Sharon Van Etten: Torch songs for the indie era

Posted on February 28, 2015 by dangrunebaum

Escaping an abusive relationship that she chronicles in her songs, Sharon Van Etten was a late bloomer. But the New Jersey native’s emotive rock ballads are finding an increasingly engaged audience. The 33-year-old spoke with Metropolis about her new album Are We There, from her home in New York City.

The New Jersey native, known for her emotive ballads

What are you up to?

Cooking in the middle of a snowstorm. I’m making a stew—it’s the first time I’m doing a stock from scratch. It’s nice to cook because I don’t get much chance. It makes me feel like a normal person.

Because you’re on tour a lot?

Yeah, and when I’m home in the Village, it’s usually only for a week. I like to watch movies and play the piano. Usually, I’m not composing, just playing stuff. It feels good to play without it being for a specific purpose.

Do you often compose on piano?

I’m starting to—but it was hard to keep a piano in New York, until my friend told me about this brand of Melody small-scale pianos. Mine was only 500 dollars.

How does writing on piano differ from guitar?

The rhythmic patterns are different, and much more simple, because I’m not very good on piano. I naturally gravitate to mid-tempo ballads, and, in a way, the piano favors that. I don’t write a lot of upbeat songs, and I don’t think I could write one on piano.

Tell us about a new song.

I have a song called “Sentence,” that’s only four chords. The lyrics aren’t there yet, but I have a melody. The idea is how in one sentence, someone can change the way you feel about them.

Do your songs tend to evolve gradually?

I have some songs that pour out of me, and they tend to be the longer ones—“Your Love Is Killing Me” is one that just poured out. But for the most part, it takes a lot of work, and the lyrics are the hardest part. If the song borders on personal, then I’d rather take more time to think about it.

Tell us about the creation of one song on Are We There.

“Taking Chances” was one of the songs that I first wrote on the Omnichord. It’s an electronic autoharp. It’s very ’80s. It has beats and chords on it, with one button you can play a chord. So I started writing like crazy on it. When I brought it into the studio, I started tracking the beats and vocals and melodies separately. Eventually we cut the beats out and let the band do their thing.

A fair bit has been written about your time in Tennessee and how that shaped your experience emotionally. But how did it shape you musically?

I worked at a café called the Red Rose that booked all-ages shows. The people that booked the place taught me a lot about the scene. I learned a lot about touring and bands on the road, and all different kinds of music. Cat Power, Sons of Ohio … all sorts of bands came through. But I also learned about country because I had friends who were session players and whose parents were real old-school Nashville country writers.

Which song do your fans request most, and why you think that is?

They ask for “Every Time the Sun Comes Up” a lot, because it’s the one light-hearted moment I have on the record and it’s fun to sing along to, even though it’s not a light-hearted song.

Have any of your fans credited you for rescuing them from suicide?

I think I’m far from rescuing people, but I think people don’t feel alone. They’re like, “Oh you’re sad too. You say the things I don’t know how to say.” A lot of listeners find comfort that other people are feeling pain, and are able to rise above it. People say my songs are sad but uplifting. I’m not sure I’m saving anybody. But I hope my music helps people somehow—otherwise I wouldn’t be doing this.

Before you found music, did you have other ways of getting those feelings out?

I made music for a very long time, without realizing it was therapeutic. I did choir and musicals and played guitar throughout my childhood, and I didn’t really take it seriously until my 20s. I had no idea what I was doing. But people started responding the more personal the songs got.

Did you find yourself more able to put feelings down in song as you kept doing it?

My mom gave me a notebook in high school at a time when I didn’t want to talk about anything. She gave me a notebook and I didn’t realize what I was doing, but I would write down my feelings, and eventually they became songs.

Why does music exist?

I think people have a hard time expressing themselves and it’s one way of communicating when you’re having a hard time verbalizing. It’s something you can feel without having to know why.

OK Go: Viral masters go Tokyo

Posted on December 31, 2014 by dangrunebaum

When Tokyo Flow reaches OK Go’s Damian Kulash, the singer is in Phoenix for a funeral. Despite the circumstances, Kulash’s trademark enthusiasm bubbles back as talk turns to the band’s tour-de-force video for “I Won’t Let You Down,” shot in Japan.

