Ambient Music from Japan

Earlier this year I caught up with dear old chum Floating Head and we set ourselves the challenge of each recording a mix of Japanese ambient music. Several months later the work is done and here it is: two different takes on an hour-ish mix of ambient music by Japanese artists.

Floating Head’s description of how he put his mix together is included below, so here's my blurb. Floating Head and I go way back and connected over music, and an interest in Japanese art and literature among other things. We’ve mostly lived in separate cities (he in Barcelona, me in Melbourne) so we’ve kept in touch by sharing music, and talked music and reading recommendations, so this seems a natural extension. On his last visit we were talking current music interests – he mentioned Yui Onodera, I was on a Haruomi Hosono obsession – and we noted Susumu Yokota’s recent premature death, and our general abiding fondness for ambient music. From there somehow we got onto the idea of a challenge, a way of shaping our listening and providing an objective. This is the sort of thing I’m always keen for, given my sense of drowning in music and the flitting I do haphazardly from one world to the next.

Until the our mixes were finished all details were secret. Surprising only one overlap (Gallery Six’s ‘Hakasui Gasansui’), and very different sounds and approaches. I’m currently fascinated with the slick polish of 1980s music production of the more commercial variety, and Japanese 80s music seems to go one step slicker. That goes for ambient/new age music of that period too, as exemplified by artists like Yoshio Suzuki and Hiroshi Yoshimura, and everything on Hosono’s Yen Records label, where even twee lo-fi is hi-fi. I wanted to celebrate this sound, linking it with more recent, older, and varied work by Japanese artists. Beyond that I wanted it to be repeatedly listenable, erring on the pleasant side, without ruffling feathers (by either abrupt dynamic shift, or boring through lack of).

As for whether Japan has a unique take on ambient music, through associations with Zen tradition, a particular understanding of nature, space and silence, or somesuch, I would rather not comment. One thing that can be noted is that there does seem a large volume of ambient music made by Japanese artists. Is this the result of the economic boom in the 1980s and a need for corporate relaxation (see root strata), or a pervasive market for it by western audiences? Or a particular knack for synthesis? Or those notions touched on above...?

DJ Tropical Breeze: Japanmbient Mix:

1 Minamo Beginning Durée 12K 2010
2 Toshiki Kadomatsu Sea Song [Reprise] Sea Is A Lady BMG Victor 1987
3 Gallery Six Hakasui Gasansui Shimmering Moods 2015
4 Hiroshi Yoshimura Green Green Air Records Inc 1986
5 Yoshio Suzuki Meet Me In The Sheep Meadow Morning Picture JVC 1984
6 H Takahashi Soft Wave Sea Meditation Entertainment Systems 2015
7 Yoshio Ojima Serene Une Collection Des Chainon I Wacoal Art Centre 1988
8 Pass Into Silence Iceblink Calm Like A Millpond Kompakt 2004
9 Inoyamaland Morn Music for Myxomycetes Transonic Records 1998
10 Toshiro Mayuzumi Mandala Mandala Symphonie Columbia 1969
11 Midori Takada Trompe-l'oeil Through the Looking Glass RCA 1983
12 saburo ubakata from late spring Reflection Primal Kaico 2013
13 Susumu Yokota Azukiiro No Kaori Sakura Leaf 2000
14 Yoshio Ojima Glass Chattering Une Collection Des Chainon I Wacoal Art Centre 1988
15 Satoshi Ashakawa Image Under Tree Still Way Sound Process 1982
16 Akio Suzuki Bottle K7 Box Alm Records 2007
17 Haruomi Hosono wakamurasaki Tale of Genji OST Sony 1987
18 sawako Piano.cote Nu.it Baskaru 2014
19 Yui Onodera Cloudscape 01 Cloudscapes Serein 2015
20 Ryuichi Sakamoto Nostalgia Three Decca 2013
21 Kazumasa Hashimoto Ending Epitaph Flyrec 2004

Here's Floating Head's comments:

