lots more besides. Like Knead, this is rather more Haino's thing than Yoshida's (you can tell Haino named the songs, not Yoshida!), though fans of the Ruins man won't fail to recognize his stamp on the proceedings as well. But actually the few, more Yoshida-esqe tracks with lotsa drum clatter and jagged guitar found here aren't our faves anyway. What we're really digging about this disc are the songs that get into a weird zone of shimmering drone, sparse and ambient, using an array of intriguing ethnic instrumentation. It's dark improvised folk psychedelia that almost sounds like it belongs on the Kemialliset Ystavat disc reviewed elsewhere this list, until out of Yoshida's rolling percussion ambience emerges Haino's unmistakable anguished vocals.
Several of us here at AQ have been on what you might term a "Keiji Haino kick" of late, digging out our old PSF and Tokuma cds and re-acquainting our ears with his unique, deeply felt sounds. Sometimes harsh, sometimes gentle, always dark, emotive, and beautiful. The appearance of this cd has been but one of the many things to trigger our personal Haino renaissance. Perhaps hearing it will instill in you the same excitement. And Yoshida is of course another long-time AQ favorite, so it's cool that he and Haino have finally gotten together for these two full-length collaborations (this one, and Knead).
RealAudio clip: "Decision After Gentle Use"
RealAudio clip: "Signs Of Gratitude For 5Hz"
RealAudio clip: "Making The Excuse That 'Of Course It Is All For You'"
RealAudio clip: "At The Instant That One Thinks To Oneself 'No Way', What Percent Is Nostalgia?"

YOSHIDA, TATSUYA & SOTOYAMA AKIRA Drum Duo (Enban) dvd-r 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

YOSHIDA, TATSUYA (AND VARIOUS ARTISTS) Devil From The East: A Decade Of Yoshida Tatsuya (Bloody Butterfly) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Another literal warehouse find, from the same place where we found the (now all gone) Leningrad Blues Machine cds listed last time, and it's another one for you Japanophiles, being a compilation released in 1994 of tracks by various and sundry bands that Ruins mastermind drummer/vocalist Tatsuya Yoshida had played in, up 'til then. Since Yoshida was (& still is!) such a crucial part of the Japanese psych/prog/noise underground, the list of bands is kinda nuts. Here's the entire lineup: Ruins, YBO2, Dissecting Table, High Rise, ZOA, Torture Garden (John Zorn's Japanese version of Naked City, also featuring Eye Yamatsuka), Gerogerigegege, Vasilisk, Malinconia, Phaidia, Aburadako, Tairikuotoko vs. Sanmyakuonna, Koenjihyakkei, Zeni Geva, and one more we couldn't figure out the English name of, plus two solo tracks by Yoshida in one-man-band mode (including the very first track, home-recorded by Yoshida way back in '83). Wow. So as well as being a Yoshida collection, it's also pretty good sampler of the Japanese underground circa '83-'93.
Obviously, in many cases, these weren't all HIS projects, the way Ruins are. Yoshida's just such an amazing drummer, that lots of bands wanted him to play with them - even the infamous masturbating Gerogerigegege! Yoshida's mock-operatic vocal stylings also come into play upon occasion (and he plays bass in one band, instead of drums). Although as you might expect, technical prog stuff is a big element of this, the range of styles is surprising, and hard to define, it includes avant-punk, gothic cabaret music, screaming hardcore skronk, industrial noise, garage doom-psych, chaotic RIO funk, and alt-alt-alt-J-pop... We're pretty sure almost all the tracks are exclusive to this comp, almost all of 'em recorded live, not taken from albums. In many cases, they may be the only recorded documentation of Yoshida playing with a particular unit. The songs we did recognize (whether live or the actual studio versions) are all from pretty rare discs anyways. And of course this out of print cd itself is rare too. We checked online, and there's places selling used copies for around $50!! So, Ruins/Yoshida/Japanese music nerds, you'd best act fast! We only found a few... And yes, we'll keep digging at that warehouse and see what else interestin' we might get lucky and discover.
MPEG Stream: ZOA "Disillusive"
MPEG Stream: DISSECTING TABLE "I Get My Slogan"
MPEG Stream: TATSUYA YOSHIDA "First Flight"

YOSHIDA, TATSUYA, & RON ANDERSON A Is For A Accident (FMN) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The second improvisatory collaboration between these two, Yoshida being the drummer of Ruins, and Ron the guitarist for Oakland's Molecules.