“It really was a new experience in a lot of ways,” he says. The piece features thousands of Japanese high school girls dancing en masse, filmed by drone from above, and the four members of OK Go gamboling about on Honda U3-X personal mobility devices.

“Director Morihiro Harano and the band saw eye to eye,” Kulash continues about the video which, at this writing, had been viewed
15 million times on YouTube. “It’s always magical when you align with someone creatively, and you feel like the whole is more than the sum of the parts. It’s even more magical when you’re crossing the language barrier.”

Choreographed by Japan’s Air:man, “I Won’t Let You Down” is a disco-flavored trifle of a dance number that sees the high school girls—epitomizing kawaii—deploying umbrellas in precise movements to create what from above looks like a shifting work of contemporary art.

People may be reminded of Japanese painter Yayoi Kusama’s dots or North Korea’s mass games, but the main inspiration goes back to 1930s Hollywood. “Busby Berkeley was a famous American choreographer from the ’30s, and he liked graphic aerial shots a lot,” Kulash explains, “so what you see in our video with the kaleidoscopic shots from on high, he often did that in the studio with dancers.”

Forming in Chicago in the late ’90s, OK Go have become known as much for their peppy pop-rock and their stint as the house band for NPR’s “This American Life,” as for their elaborate videos, which collectively boast over 100 million YouTube views.

To what does OK Go ascribe the remarkable audience for their videos online? “We don’t try to spell out our lyrics or match the song’s emotional content,” hazards Kulash. “We look at the shape of the song, and try to match the arc of it. For example, with a sad song, rather than trying to make a sad video, we try to make something with the same ups and downs. What we hope is people will see that this three-minute thing is not about the lyrics, it’s just this piece of art for them to like—there’s a radical transparency of process.”

ok go 3 Ok Go goes Tokyo

The success of OK Go’s videos means the revenues from them form a key part of the band’s income, and Kulash even appears on panels devoted to the secrets of making viral videos. The band has become something of a poster child for the way post-analog bands leverage numerous media formats to get their music out.

“We like to think that recorded music in the 20th century existed in a bubble and there were no commercial pressures on it, and it was art,” Kulash reflects, “and no wonder we hated the labels—they were doing all the dirty work and paying themselves 90 percent of the profits.”

Kulash observes that in the current, more complex environment of downloads and streams, it’s more difficult to figure out the commercial side of one’s artistic endeavor. OK Go’s solution has been to, so to speak, get in bed with the enemy.

“We find it creatively freeing to go into business with people directly,” he says. “We know then what’s expected of us and vice versa. So rather than having a record company who thinks they know better than you what to do with your art, we work with people who want to be associated with what we do. It’s a much healthier relationship.”

In the case of “I Won’t Let You Down,” there’s the obvious promotion for Honda’s mobility device. “I can’t discuss the specifics of our deal with Honda—but we knew what was expected of us and what wasn’t,” says Kulash. “We knew they would let us make the video exactly as we wanted and have creative control. They didn’t want to change what we were doing because they liked it.”

Kulash says people need to get over the idea of sponsorship as crass. “That’s where a lot of the music is to be found these days because radio plays only a few extremely well-funded acts,” he says. “I have problems with corporate domination of culture, but as long as I’m not in a position where I’m shilling products, I’d rather be where culture is actually happening than try to avoid it.”

OK Go has had a fan base in Japan ever since touring its eponymous debut album in 2002. Last summer’s packed Fuji Rock appearance and the upcoming sold-out date in Tokyo indicate just to what extent “I Won’t Let You Down” has cemented the band’s relationship with people here. “In Japan, it feels like everyone is a nerd about something—whether it’s film or rock ‘n’ roll or bowling,” Kulash says. “Having our music finally take off there just feels right.”

The singer is an astute observer of the way music scenes have evolved since OK Go’s days on the Chicago band scene. “Those communities used to be based around physical proximity,” he notes. “They still exist, but now they’re based around concepts or styles or artistic choices rather than geographic locations.”

Whether in a close physical community of bands, or a digitally diffused community of creators, the social role of music is clearly one of its most important. But Kulash says it’s music’s secret sauce that made it his life choice.

