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viewing 1 To 13 of 13 items
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LP
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BE 007LP
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Black Editions present the first ever vinyl edition of Kan Mikami's I'm the Only One Around. For 50 years, Kan Mikami has stood as a master of the Japanese blues and outsider folk. His unmistakable, powerfully evocative voice and surrealistic poetry reveal a gritty, transgressive life on the margins shot through with evocations of sex and violence, religion and romance. Released in 1991, I'm the Only One Around was Mikami's first album with Tokyo's legendary P.S.F. label and heralded an artistic renaissance. It marked the beginning of an incredibly productive and wildly creative era for Mikami that extends to the present day. This opening salvo presents the essential core of Mikami's music; with nothing but his voice and a stripped-down electric guitar the album is a powerful, effortlessly emotional statement filled with moments of both brutal passion and gentle revelation. It is unrestrained, direct, brutally honest. It embodies Mikami's philosophy: "If you're going to make music, stake your life on it -- it's worth it. Making music is an intensely human act." In the newly translated notes to the album, Hiroyuki Itsuki, one of Japan's most renowned writers perhaps put it best: "What erupts here is all the fury and grief of Jōmon Man (the prehistoric people of the Japanese archipelago), lobbed into the middle of a 1990s city. Kan Mikami is unchanging, yet definitely in motion. He advances not forwards, but backwards. Not a retreat, rather he consciously progresses backwards. At the final destination for his full-steam astern poésie lies a massive, gaping black hole, exuding a dazzling, black light. This is the image evoked by the world of Kan Mikami that you can hear on this album." Mikami would go on to release 15 solo albums with P.S.F. as well as numerous collaborative efforts with other giants of the Japanese underground including Motoharu Yoshizawa, Masayoshi Urabe, and Keiji Haino, with whom, along with Toshiaki Ishizuka he formed the group Vajra. Features lyrics translated by Drew Stroud and newly translated notes by Alan Cummings. Remastered and cut to vinyl at Elysian Masters Los Angeles, pressed by RTI, packaged in heavy Stoughton tip-on jackets with insert featuring textured paper, gold foil stamping and metallic inks.
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2LP
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BE 010LP
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Black Editions present a reissue of Musica Transonic's self-titled release, originally released in 1995. Musica Transonic was comprised of three of the most crucial artists to emerge from the 1990s Japanese underground: Nanjo Asahito of High Rise, Makoto Kawabata of Acid Mothers Temple and Tatsuya Yoshida of Ruins. The group's music was a supercharged combination of complex rhythms, blistering guitar attacks, and enormously deep bass momentum. Pushing the rock power trio to its miasmic, overdriven limits, Musica Transonic's sound retains the ability to shock even now, 25 years later. Remastered, Musica Transonic's self-titled debut is now available for the first time on LP and includes previously unheard material. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI. Gatefold, heavy tip-on jackets; includes download.
"In 1986, Tokyo's PSF Records released the second album by High Rise, simply titled II, and it immediately became one of those legendary albums that hipsters worldwide whispered about, because hardly anyone had it to listen to . . . High Rise wasn't nearly enough to occupy the busiest guy in Tokyo's underground, though, and by the mid-90s Nanjo had enough bands going that nobody could really keep track anymore. PSF's legendary high-quality standards recognized a couple of them, however, with releases in 1995, including the enigmatic Musica Transonic. This was an unhinged band that on first hearing seemed to check many of the same boxes as High Rise, including the trademark redlined sonics. But those who cranked it up and really listened realized it was actually a very different beast, a sort of musical manticore assembled from a variety of monstrous parts . . . Guitarist Makoto Kawabata would achieve renown the following year as the leader of Acid Mothers Temple, also appearing as the guitarist in Mainliner, another High Rise-adjacent project with Nanjo. While by 1995 he and Nanjo had been playing together in other projects for several years, on this album Kawabata brought a chaotic, free-flowing guitar aptitude that painted a stranger spectrum than the laser-focused rock of High Rise. In concert with the brilliant drummer Tatsuya Yoshida -- well-known in the scene from his long-running duo Ruins -- the results are entirely unpredictable, and joyously so. After focusing for some time on repetition, Nanjo struck off down a new road with Musica Transonic. The better-known High Rise is a straight-ahead blast, minimalist in its approach as they drive right at your gut. With Musica Transonic, the combination of Yoshida's complex rhythms and Kawabata's ability to find unexpected angles for his guitar attack recalibrated the rock trio, with magnificent results that retain their ability to shock even now, 25 years later..." --Mason Jones, San Francisco, CA, 2020
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2LP
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BE 012LP
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Black Editions present a reissue of Toho Sara's self-titled album, originally released in 1995. A mystifying work of Japanese avant-garde shamanism, Toho Sara's 1995 debut introduced a radical new sound from Asahito Nanjo (High Rise), Makoto Kawabata (Acid Mothers Temple), and Hisashi Yasuda -- playing an array of ancient instruments including tabla, piri, harmonium, biwa, shakujo, and hansho the group evokes an otherworldly ritual music, meditative and haunting. Originally released on CD by P.S.F. Japan, newly expanded, remastered and available for the first time ever on vinyl. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI. Gatefold, tip-on jacket; Includes insert and download.