YURA YURA TEIKOKU na.ma.shi.bi.re.na.ma.me.ma.i (Mesh-Key) cd 11.98
This modern Japanese psychedelic pop band has been around forever (like, 15 years now at least), having recorded for underground labels like Captain Trip and PSF before making the jump to (in Japan) major-label status, we think. Over here of course they're still fairly unknown, but NYC label Mesh-Key is doing their best to change that, by issuing this 2003 live recording in the States (actually, the cd itself appears to be the actual Japanese release, but with an extra paper obi sleeve printed up by Mesh-Key added on to provide some English-language context). Over an hour long, the show documented here should definitely give prospective Yura Yura Teikoku fans a decent sampling of the band's charms, from the ghostly to the garagey, from chaotic crashing rockers to Velvets inspired, gentle poppiness. There's definitely enough in the way of intense Rallize-like distorto guitar on here to please those into YYT's colleagues LSD-March and Up-Tight (as on the track "Penetration" that starts off all "Twist And Shout" before they burn up their amps in a firestorm of guitar noise).
For those who follow the Tokyo psych scene, we should mention that Yura Yura Teikoku features one of the members of The Stars, and that Michio Kurihara (Ghost/White Heaven/The Stars) often guests on their records, though we don't know if he's on here or not...but he IS quoted in a blurb on the obi calling Yura Yura Teikoku "the greatest band in the world"!!
Limited to 700 copies, presumably because that's how many left-over cds from the Japanese cd pressing Mesh-Key was able to buy up? Limited vinyl also due soon from Mesh-Key.
MPEG Stream: "Penetration"
MPEG Stream: "Became A Star"

ZABRODZKI, PIOTR & TATSUYA YOSHIDA Karakany (Vivo) cd 14.98
Drummer Tatsuya Yoshida from Japanese prog-crazies the Ruins teams up with Polish pianist Piotr Zabrodzki for these sixteen tracks of advanced "jazz" insanity, recently recorded in Warsaw. We'd never heard of Zabrodzki before, but he more than holds his own with the notoriously hyperkinetic Yoshida, playing distorted bass as well as piano (at the same time? sounds like it -- must be overdubbed, though you never know with a Yoshida project, as he's able to play, like, a half dozen instruments and sing all at the same time, so maybe his friends can too!). The duo's presumably improvised music wildly ranges along an extremely spastically noisy to almost classically jazzy continuum. They attain appropriately Ruins-y levels of Magmoid prog-ness (the throbbing bass pulsations! the octopoidal percussion frenzies!) punctuated with some gargling vocals from Yoshida. The ivories are tickled unto death by Zabrodzki, who plays with "Great Balls Of Fire" ferocity, fractured into the avantgarde abstraction of a Cecil Taylor. It's all very chaotic and complex, manic yet melodic. And meaningful? Maybe, we're puzzled by the African imagery found in the cd packaging, how does that fit with the quasi-scientific sounding song titles ("Permanent Beta Power", "Tri-Command Connector", "Oxymoron 9", "Micronode Examination", "Quick-Core", etc.), or the Poland/Japan connection also celebrated in the cd graphics with the flags of both countries? Who knows, but anyway Ruins/Yoshida fans should dig this, it's another in a long line of interesting, intense duets in which the drummer has taken part. Satoko Fuji is probably jealous.
MPEG Stream: "Bei-Bar"
MPEG Stream: "Rat-Tiristor Noise"