“For me, music is the only thing that can scratch that itch,” he says. “I think the reason why is, life is not simple. In your most joyous moments there is melancholy. For example, I’m talking to you from a funeral today. Being human is so complex and magnificent, and for me the interplay of sounds speaks to me in those complex emotions.

“An amazing fact is that when people sing together, their heartbeats align, and they release oxytocin on the level of sex. Oxytocin generates feelings of loyalty and love, and if you can generate that in a society by performing music, then it has a huge function in making society whole. It’s amazing that you can get the same answer scientifically and emotionally and evolutionarily—which is that music is fucking magic.”

Indie Seers: Ogre You Asshole’s elegant introspection

Posted on December 12, 2014 by dangrunebaum

A sense of honeyed sadness suffuses Nagano indie rockers Ogre You Asshole’s new album Papercraft. “If you must put it into words,” frontman Manabu Deto says of the trilogy the disc completes, “the unifying theme of those three albums would be ‘someplace cozy and comfortable, yet miserable.’”

Deto is reluctant to comment further on any specific themes of the album’s songs but prodded on the matter, offers the following metaphor: “Something that looks decent on the surface could be so shallow and flimsy when viewed from a different angle—like a stage prop in a play.” It’s a sentiment reflected in the cover of Papercraft, which depicts a Hollywood-style building façade: All surface and no depth.

Perhaps it’s the slower pace of country life or the distance from Tokyo’s commercial entertainment industry, but Ogre You Asshole’s sound impresses as more contemplative than that of many indie rock outfits in the capital.

All surface and no depth: The Papercraft cover depicts Hollywood-style building facade

Since forming a decade ago in Nagano, the band has stubbornly resisted the lures of the big city. The ability to step back and do something expansive and conceptual is important to its members. “Creative activities of artists change with the times,” Deto says, “even more so in the rapidly changing times we live in. In such a transitory world, in order for Ogre not to be affected by fast-changing trends and create a series of works with a strong unifying theme, we had an understanding between the band and our production team that it was necessary for us to take a few years making three albums so our listeners could gain an understanding of our work.”

Papercraft launches with “Someone’s Dream,” a noire outing that sounds like it could appear on a Wim Wenders or Quentin Tarantino soundtrack. The album then segues through the boogaloo beats of “Perfect Lovers in the Perfect City” to the laconic, slide guitar-driven title track.

Throughout, Deto’s singing and his bandmates, guitarist Kei Mabuchi, drummer Takashi Katsuura and bassist Takashi Shimizu’s playing are understated yet always unexpected. Listeners familiar with cult psych rock band Yura Yura Teikoku will detect a rich vein of quirky influences from leader Shintaro Sakamoto.

Deto cites Sakamoto’s “strong concepts,” and Papercraft was in fact produced by You Ishihara and engineered by Souichiro Nakamura, both of whom worked with Yura Yura Teikoku. The album’s analog recording approach and use of vintage instruments like the mellotron also impart a nostalgic acid rock atmosphere that gives it a certain kinship with Sakamoto’s work.

Ogre’s psych rock appeal has made the group a favorite touring partner of bands like Modest Mouse (whose bassist gave them their name from the film Revenge of the Nerds), Wolf Parade and Deerhunter. Live, the band stretches out on extended improvisational excursions that evoke Krautrock, another key influence.

But Ogre You Asshole aren’t trying to lead or follow any specific trend or pop music phenomenon. “For the past few years, I’ve been listening mainly to music of the ‘60s and ‘70s, so I don’t really know much about the current music scene,” Deto says.

“I thought bands such as Deerhunter, MGMT and Wolf Parade, with whom we performed in Japan, were all good. I recently heard Flying Lotus and Ariel Pink, and they were good too. But we don’t really know much about them and aren’t so interested in what’s happening in the Japanese band scene.”

Dec 27, 7pm. ¥3,600. Liquidroom, 3-16-6 Higashi, Shibuya-ku. Nearest station: Shibuya. http://meturl.com/ogrepapercraft

Ten Indispensable Albums
We asked Ogre You Asshole’s Manabu Deto to name ten albums he simply could not do without.