"To be honest I can’t quite remember the exact reason how this started. The real origin of the seed of the idea could have come from anywhere, perhaps just the need to have a basic concept to tie a mix together. Why Japanese in particular I cannot really say anymore. I don’t remember if there was a particular album or anything that triggered it off. But in any case, I remember discussing it with my good friend, fellow music lover and radio presenter Josh/DJ Tropical Breeze while in Melbourne at Christmas time. The idea from that time was that we would each prepare a mix of Japanese ambient music and publish them around the same time. Since then it has been a steady immersion in as much Japanese ambient, synth pop and experimental music as possible, around 6 months of focussed listening. While we did exchange names of artists and albums, there was no other insight into what the other was doing until we shared our mixes and track lists this week. Several of the artists consequently overlap, although in the end there is only one track that is the same between mixes, Hidekazu Imashige/Gallery Six’s Hakasui [Shimmering Moods].

My shortlist for the mix was 100 tracks clocking in at around 12 hours of sound if unedited and unmixed, so about one third of the tracks made the final cut and plenty more that didn’t make it. Consequently there is also quite a bit of overlap between tracks, with the first 17 tracks all fitting in to the first 25 minutes alone. That is, for the first 25 minutes there is generally at least two and sometimes up to four tracks playing at the same time. It’s a bit less crowded by the end.

One thing that surprised me making the mix, which was assembled carefully on Adobe Audition and in no way was mixed live, was that the tendency was to mix down tracks and not up as is usually the case. Not sure if this is something specific to Japanese ambient or it relates more to the superimposition of multiple tracks at the same time. In any case, the mix uses a lot of dynamic range and tries to emphasise the noise and the silence where possible.

I have seen quite a few Japanese artists complaining about lazy Western journalists describing their music in terms of Zen and related concepts, probably without really understanding anything about Zen and having only a post-card image of what Japan is really like. In any case, I really appreciate a lot of the material I found was based on field recordings and even in some cases people playing instruments as if joining in with nature and natural sounds as well as of course some temple sounds and related audio phenomenon. It would be interesting to talk directly to a lot of the artists and to see what terms they would use to describe their sounds and if Zen is a genuine interest or it is just a coincidence.


Floating Head: Japanese Ambient Mix:

1 Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. La Novia - Speed Guru (Live in Tokyo) Acid Mothers Temple 2002
2 Tetsu Inoue Background Story Instinct Ambient 1996
3 Ametsub Faint Dazzlings Mille Plateaux 2010
4 Ghost Masttillah Drag City 1996
5 Geinoh Yamashirogumi Shohmyoh Victor 1988
6 Ground Zero Paraiso 1 Trigram / ReR Megacorp 1995 / 2005
7 Gallery Six Hakusui Shimmering Moods 2015
8 Yui Onodera Rhizome 4 Gears Of Sand 2007
9 Buddhastick Transparent Labyrinth (Lunatique Lux) Sharira 1997
10 Adzuki 秋 / Autumn Adzuki Self-released (Bandcamp) 2014
11 松本 一哉（Kazuya Matsumoto） たゆたう水月（Tayutau suigetsu） Spekk 2015
12 Chihei Hatakeyama A bronze pike Room40 2015
13 松本 一哉（Kazuya Matsumoto） 秋霖（Shurin） Spekk 2014
14 Yasuaki Shimizu Kono Yo Ni Yomeri #2 Better Days 1982
15 Tetsu Inoue Remote DiN 2005
16 Stilllife 彗星 Nature Bliss 2014
17 Ippu-Do Alone Epic 1982
18 Stilllife やがて霞とともに Nature Bliss 2014
19 Ametsub 66 Mille Plateaux 2010
20 Michiru Aoyama World Shimmering Moods 2015
21 Yoichiro Yoshikawa Crater On The Moon (Short Version) Eastworld 1987
22 Yamaoka Late in summer Twice Removed 2015
23 Fourcolour Double 12k 2016
24 ENA Absorption #2 Samurai Horo 2014
25 Go Hiyama Hiku Stroboscopic Artefacts 2011
26 A.O.T. ”フィードバック (Go Koyashiki Remix)” (Rundgång) SonuoS 2013
27 Yui Onodera Semi Lattice Part 5 Baskaru 2015
28 Dumbtype Drawing #3 Digital Narcis 1997
29 Toshifumi Hinata Colored Air Alfa 1986
30 Maki Asakawa Onna Honest Jon's Records ? / 2015
31 Fruit Of The Original Sin Interscape (-X) Kin Sound Recordings 2001
32 Susumu Yokota Shinsen Leaf 2000
33 Buddhastick Transparent Morpheus (Eve Eva : X) Sharira 1996

1980s Japan - Are We 30 Years Behind?