ZEITKRATZER & KEIJI HAINO Electronics (3) (Zeitkratzer) cd 17.98
The gorgeous image of a stagecoach barreling down a mountain roadside, as if being watched by a crow perched in a fir tree, has great appeal to an imagination that begins listening the moment it beholds a record's cover. Unfortunately, the music inside this cover does not really correspond to what is evoked by that image.
Not quite so mysterious, or adventurous, this live recording, complete with polite audience applause and the pristine but cold high end of a digital room recording, is probably less satisfying than actually having been at the performance(s) that brought together Japanese improv psych shaman Keiji Haino and the German experimental chamber music outfit Zeitkratzer. The physicality of Keiji's input - his vocalizations and percussive noises - rescues Electronics (3) from the banality of the "noise" its liner notes make such a fuss about. Sometimes it's a bad idea to read the liner notes! Whether it's just very naive or, more annoyingly, a stab at self-important academic validation, the essay that accompanies this disc offers little to make Zeitkratzer's project any more exciting or "important". Some name-dropping - Levi-Strauss, Nietzsche, Bach, musique concrete, Carlyle, Dionysus, Susan McClary (?), Debussy, etc. - sprinkled amidst lines of academic jargon and just a bit of actual information about the "construction" of this music, and rehearsals behind this record (aren't there artists and bands spontaneously creating such 'noise' music all the time? Artists like Haino?) makes one wonder why they just didn't opt for a photo of the the ensemble's gig bags for the cover? Couldn't the liner notes have simply said that these musicians were stoked to jam with Haino, and really let their hair down??
Having said all that, liner notes aside, for any Haino fan, this may be worth the purchase just for the dramatic track 3 alone, the approximately 25-minute "Sinfonia", given the peaks of ecstatic beauty reached by Haino's noise-making therein... tracks 1 and 2, "Aria I" and "Aria II", are rather more typical of haunting, eerie-sounding 20th century classical, albeit with added extremity due to the Haino factor.
This is the third in a series of Zeitkratzer collaborations entitled Electronics, the other two featuring Carsten Nicolai and Terre Thaemlitz respectively, and thus this is the most "out there" of 'em all, being more about improvisation than composition, Haino himself (on guitar, Theremin, voice, drums...) the equal of the entire ensemble that's accompanying him (on tuba, trombone, clarinet, cello, drums, etc.).
And now that we're listening to the disc, rather than reading that cd booklet, we've gotta say we're also really digging the "bonus" track 4, a "Drum Duo" (presumably of Haino and one lucky Zeitkratzer member). Their freeform percussion blitz gets down to business without any of the highbrow posturing of the previous, larger scale pieces.
MPEG Stream: "Aria II"
MPEG Stream: "Sinfonia"

ZENI GEVA 10,000 Light Years (Neurot Recordings) cd 14.98
Here's one to play loud! The first new album from Japanese heavyweights Zeni Geva in six years (their last being 1995's "Freedom Bondage" on Alternative Tentacles), their ninth-ish disc overall (more if you count tapes and splits etc.), is out now on Neurosis' Neurot label. Zeni Geva mastermind KK Null takes a break from his solo ambient/electronics projects to return to his roots: crushingly heavy metallic avant-rock, rooted in the Swans (and more proggy stuff too). Recorded by Steve Albini (who has collaborated with Zeni Geva many times before), this has a very Albini/Chicago vibe, sounding at times not unlike something like Dazzling Killmen. "10,000 Light Years" is mostly instrumental (although don't despair, there's still moments when you'll get to hear Null chant stuff like "Auto-Fuck!" in his gruff growl) with lots of quiet/loud dynamics, dissonant chords, and shifting song structures. It's perhaps Zeni Geva's most "post-rock" (prog rock?) record yet. And, they're still terrifyingly heavy, more brutal and metal than most "real" metal bands. Punishing, cathartic math-metal from the masters (the lineup this time: Null on guitar/vox, Tabata on guitar, and Fuji on drums).
RealAudio clip: "10,000 Light Years"
RealAudio clip: "Tyrannycide"

ZENI GEVA Freedom Bondage (Alternative Tentacles) cd 14.98
9 new songs from KK Null and crew. Heavy as ever, but with the addition of keyboards, acoustic guitar and melodic (!) singing on a couple of songs.

ZENI GEVA Freedom Bondage (Alternative Tentacles) lp 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
9 new songs from KK Null and crew. Heavy as ever, but with the addition of keyboards, acoustic guitar and melodic (!) singing on a couple of songs.