Joe Meek, I Hear a New World
Kei (Mabuchi/OYA’s guitarist) wrote a song that reminded me of this Joe Meek album, which we recorded for the Japanese Anime “Space Dandy.”
Can, Tago Mago
Back in our college days, a friend of mine used to play this album a lot. It brings back memories and so I guess this is my favorite of all Can albums.
Modest Mouse, This Is a Long Drive for Someone With Nothing to Think About
This is the album that I listened to most in my college days when we started our band. It’s different from the kind of music we play now as OYA, but I still think it sounds great.
Todd Rungren, Something Anything?
I like all of Todd Rungren’s albums, but particularly like this one. I guess this album shows what I think of as “mellow.”
Arthur Russell, World of Echo
It’s so soothing that I could just keep listening to it.
Stereo Lab & Nurse With Would, Simple Headphone Mind
I’ve been listening to Stereo Lab for quite some time, but I’ve just recently heard this album they made with a noise/industrial rock band called Nurse With Wound for the first time. I thought that they were doing the kind of minimal musical phrases we sought to create (on our new album Papercraft) already in the ‘90s.
Terry Riley, A Rainbow Curved Air
The thing I like about Terry Riley is that his music sounds inorganic, but if you keep listening to it, it gradually leads you to a trippy state.
Yo La Tengo, And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out
The thing I like about Yo La Tengo is that just by listening to their album, I can tell that they truly love music.
Throbbing Gristle, 20 Jazz Funk Greats
In between albums “100 years passed” and “Papercraft”, OYA released an album called “Confidential” which we rearranged songs from our early days. We came up with the ideal of adding industrial rock elements like that of D.A.F. and Throbbing Gristle and it turned out quite interesting.
Lou Reed, Transformer
The first solo album by Lou Reed that I ever listened to was New York (released in 1989). I thought that I prefer the Velvet Underground over his solo works, but then when I started listening to his earlier solo albums released during the ‘70s, I came to like his solo works more.

Uhnellys CD Release Party: Avant-garde rap-rock duo presents Loopholic

Posted on November 26, 2014 by dangrunebaum

Avant-garde rap-rock duo Uhnellys welcomes special guest Seagull Screaming Kiss Her Kiss Her for what looks to be one of the season’s best live music nights.

With guitarist, rapper and sampler-extraordinaire Kim at the mic and the lovely—and dead solid—Midi on the drums, Uhnellys is consistently one of Japan’s most energetic and imaginative rock outfits.

Aggressively philosophical, the band celebrates the release of its latest live outing, Loopholic, on December 22 in Daikanyama.

Dec 22, 7pm, ¥2,500 (adv)/ ¥3,000 (door). Daikanyama Unit. Nearest station: Daikanyama.

The Mornings: Post-hardcore trio explores new ideas

Posted on November 21, 2014 by dangrunebaum

The Mornings are a band of ideas. It’s no coincidence they’ve named their brand-new album Idea Pattern.

But when Metropolis first speaks with them, it’s last winter and the trio is busy rehearsing at a friend’s Asagaya studio for a gig celebrating the band’s tenth anniversary.

“At first, we didn’t know what we were doing—we just did what we wanted. We were naive college students,” says singer/guitarist Junya Kishino. “We’d always wanted to do something original, but we didn’t have the ability to pull it off. I think our skills have finally reached the level where we can do what we want to.”

Emerging out of the post-hardcore scene, the band’s early material was intended to be cathartic. “On our first album, work stresses were a big theme,” Kishino continues. “I come from punk and hardcore, so there’s some of that influence in the first album. But on the second album, the ideas are more imagistic. I always think, if people listen to music with their eyes closed, what would come to mind? Then I write based on what that might be.”

The Mornings’ third album, Idea Pattern, builds on this impulse. The Tokyo band, which also includes keyboardist/vocalist Shimpei Watanabe and drummer “Kemono” (“beast”) Keika, was looking to create music that demands more of the listener.

“Compared to the last album, this one is not only catchier,” they say. “It’s also difficult to say exactly what kind of music it is.”