With the contemporary obsession with 1980s Japanese music, epitomised by recent reissues of releases like Mariah and Dip In the Pool and less recent interest in City Pop and corporate new age by the likes of Green Linez and Root Strata, are we simply 30 years behind?





Certainly the Balearic New Age House that's currently popular owes much to 1980s Japan, particularly that from around these down under parts.





I doubt they'd mind the connection, all part of the retro world we're living in, but if we are 30 years behind should we be paying more attention to Japan in the 1990s to see what we're up for next? Shibuya-kei? Might not be so bad.

Abul Mogard: Circular Forms

Beguiling - if slightly untrustworthy - back story to Abul Mogard: apparently he's a retired Serbian metal worker who now makes industrial tinged electronic music. Nonetheless Circular Forms on Ecstatic Recordings is excellent. Touches of Deathprod and Thomas Koner in the 16 minute final piece 'House on the River', and in the hissing undercurrents of all four works here. Beautiful with hints of dread but never overpowering, remaining more alluring than threatening.

Motorik Futures

In refining the schtick for Pattern Repeat I listened to a lot of what could be termed ‘ambient motorik’, a not-quite-house-not-quite-ambient chugging music, zipping along an imaginary autobahn, at night of course, illuminated by neon blips and spacey bleeps, the synthetic rush providing a sensation of forward motion. Cast back to the likes of Neu!, Harmonia, Michael Rother et al and the original sense of the motorik, even Kraftwerk’s iconic Autobahn, and perhaps more so to the original NY Minimalists – Riley especially but early Glass too, repeated arpeggios evoking endless space and sense of movement. Add in the recent rediscovery of new age synths, the bucolic edges of low-fi industrial music, traces of synthetic Balearic disco, Patrick Cowley soundtracks … No shortage of early versions to explore.

In the present day there’s masses of stuff in this mould, too much perhaps, but also too much of quality to write off completely. Stretching from the new new age synth and guitar dudes of LA and beyond, of which there are very many, to the possibly kookier ends in Europe and elsewhere … Again, nothing really new here, and no need to lasso all this together aside from the fact that there is much fun to be had zinging across these sounds, stringing mixes together taking in these tangents. Here’s a few recent highlights:

From recent Opal Tapes collection (May 2014), Holvr’s “Space Weight” was a highlight and perfectly representative, acid for beanbags:


Postmodern Autobahn update:


Drifting into actual house rhythms but hardly dance music, everything Steve Moore does is smooth gold:


Getting more bucolic, Vermont is exemplary, and hopefully influential on future Pop Ambient collections:


Jurgen Muller - Science of the Sea – A homage/pastiche of an imaginary soundtrack to a 1970s Jacques Costeau figure, said to be the work of LA’s Norm Chambers…


… aka Panabrite, which his Sub Acquatic Meditations removes any doubt:


Much great stuff in this realm can be found on house and techno B-sides and album fillers, such as this:


… And the godfather of techno b-side motorik synthscapes:


And back further, this Michael Rother track is superb:


The net is wide but such beautiful music all this, and masses to explore.

Listening: 26 March 2013

The home stereo plays more ambient than most forms of music. Recently enjoyed the following:


Sawako (pictured): 'Tsubomi, Saku'


Northerner: 'The End of December'


Brian McBride: 'Several Tries in an Unelevated Style'


Akira Rabelais: 'With the Gift of Your Small Breath'

Der Prozess

'Somebody must have made a false accusation against Josef K., for he was arrested one morning without having done anything wrong.'

In response to such absurdity I present Somebody must have made a false accusation against Josef K..., an hour of ambient music.