ZENI GEVA Maximum Money Monster (Cold Spring) cd 15.98
Swans. Godflesh. Big Black. Melvins. Eyehategod. Unsane. Zeni Geva. We're concerned here with the latter, who maybe aren't as well known as the first half dozen bands mentioned, but sure as heck belong in that illustrious company... and sound VERY much like some unholy, heavier-than-thou hybrid of all of 'em!! It's been a long time since we've had a new Zeni Geva album to write about... and no this isn't actually a new album. But we're still pretty excited. Every once in a while, we have the opportunity to list and review an old favorite. Something that's been out of print for longer even than we've been doing the Aquarius website and New Arrivals emails, that we'd never had the chance to stock and recommend before, that finally at long last gets a well-deserved reissue and is cause for much celebration 'round here. For instance, to name a couple of recent examples, Harvey Milk's My Love Is Higher Than Your Assessment Of What My Love Could Be. And Skullflower's IIIrd Gatekeeper. You'll note the examples we just cited are all on the "heavy" side... well that's 'cause what we're about to recommend here also pretty darn heavy. To say the least.
You may already be familiar with Japan's Zeni Geva, as they've been around for years and years. This cult "progressive hardcore" trio is the brainchild of guitarist Kazuyuki Kishino Null, also well-known for his "nullsonic" solo recordings. Definitely influenced by early Swans, KK Null started up the doomy and noisy ZG in about 1987. Previously he'd done time in Tokyo underground industrial noise-terrorists Absolut Null Punkt, and with prog act YBO2, which also featured drummer Tatsuya Yoshida, who of course later went on to lead the incredible Magmoid duo Ruins. Meanwhile, post-YBO2, Null formed the far more metallic* Zeni Geva. Null did draft Yoshida in to play drums on some early ZG material (wouldn't you?), and you'll here him here on about half of this disc's tracks, contributing his distinctive vocals as well to a couple songs. Ikuro Taketani (ex-Hanatarashi) plays drums on the other half. The lineup also includes Tabata Mitsuru (ex-Boredoms and Leningrad Blues Machine) on guitar. That's right, there's no bassist in Zeni Geva which is pretty incredible considering how hellishly heavy they are! And it's clear that ZG are something of a underground Japanese rock supergroup.
MMM was ZG's first cd release, coming out originally in 1990 on the UK's now long-gone Pathological label. It's a lumbering juggernaut fully blessed and bloated with everything we LOVE about Zeni Geva that would also be heard on later, Albini-produced releases like Total Castration and Desire For Agony: Utter headbanging, slo-mo, dirt-plowing destruction. Molasses thick riffs dripping from electric axes. Frenzied, technical bashing. Mathy post rock song structures. High-end guitar solo skree. Mean misanthropic attitude. Pounding repetition. Pounding repetition. Pounding repetition.... adorned with the aforementioned guitar soloing, providing a crashing, crushing soundscape to underscore the throaty proclamations of "Sweetheart!" or "War Pig!" or "Blackout!" from gruff vocalist/guitarist Null -- the lyrics to these tracks being little more than the song title shouted over and over with fervent anguish. Glorious stuff, massive and mesmeric.
From the first track, the 16 minute harrowing dirge-stomp "Slam King" that ends terrifyingly with waves of unaccompanied, effected vocals, to the last, the rhythmic and witchy "On Suicide", featuring lyrics borrowed from Bertold Brecht, this is scary, monolithic, artistic heaviness of the highest order.
Let's give a big thanks to Cold Spring for making this classic available once again (as part of a wave of Japanese releases including a new disc from noise legends CCCC). Though we don't see why Cold Spring felt the need to replace the original, much more colorful, and in our opinion, superior artwork, we are happy to note that they did make one major improvement. While the eight songs on the original disc were inexplicably presented as one loooong track with no separate-song indexing (annoying!) they're thankfully corrected that. Now you can skip right to "Guystick Bodie", or put "Skullfuck" on repeat. And in addition to the eight original tracks, they've added three previously unreleased bonus cuts as well! Devastating live versions of album cuts "War Pig" (a Zeni Geva song, not Sabbath's "War Pigs" plural) and "Skullfuck", along with "Dead Car, Sun Crash" (an early ZG number not included on the album proper), recorded in Tokyo circa 1988-89. Whee! Like we said, we're so stoked to get to list/review/recommend this!
*Though not metallic enough to be accepted by the online metal authority Encyclopedia Metallum it must be noted...
MPEG Stream: "Slam King"
MPEG Stream: "Sweetheart"
MPEG Stream: "War Pig (live)"