Listeners may recognize a bit of the thrashy blend of guitar rock and electronica that characterizes bands such as Japan’s Boom Boom Satellites. But The Mornings’ music has a headier quality—something akin to their heroes Radiohead—that makes it equally as suited to headphones as to the mosh pit.

“VSCOM,” for example, begins with Kraftwerk-era synth bloops before launching into Keika’s formidable drumming. Dub-ified vocals from Watanabe are chopped into fragments before Keika drops in with a singsongy, almost J-pop refrain. And then, without warning, it ends.

Idea Pattern by The Mornings

“From the first 11/8 meter sampler phrase, I aimed for something that sounds a bit like an electronic, kaleidoscopic version of the Matrixsoundtrack,” says main songwriter Watanabe. “The rhythm has abrupt changes and tricky drum and bass, but it’s not intended to sound tricky or make you feel uncomfortable. We put a lot of time into arranging this song. Especially in the last violent climax of the song, the previous parts all come together in an unexpected way.”

The Mornings turned to noted Japanese dubstep producer Goth-Trad to helm the production of Idea Pattern. “We had cosmic images in mind,” they say. “In order to bring out that atmosphere, we felt the only way to do it was to work with a cutting-edge electronic music producer.”

The band says it was the right choice. “It wasn’t only that Goth-Trad understood our intention and gave form to it, but also that he understood the potential of songs that even we ourselves didn’t have a sense of. He’s very detailed and makes good decisions; we got a sense of why he’s respected as a producer worldwide.”

With the band members holding down serious day jobs as copywriters, corporate planners and IT headhunters, The Mornings are a determined lot to stay together for ten years. What have they learned in a decade on Tokyo’s often soul-sucking “live house” scene?

“Most of the bands that started around the same time have broken up,” Watanabe says, laughing at the question. “I just turned 30, around the age when many give up. A lot of people make music for commercial success, and when that doesn’t happen they stop.

“For us now at 30—I have a kid and our drummer is also married—it will be harder for us to balance our lives, and there will be tradeoffs. If we’re going to sacrifice, then we want to make music that will go down in history in some way.

“You never know if you’re going to sell records, so you may as well do something special.”

Idea Pattern release party Nov 19, 7:30pm, ¥2,500. Shimokitazawa Shelter. Nearest station: Shimokitazawa.

http://themornings.biz

Mr. Porter “A Saturday with…Zim of Black Shadow”

Posted on November 14, 2014 by dangrunebaum

Film by Mr Antony Crook (Text by Dan Grunebaum)

They are Tokyo icons. Visit Yoyogi Park or the waterfront of Odaiba on a Saturday or Sunday and they’ll be there, rain or shine. Swivelling in leather get-ups to vintage rock blasted through portable sound systems, they’re Japan’s self-styled rockabillies.

Zim is the leader of Black Shadow, a well-known gang who dress up like 1950s rock’n’rollers. During the week, Zim is Mr Kinya Ueno and he holds down a regular nine-to-five job. But he prefers not to talk about his life Monday to Friday, for he is a man who is truly working for the weekend.

Black Shadow’s heyday was in the 1980s, when Japan experienced a retro-rock boom and American and British pop culture offered an irresistible lure of freedom to rebellious Japanese youths, who railed against a conservative society ruled by the proverb “the nail that sticks out gets hammered down”.

Zim left high school in the provinces as soon as he could and fled to Tokyo as a teenager, determined to become part of the scene. Like many who reject Japan’s corporate treadmill, his decision consigned him to a life on the margins.

But for a member of Black Shadow, being part of the gang was more than ample reward. Music and fashion provided more of a satisfying life than being one of Japan’s corporate salaryman drones ever could.

Heavily tattooed, clad in black leathers and with their “Regent” pompadour hairstyles blow-dried and styled to crazy heights, Black Shadows do what many Japanese can only dream of: express themselves. Extravagantly. Unabashedly.

Now these rock’n’rollers are growing old. Zim, now 45, has been in the gang for nearly 30 years. But teens today are into J-pop or electronic dance music. They have home-grown styles such as cosplay (dressing up in anime/ manga/ cartoon costumes) and don’t look to the West as much as Zim’s generation once did.