Download: Somebody must have made a false accusation against Josef K...
Tracklist:

1. mark mcguire emergency exit
2. novisad sommersonnenschen
3. pass into silence big and small waves
4. clem leek at the mercy of the waves
5. gas pop
6. elluvium ogives redistributed
7. raphael anton irisarri voigt kampff
8. angelo badalementi nostalgia
9. rene hell adagio for string portrait
10. jurgen paape ein schone land
11. oneohtrix point never adagio in g minor
12. ulf lohmann on frozen fields
13. brian eno chamber lightness
14. chihei hatakeyama mirror
15. a winged victory for the sullen all farewells are sudden
16. morton feldman palais de mari
17. the caretaker the sublime is disappointingly elusive

Ruckverzauberung 4

I'm surprised at the lack of attention that has been paid to Wolfgang Voigt's latest ambient project Ruckverzauberung, especially given its similarities to, and expansion beyond, his universally praised Gas productions. Only two tracks have been released thus far: the typically-functionally-titled 'Ruckverzauberung 1' and 'Ruckverzauberung 2', the former on Pop Ambient 2011, the latter the A-side to Profan 34. Both are sonically dense, texturally rich, heavily processed treatments of classical music fragments, inviting close listening and further scrutiny. '1' is calmer and more peaceful, while '2' is dark and foreboding, employing warbled tones reminiscent of Oneohtrix Point Never. Here's '2':



So like Gas then, only here the gaseous element is largely absent, replaced with cleaner lines and more discernible source material, and in place of the surging drone we have shifting fragments and a greater sense of linear development. Certain patterns are repeated, shot through with delay and reverb, and then retreat, like motifs in classical composition. There is also a more overt focus on electronic timbres, bringing a sharpness entirely absent from Gas and also his work as All, which adds an element of menace more closely associated with the soundtracks of John Carpenter and Alan Howarth. There's none of the sheer aural bliss that oozes from parts of Konigsforst, Pop or Alltag 1-4.








Ruckverzauberung is clearly a significant work for Voigt as it's soon to be released in a limited art edition LP-sized double CD with Kafkatrax, an awkward format and pairing to be sure.



The latter though is good, prompting reviews in two subsequent issues of The Wire, with my take for Cyclic here. Appropriately confused videos by 29Nov to these too:




I wonder whether Kafkatrax get much play for the floor out at clubs? Figure it could work well within your contemporary dark Techno set a la Berghain etc. Does Voigt perform them? I'm still longing for the tranced-up version of Roxy's 'More Than This' he played with Jorg Burger back in 2008 at the Millenium Dome. What a song! Settle for this rendition in the meantime:

Ambient 7

Just discovered Eno's Shutov Assembly from 1992, apparently his 'Ambient 7'. What happened to 5 and 6? Anyway, it's wonderful, exactly what my sleep-deprived nerves need right now. Dedicated to Russian artist Sergei Shutov, of which the image above resemble Picabia's multiple image paitings.

The music is reminiscent of a stripped back On Land, with fewer threatening gestures, although threat never seems far away.



Highlight is the 16 minute 'Ikebukuro' - props to Eno for finding such beauty in that rat infested consumer cesspit, although the slow-motion flapping of wings could represent the crows that come out in the early hours to eat the shit the rats left behind.

Out on a Limb, 2

I've only got two albums to speak highly of for 2011, for now anyways, as I realise I've spent most of my time really enjoying old classical vinyl (yawn), polished genre music or reissues. The year's been great for the latter - John Beltran's Ambient Selections, Soul Jazz's Mysteron Killer Sounds, <i>Gene Hunt Presents Chicago Dance Tracks, with plenty of good House genre work from Workshop, Omar-S, Roman Flugel, Morphosis and plenty others. But adventure is hard to do, which is why these impressed:

Surgeon: Breaking the Frame
Much contemporary techno leaves me cold, particularly when heard in non-club contexts (all my listening these days). Its general lack of melody and reliance on more physical properties - volume, textural density and sheer thrust - make for lackluster listening through headphones. But Surgeon's latest was astounding, particularly the beatless tracks - my focus here. By channeling the surge of Whitehouse Noise and Alice Coltrane Free-Jazz Spirituality into vast, multilayered throbs Surgeon has created a kind of rhythm-less dance music, and proposed a new(ish) direction for techno producers/DJs to explore. Like much of the zeitgeist it works by ferreting about with existing music (A Coltrane, Whitehouse) but the result in tracks like 'Presence' and 'We Are Already Here' remains firmly Techno despite the absence of drums. Mind Bomb noticed something peculiar about the physical record too:

One is that the vinyl version beginsinside the run-in groove, especially for the techno track “The Power of Doubt” suggesting perhaps that it has “broken the frame” as it exists outside the physical space of the record' is interesting here too.