"In 1995, Tokyo's legendary label P.S.F. Records released two very different albums, connected by the shadowy personality behind them: Nanjo Asahito, well known by music fanatics acquainted with his band High Rise. The pair of 1995 releases, though, were quite different from the brain-scrambling, fuzz-driven, motor-psycho sounds of High Rise. One, by the mysterious Musica Transonic, refracted that distorted rock through a prism that broke it into abstract, free-form shapes. We're here, though, with regard to the other album, the self-titled debut by 東方沙羅, Toho Sara . . . From the first of the simply numbered songs (no titles here) it's clear that Nanjo, Kawabata Makoto, and Yasuda Hisashi have something special in mind: the delicate percussion and woodwinds are quickly joined by a much more ominous drone, and they combine brightness with murk throughout the album . . . Nanjo and Kawabata had played together for some time before this album, including a band called Johari, which brought together ethnic and contemporary music. They formed Toho Sara to revisit the idea, focusing on Asian spirituality while experimenting with acoustic instruments. Yasuda joined them after playing in Nanjo's avant-garde outfit Group Musica, and later played in the early Acid Mothers Temple with Kawabata. Toho Sara translates to Eastern Most, which follows the idea behind the group. Fascinated by shamanism, Nanjo wanted to create an avant-garde musical embodiment of ideas like kagura, ancient ritual theater, and bring it to album and stage . . .The fourth track, the album's eleven-minute centerpiece, bursts open in a chaotic clatter that barely disperses as mysterious scrapings and bowings come and go, a bewitching accretion of brain-scrambling sounds. It's a dramatic, eerie, and anarchic passage that would undeniably suit a summoning ritual for Moorcock's chaos-god Arioch. Some of the tracks are calmer, even peaceful if you don't mind a bit of ambient dread seeping into your peacetime. Slow drumbeats and gentle gongs are layered with not-quite-atonal woodwinds, intermittent clacks of wooden percussion accent some variety of buzzing woodwind, and droning harmonium underlies clarinet-like slow melodies..." --Mason Jones, San Francisco, CA, 2020
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LP
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BE 011LP
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Limited restock. Black Editions present a reissue of Kazuo Imai's far and wee, originally released in 2004. Kazuo Imai is one of the few artists to traverse both Japan's early avant-garde and free jazz movements. Though he began performing in the 1970s, his 2004 P.S.F. album far and wee was only the second under his name. In a series of thrilling acoustic guitar improvisations -- Imai's playing crackles with dynamic tension and physicality as well as a subtlety and nuance that reveals him as one of the instrument's true masters and innovators. In 2004, Kazuo Imai (Marginal Consort, East Bionic Symphonia) recorded a series of nylon-string classical guitar improvisations at the request of P.S.F. founder Hideo Ikeezumi. far and wee, the resulting album, vibrates with the inherent duality of nylon: the strings stretch and snap back like rubber tautened and released, and paint the softest of caresses in silky washes. Imai was a student of two of the foundational artists of the Japanese avant-garde: Masayuki Takayanagi, the pioneering free-improvising guitarist and Takehisa Kosugi, the visionary Fluxus composer also known for his work with Group Ongaku and the Taj Mahal Travelers. A sense of inquisitiveness about how far he can push himself and every part of the guitar pervades these performances as Imai makes everything from the pegs to the bridge to the strap pin explode with resonate. For over 20 years, Imai has been a driving force behind Marginal Consort a collective of Japanese avant-garde musicians devoted to collective improvisation, known for their incredibly layered and varied annual performances that last for three continuous hours. Using a blend of homemade and traditional instruments, electronics, and sculptural and natural forms, they create auditory experiences of exceptionally unique color and vibration. The same dedication to vitality and variety is found in Imai's guitar music, and it is via the guitar that his vast studies in philosophy and music come together in extreme focus, allowing him to tease and extend the history of the instrument while interrogating the limits of its edge. far and wee continues the tradition of the Soloworks concerts that Imai has been giving for several decades, and allows the listener to breathe in the unique space of Imai's thought processes. He attacks the instrument: the nylon strings explode against the guitar. And he caresses it, soothing each centimeter of string with delicate force and concentration. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI. Heavy tip-on jackets; includes download.