Still, as long as Zim can wax his Regent and shake his hips to the rock’n’roll beat, he’ll keep coming back each weekend to the place – and the people – that gave him his identity and set him apart from the mainstream; that made him and all the Black Shadows, in a word, different.

Rock in Opposition: European fest explores prog-rock’s potential in Japan

Posted on November 11, 2014 by dangrunebaum

The original Rock in Opposition (RIO) took place on March 12, 1978 in London, England. It brought together European prog-rock bands united by their common unmarketability to major record labels, including such acts as England’s Henry Cow, Italy’s Stormy Six and Belgium’s Univers Zero.

Over 35 years later, the fest finally sets foot in Japan, chaired by Akiko Nagai. Head of Disk Union’s progressive rock section for seven years, Nagai also helms the Tutinoko label, on which some of the RIO musicians have released albums. Nagai sat with Metropolis to discuss how it all came about.

How did Rock in Opposition come to Japan?

It grew out of the first tour by RIO headliners Univers Zero. The core group of people behind the festival were involved in producing the tour. Then our release of the documentary DVD About Rock in Opposition sold well, showing there is a demand for this sort of event in Japan. We then negotiated with French RIO festival directors Michel Besset and Chris Cutler for the rights to the name. As it turned out, the name “Rock in Opposition” was already in the public domain. We then linked up with Smash West and the Tokyo Arts Council to put it together.

What are your hopes for Tokyo’s first Rock in Opposition?

We want to share the history of Rock in Opposition with many people—not only prog-rock fans but all people with open ears. We also want to bring together the worldwide rock scene with the Tokyo scene, in hopes that something new will emerge, and that it will provide a platform for avant-garde music in Japan. RIO is expensive to put on, and the tickets aren’t cheap, but we hope that if it’s successful one day we can put on a free concert.

What is the audience like for progressive rock in Japan?

Japan’s prog-rock market is large. Bands can fill large halls here. But there are a lot of young bands that borrow prog-rock’s forms, rhythm changes and instrumentation, but aren’t really progressive rock in the true sense of the term. We don’t want to host a nostalgia-fest. The artists on our lineup are forward-thinking—“progressive” in the true sense of the word. The music may be difficult, but we hope our audience will rise to the challenge.

Nov 15-16, 3pm, ¥14,000. Tsutaya O-East. Nearest station: Shibuya. Tel: 03-5458-4681.

www.rockinopposition-japan.com/index_en.html

Fuji Rock Festival 2014: Still an unmatched feast of sounds

Posted on October 4, 2014 by dangrunebaum

Fuji Rock turned 18 this year, an age when newly minted adults are able to drink and drive in many countries.

Promoter Smash marked Fuji’s coming of age quietly. Japan’s marquee rock festival isn’t the rapidly growing sprout of its early years. Instead, like its model Glastonbury, Fuji Rock has reached a stage of maturity where few surprises are expected, but it can still be trusted to deliver an unmatched feast of sounds—and offer a snapshot into the state of international music in Japan.

For some perspective consider the following: when Fuji began in 1997, this year’s headliners, Canada’s ambitious Arcade Fire were still fresh-faced teenagers. Late-breaking New Zealand songstress Lorde was an eight-month-old infant.

With Japan’s youth population in a tailspin, Smash has had to cultivate the loyalty of its aging rock demographic. This it’s done in style by building its kids area into a memorable Tarzan-adventure treat (disclosure: I attended with son in tow for the first time).

The quoted attendance of 102,000 over three days was down a bit from peak years, but among the revelers was a growing contingent of families. Cultivating a multigenerational audience—long a goal of Smash boss Masa Hidaka—and attracting more folks from overseas (Chinese accents were heard frequently this year), look to be the key to maintaining Fuji’s run of success.

The larger problem of whether rock itself is facing senescence is something festivals everywhere are grappling with. Fuji’s stabs at broadening its audience into the hip-hop market have yielded acts from Run DMC to Eminem. Kanye West was supposed to headline the 2014 edition but for unexplained reasons canceled, leaving a reunited Outkast to wave the banner.