Kyle Bobby Dunn: Ways of Meaning
This is like the polar opposite of Surgeon, a record so soft and wispy as to have almost no momentum nor substance. Kyle Bobby Dunn works in vapour, gorgeous scented mist on Ways of Meaning, an album so amorphous and shamelessly pretty it feels unnatural in 2011. Nothing structurally new here, tones mostly taken from Eno's Apollo soundtracks, but the sustained cotton wool nebulousness, and Dunn's ability to keep us interested within such uniformity, makes Ways of Meaning a geuinely outstanding ambient release.

Kyle Bobby Dunn - Canyon Meadows by desire path recordings

Kyle Bobby Dunn - Canyon Meadows from joe morgan on Vimeo.

More on the genre work later.

G.R.R.L.

Everyone knows what a producer Terre Thaemlitz is but he's also a good DJ, not in the deft Q-Bert/Jeff Mills turntablist manner but as a selecter, crafting cohesive and convincing narratives from a string of distinct records. This set for Made Like A Tree is an understated stunner, crafted entirely from Thaemlitz productions it's naturally consistent, but the blend between subdued house and beatless ambient is beautifully achieved, creating a wonderfully downbeat whole linked by gaseous synth swirls and jazzy piano interludes.

Thaemlitz's ivory twinkling can actually become quite dissonant, which upsets the usual mold of mindless jazz-house riffing, but it's so washed out by processing that it's easily overlooked. Listen up though and you'll hear Cecil Taylor-esque forearm chords and dynamic atonal stabs, doubtless played on the same overtly plastic midi piano used on her Rubato records.



I'd read about Thaemlitz's penchant for playing whole tracks, crossfading at song's end, but it's more complicated than that sounds, and in part closer to Michael Mayer's late beatmatch approach. The tempo is consistent(ly slow) throughout, and the beatless selections that link most tracks segue effortlessly, as do those with drums. It's inspired me to want to try and play records differently, and mix ambient more readily with rhythmic house music.

Right Click to Download: G.R.R.L. Mlat46

1. Terre Thaemlitz - There Was a Girl / There Was a Boy Declaramation [Mille Plateaux]
2. Terre Thaemlitz - Taking Stock in Our Pride [Mille Plateaux]
3. Terre Thaemlitz - G.R.R.L. : Face (Extended Dub Edit) [Comatonse]
4. Terre Thaemlitz - Double Secret [Comatonse]
5. Terre Thaemlitz - Chugga : Theme From Buck Rogers Light Rope Dance (500 Year Orbit Mix) [Comatonse]
6. Zeitkratzer & Terre Thaemlitz - Down Town Kami-Sakunobe [Zeitkratzer Records]
7. Terre Thaemlitz - Commodité Sexuelle [Mille Plateaux]
8. DJ Sprinkles - Brenda's $20 Dilemma [Mule Musiq]
9. DJ Sprinkles - Ball'r (Madonna Free Zone) [Mule Musiq]
10. Terre Thaemlitz - Chugga : Theme From Buck Rogers Light Rope Dance (Deep Space Probe Mix) [Comatonse]
11. Terre Thaemlitz - Systole.009 [Mille Plateaux]
12. Terre Thaemlitz - Residual Expectation [Caipirinha Productions]
13. Terre Thaemlitz - Resistance to Change - 4. Transformative Nostaligia [Mille Plateaux]
14. DJ Sprinkles - Midtown 120 Blues [Mule Musiq]
15. DJ Sprinkles - Grand Cental Station. Pt. II (72hrs. By Rail From Missouri) [Mule Musiq]

The Sight Below / Rafael Anton Irasarri

I've been a big fan of Rafael Anton Irisarri's work since I heard his incredible The North Bend on Room 40 - bleak Badalementi-esque ambiance evoking some terribly sad place, less defined by portentous Lynchian horror than by the barren aftereffects of such menace, the alienation of a world emptied of hopes and dreams. After that I tracked down all his stuff, the Lynch connection made concrete on 'A Great Northern Sigh':


... and 'Lumberton' (a favourite of bvdub):


... along with his other influences - 'VoigtKampff's nod to Wolfgang:


... recordings of Satie's 'Gnossienne #1' (with Goldmund):


... and Part's 'Fur Alina':


... all demonstrate just how close his tastes are to mine. It's fortunate, and oddly rare, that I like his music, as all too often one comes across artists who cite fantastic influences only for their work to be total shit.