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LP
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BE 005LP
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Repressed. White Heaven's debut album Out is one of the greatest psychedelic rock albums ever recorded. First released in 1991 by Tokyo's P.S.F. Records and pressed in an edition of 500 copies the original LP has become a holy grail in underground circles, with only a scant few copies ever making it outside of Japan. Built on the chemistry between You Ishihara's lysergic lyricism and the blistering leads of one of Japan's undisputed guitar gods Michio Kurihara, Out is an absolute classic. It is one of the few albums to successfully join a deep love of classic rock n' roll with the rapturous energy of punk and openness of the avant-garde. Each song creates its own world, raising dynamic structures that defy categorization. Meticulously re-mastered by the artists this new edition is the album in its clearest, most powerful form. Cut at the legendary Bernie Grundman studios and pressed at RTI it is now available on vinyl for the first time in almost 30 years. Black Editions presents Out in its definitive edition. Deluxe LP edition, Heavy tip-on jacket and tri-panel insert printed on black paper with metallic gold ink. Vinyl mastering by Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman, high quality pressing at RTI.
"What happens if you want to make a sound like Eric Clapton on 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps,' or Ritchie Blackmore on Made in Japan -- two early influences Kurihara mentions in particular -- but you've never been in a recording studio before? What happens if you want to sing like Marc Bolan or Robert Plant -- or even Lou Reed and Tom Verlaine -- but you've never been on a stage before? Listen to what happened on Out: a wide knowledge and love of classic rock sounds fused to a freedom of expression based not only on punk, but on avant-garde experimentalism. It isn't that these young players had chops like that at the time. But neither did they need them to hit heightened moments of what I can only describe as rock rapture." --Damon Krukowski
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LP
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BE 008LP
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2020 repress. Black Editions present the first ever vinyl edition of Go Hirano's third album, Corridor of Daylights, originally released in 2004. Corridor of Daylights is a quiet work of dreamlike brilliance. A home field recording where fragile piano melodies float alongside wind-chimes and wistful melodicas -- insects hum in the distance and a breeze gently rustles as summer day eases toward evening. Originally released in Japan by P.S.F. Records in 2004, Corridor of Daylights is a beautiful, soulful dispatch from early aughts Tokyo. Black Editions present Corridor of Daylights, newly mastered for its first ever vinyl edition. Includes bonus track. Comes in a deluxe edition featuring pearlescent paper, metallic inks, and foil stamped letters as well as two inserts including a newly translated illustrated story booklet; Includes download.
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2LP
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BE 009LP
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Restocked. Black Editions presents the deluxe, first-ever vinyl edition of Acid Mothers Temple's classic self-titled first album. Over the last 25 years no group has been more prolific or dedicated to pushing psychedelic rock to its limits than Japan's Acid Mothers Temple. Their maximalist technicolor vision was first revealed on this, their now legendary self-titled 1997 debut released by P.S.F. Records. Led by Makoto Kawabata, the album contains some of the group's most cosmic, hypnotic and over-the-top material; it kick-started and set the tone for a journey that has included countless releases and performances around the world -- a freaked-out trip that continues to this day. Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. is one of the essential albums of the world's psychedelic underground. Deluxe Edition housed in ten-color heavy tip-on gatefold jackets, featuring soft touch and spot gloss finishes and full color interior pockets. Includes full-color, spot glossed inner sleeves and a 24"x24", full-color poster. Remastered and pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI; Digital download included.
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LP
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BE 1003LP
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Psychedelic Speed Freaks is a new power trio led by Munehiro Narita, founding member of Japan's legendary High Rise and easily one of the wildest, most original guitarists in rock history. Blazing in total hyper-saturated glory, Psychedelic Speed Freaks centers on the raw, unrelenting attack of Narita's "motorcycle fuzztone guitar" and a rhythm section driven by a pair of untamed LA acid punks. Recorded deep in-the-red and punched into overdrive, Psychedelic Speed Freaks is a full-throttle adrenaline shot into the 21st Century. Deluxe Edition housed in heavy tip-on jacket featuring silver foil printing and embossed paper. Includes metallic printed insert. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI; Digital download included.
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LP
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BE 006LP
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Makoto Kawashima was born in Saitama, a prefecture of the Greater Tokyo Area, in 1981. He picked up the alto sax in 2008, and started playing solo in 2010. He is the founder of the Homosacer (Sacredhuman) label. Homo Sacer was originally released in 2015. It was Kawashima's second solo release and his first full-length album. It was also the final release by P.S.F. Records. The album was recorded live during a heavy rainstorm at the gallery and café Yamanekoken in Iruma, Saitama. Facing up towards the ceiling, his sound arcing up to meet the raindrops beyond the roof. Kawashima played with a reed he had been given by the mother of the late Japanese saxophone giant Kaoru Abe. Housed in a heavy tip-on jacket featuring metallic printing and gloss film-laminate finish. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI; Digital download included.