In the meantime Smash can only hope that emerging lights such as deep-lunged Lorde and indie rock fairy princess St. Vincent—this writer’s best act of 2014—will one day be big enough to fill the Naeba Ski Resort’s gigantic Green Stage with a new generation of rock fans. With stadium-level classic rock, punk and even grunge-era rock bands in increasingly short supply and international music’s market share in Japan stagnant, Fuji Rock may look different in the future.

In addition to fighting to maintain international rock’s appeal in Japan, we’d also like to see Smash do a better job of alerting Japanese to their own emerging rock music. Toward this end we think it’s possible to achieve a more creatively curated selection of young domestic acts for the Rookie A Go-Go stage. This stage has been the launchpad for acts like Sambomaster, but for the most part doesn’t seem to host many of the intriguing bands on Japan’s underground live house circuit.

What isn’t in doubt about Fuji Rock is the promise of a rewarding and diverse weekend of music, performance, freak shows, mountain breezes, and a uniquely freewheeling break from Japan’s grueling day-to-day. It’s the last factor that more than anything else guarantees the festival’s future for many years to come.

Metropolis, July 31, 2014

Call and Response Records: Cutting-edge J-indies label turns 10

Posted on September 27, 2014 by dangrunebaum

British expat Ian Martin began “stalking” Japanese rock bands a decade ago, and soon founded Call And Response Records with a mission to bring undiscovered music from the archipelago to a wider audience. Martin talks music with Metropolis.

How did you first come across Japanese rock?

Just from growing up in Britain in the ’90s with Shonen Knife, Cornelius remixing Blur, Melt Banana; that sort of thing. But the actual ground scene came through this band called The Students who I started stalking at their shows. Seeing their gigs at empty venues, I felt I had to put on my own gigs. After doing that for a year, it felt natural to start a label.

What do you hope to achieve through Call And Response Records, and why should people listen to the new albums by Futtachi and Jebiotto?

I just want to get the music I release out to the kinds of people who will like it. Looking at these releases’s contrasts helped clarify what links the music that appeals to me. I love music like Futtachi’s, that takes something avant-garde and draws you in; or Jebiotto’s, that takes something really pop and sabotages it. That tension between discord and harmony is the key. Making the audience work a bit [to like the music] is showing them respect, and they’ll appreciate the result more. Once musician and audience reach toward each other, there’s a “call and response.”

What have you learned in a decade of running Call And Response?

You can’t please anyone all the time and you can’t please everyone any of the time. Whatever you do, things will go wrong. Find glimmers of light and cherish them.

You’re writing a history of Japanese rock: What are the most important differences between Japanese and Western rock?

There are broad differences between Japanese and Anglo-American pop in the number and sequencing of chords, the vocal delivery. The biggest difference, however, is the structure of the industry. In Japan, management companies have all the power, with the artists as salaried employees. Together with the labels, TV companies and advertising agencies, they make a sort of cartel. This makes the industry less prone to change. The structure that promotes popular music and the kinds of challenges facing talented artists trying to break in are where the big differences lie.

What are the biggest misconceptions about Japanese music?

The idea that Japanese music is just a “copy” of Western music is rubbish. Japanese rock and pop have had a lively domestic tradition since the ’60s, and the influence of overseas acts has shrunk to near-irrelevance by now.

Who do you tip to be the next Japanese act to go big internationally?

I think we’re going to see a lot of idol-style acts trying to reach overseas audiences—although trying to transfer a very Japanese promotional model to overseas markets that operate differently seems problematic. Frankly, there’s really no one in even semi-mainstream Japanese pop and rock that I think deserves overseas success.

20000V, Sep 27. See concert listings (popular) for details. http://callandresponse.jimdo.com

1. Hikashu Super, Hikashu (1981)

This album gathers a lot of the best tracks from the first couple of years of what is probably my favorite Japanese band ever. Hikashu represents one of the most original, trailblazing groups of the new wave era.

2. Atsureki,
Friction (1980)

Arguably the best Japanese punk album (though Meshi Kuuna by Inu runs close), Atsureki is effortlessly cool and fizzes with spiky energy.

3. Futurama, Supercar (2000)

Supercar was one of the bands that defined early 2000s Japanese rock, and while lots of people prefer their shoegazey 1998 debut Three Out Change, this album soundtracked my early years in Japan.