I'd read somewhere about Irisarri's other project The Sight Below but only heard it this morning, thanks to my dear friend Christo. Here the Voigt influence - read Gas - is clearly audible: dark, slowly unfolding synthetic waves powered by steady bass drum. There's less presence than with Gas, and less detail in the midrange drones, which Irisarri creates from effected guitar, not samples. There's also ample originality to justify its independent existence - a kind of shoegaze Voigt, or 'Gas meets Grouper' as one friend put it. These from 2008's Glider:





By 2010's It All Falls Apart there's less Gas and more Grouper, with Slowdive's Simon Scott on board to deliver added whoosh, as on 'Stagger'


... and there's vocals even, by Jesy Fortino of Tiny Vipers on Joy Division cover 'New Dawn Fades':


Beautiful and interesting music. I'm reminded too that other titan of ambient techno, Markus Guentner





Irissari favours vinyl, so check here for links to buying it.

Listening: Early Part of w/e 29 May 2011

Was hungover yesterday morning after too much champers at my four-week-old's welcome party. Even codeine couldn't help. Forgot my ipod too so had to listen to humanity on the tram, ghastly. Got home and needed comforting, so listened to the following.

I hadn't played Eno's Ambient 4: On Land for a while, and my how wonderful it is. With the gently chirruping frogs he skirts close to scented candle territory, yet paradoxically it's also his darkest ambient work. Marked by indigestion-like groans and slow, grating stomach twists, it's relieved by a shimmering warmth and soothing Gaviscon glow; an expertly balanced album.



Also listened to Akira Rabelais's excellent Caduceus from late last year, another album with two poles to it: gorgeous, sinuous threads of sound, and Mego-esque noise bursts sharp like a scalpel. I skipped the latter and savoured the former: as beautiful as anything he's done, slippery threads of guitar tone sliding between faint gritty elements, his trademark processing needling them deep into your ear cavity.





Excerpt below from Alain Resnais' Last Year at Marienbad, shades of the art from Motion Sickness of Time Travel:







Above all from Caduceus, fantastic album. His website remains uniquely odd, based upon changes from the I-Ching, a la Cage. Developed years ago when the web was in its infancy, sad that it still stands out as innovative in an interweb choked with obedient blandness.

akirarabelais.com

His software Argeiphontes Lyre is also available here, Mac users only, although I've never worked out how to access anything from his cryptic website:

Argeiphontes Lyre

And a wee treat: Hollywood:

Hollywood

We'll hear more from Rabelais in future, he's long been a favourite of mine, but I'll leave you with this:

Mix: Preparing for the Aerotropolis

While fretting over recent tumultuous personal events I found solace in the soothing tones of ambient music, and one night I hit the wheels of steel and came up with this. I call it Preparing for the Aerotropolis, a collection of sweet yet anxious pieces, reflecting the nervous yet hopeful state of mind of those awaiting vast change.

Preparing for the Aerotropolis
Ekkehard Ehlers: Rund (mille plateaux)
The Caretaker: It's All Forgotten Now (vv/m)
Philip Jeck: Chime Again (touch)
Loscil: Dub For Cascadia (kranky)
IMPS: Jonty's Way (Jan Jelinek Remix) (mule electronic)
William Basinski: DLP 1.2 (2062)
Brian McBride: Supposed Essay On The Piano (kranky)
Sawako: Air Aif (12k)
JZ+ARKH.CO.UK: Ddrhodes (kompakt)
Akira Rabelais: Pleure De Le Voir Gai Comme Un Oiseau Des Bois (orthlorng musork)
Ulf Lohmann: Falling Down (kompakt)
Brian Eno: An Ending (Ascent) (polydor)

Thank you. I hope that wherever you are the world is just dandy.