4. A Long Vacation, Eiichi Ohtaki (1981)

Happy End and Haruomi Hosono are pretty much the godfathers of all modern Japanese rock. But it’s Ohtaki who I think made the greatest single contribution with this gorgeous, Beach Boys-influenced, multilayered pop masterpiece.

5. Sashitai,
Hyacca (2007)

In 2006, my life was a mess and I took a trip to Fukuoka to get away from it all. I got drunk with some musicians there and woke up the next day with this plain white demo CD in my pocket, containing the most perfect postpunk/pop/noise ever. So I tracked down the band, offered to release it and never looked back.

Metropolis, Sep 4, 2014

Carl Stone: Resident expat computer music seer

Posted on September 27, 2014 by dangrunebaum

Computer music pioneer Carl Stone’s career took a left turn when he joined the Department of Information Media at Chukyo University in Aichi. Stone had begun to explore sonic collages via cassettes and turntables in the 1970s, and in the ’80s innovated the use of laptops to create live electronic music. Invitations to Japan led to a faculty position, and Stone now splits his time between Japan and the US. The native Californian spoke to Metropolis about the computer’s evolving role in music and how Japan shapes his sound.

Computer music is now omnipresent. What have been the biggest changes since the ’70s?

Miniaturization and portability. When I was a student we had a synthesizer studio that probably cost about a half-million dollars. Now that studio’s power can be roughly represented in a ¥5,000 iPad app. I used to tour with about 50kg of gear. Now all I take is a laptop, audio interface and toothbrush.

Is the computer now just another musical instrument?

It depends on how one chooses to use it. It definitely can be an instrument, but it can also be a tool for composing, for recording and more.

Much computer music lacks traditional identifiers of music such as melody and rhythm. What differentiates “sound” from “music”?

In John Cage’s theory, nothing. Not only did he feel that any sound could be repurposed as music, but in fact the distinction between even unintended sound and music was artificial. I remember listening to a conversation between Cage and Morton Feldman, another great composer. Feldman was complaining about the time he was walking on the shore, lost in thought, and some people were blasting music from a radio. Cage, who often used unintended sounds including random radio transmissions, laughed and said that it wouldn’t have bothered him because, “I would think they were just playing one of my pieces.”

Tell us about two or three of your defining works, and what you were trying to achieve with them.

Probably my most notorious work is called “Shing Kee,” which takes a small sample of German art-song sung in English by a Japanese pop singer, and methodically stretches it until it becomes a new sonic world. A more current series of pieces I’ve done recently use an electronic process I call “skinning,” where the shape and rhythm of one piece of music is “wrapped” around the harmony of another. Some very interesting things can result. Probably the best example of this is in my piece “Al-Noor.”

How have your many years in Japan influenced your music and career?

In many ways. First of all, just being in Japan serves as a place of constant stimulation, not only because of the arts scene but because of the fascinating urban soundscape. I rarely go outside without a handy portable recorder. But also the music scene itself here is interesting, and I’ve found a lot of musicians I enjoy playing with. I’ve been lucky to improvise with great musicians like Yoshihide Otomo, Yasuaki Shimizu and Yuji Takahashi.

What are some of the challenges you face as a foreigner on the faculty of a Japanese university?

The usual issues of language and culture differences, which of course get mediated over time. I was a freelance composer for many years before I took this job, so I had very little experience in academia besides my early years as a student at an American art school. Academic bureaucracies are problematic enough, but the Japanese seem to have raised them to an art form.

Japan is a hub of computer music. Tell us about a few favorite Japanese computer music composers.

Electronic music has a lot of important history here, going back to pioneering work by Toru Takemitsu, Yuji Takahashi, Akira Ikufube. These days I’m enjoying music by Ryoji Ikeda, Satanic Pornocultshop and Chihei Hatakeyama.

Tell us about your upcoming performances and new groups.

I’ll play on June 6 with Brian O’Reilly from Singapore, who performs as Black Zenith. In the fall, I’ll play with new group Tapakasa, featuring the great Akira Sakata on sax, Yumiko Tanaka on shamisen and Pearl Alexander on bass. We performed earlier this year as an experiment and liked the results so much we are planning to keep it going.

Metropolis, Jun 4, 2014

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