"Homo sacer -- sacred human. Kawashima's sax is ripe with the spirit of Japanese free jazz, dwelling as it does between the violent and the beautiful. Kaoru Abe, Masayoshi Urabe, Takayuki Hashimoto, Harutaka Mochizuki... all of these altoists live in an area of personal expression rare in the world, one that feels like the body itself is being whittled away at. It feels like we have a new genius to add to that list." --Hideako Kondo, from the Japanese liner notes
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2LP
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BE 004LP
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Black Editions present the first ever vinyl release of Ché-SHIZU's signature album A Journey, originally issued in 1994 by Tokyo's legendary P.S.F. Records. Ché-SHIZU is one of the most original and mystifying groups to ever emerge from the Tokyo underground. Founded by master improviser Chie Mukai in 1981 the group has been guided by her singular vision for nearly 40 years. Throughout its history Ché-SHIZU has challenged traditional notions of song structure and improvisation. Mukai's signature instrument, the Chinese er-hu, is an ancient two stringed bowed instrument rarely found outside of traditional music. Even within the wildly diverse roster of artists on P.S.F. Records, Ché-SHIZU is a playful and confounding outlier. Early on Mukai became active within the avant-garde movement flowering in Tokyo during the mid-1970s. She studied with renowned Fluxus composer and violinist Takehisa Kosugi, recalling, "that encounter was so huge for me, much more than any one technique. Even in terms of the er-hu, I only started playing it because Kosugi gave it to me." In 1975 she joined his East Bionic Symphonia, a large improvising ensemble featuring students from Tokyo's Bigakko art school. From there she contributed to improvising avant-garde groups including an early version of Marginal Consort and later the Vedda Music Workshop. Her work with Ché-SHIZU however is where her vision most clearly emerged. Ché-SHIZU released its first album I Can't Promise in 1984 on Zero Records, in time the album would become a revered classic. It would be another ten years before another full-length would be released. During that time the group performed extensively with various rotating line ups. In the summer of 1994, Mukai led the group to Studio J in Tokyo to record an album for the P.S.F. label. Released later that year, the album was titled A Journey. Fittingly, it is a sprawling excursion through ethereal dreamscapes, the group confident in its own resplendent joy. Over the album, the group creates a spontaneous, loose form of chamber pop that weaves folk and a light psychedelia into something entirely unique. Pop songs like "Juso Station" intersect with instrumentals such as the title track to create a varied yet coherent improvisational language. Remastered; deluxe double-LP edition cut at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin and pressed at Pallas Germany. Includes new expansive artwork and lyric translations, housed in a spot gloss heavy gatefold jacket; Includes high resolution digital download.
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LP
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Repressed! Pitchfork Best New Reissue: 8.4: Black Editions present a reissue of High Rise's II, originally released in 1986. High Rise exploded onto Tokyo's underground music scene with the roar and reckless abandon of a motorcycle accelerating headlong into a dead man's curve. Born from the explosive chemistry of bassist/vocalist Asahito Nanjo and frenetic guitarist Munehiro Narita, the band blazed a wild new stream of psychedelic guitar music. Their second album is a defining document of the band and unquestionably one of the greatest albums to emerge from 20th century underground Japan and beyond. With Nanjo's distorted thunder bass and Narita's wildly narrative lead guitar playing, II is a non-stop tour de force of improvised rock music. Combining elements of garage rock, punk, and no wave, the band pushed all levels fully in-the-red and transcended the limits of rock and psychedelia to create a raw, unique expansion of the music. Black Editions present High Rise's II, newly mixed and mastered by Asahito Nanjo in what the band states is the definitive version of their most quintessential recording. This new edition restores the original vinyl version's textured black and silver artwork. Housed in heavy Stoughton tip-on jacket. Pressed onto high quality vinyl by RTI.
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2LP
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BE 001LP
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Repressed! Black Editions present the first ever vinyl edition of Tokyo Flashback, the legendary 1991 compilation that defined the Tokyo psychedelic movement and first brought it to the outside world. Tokyo Flashback is one of the most iconic compilations in the history of underground music. Originally released by Japan's P.S.F. Records, Tokyo Flashback defined the breathtakingly unique and previously obscured musical movement that had been developing in Japan since the late 1970s. The compilation features some of the earliest released recordings by Keiji Haino, High Rise, Masaki Batoh's Ghost, White Heaven, Fushitsusha, Kousokuya, and Marble Sheep. It captures the excitement and energy of a Tokyo awash in Technicolor and deep blacks; the music echoing krautrock, psychedelic freak-outs, garage, and no wave. At the same time it reveals astonishing, totally idiosyncratic expansions of rock music. In time, Tokyo Flashback expanded to a synonymous nine volume series that, over the following two decades, unveiled Japan's ever evolving soundscapes to the rest of the world. Tokyo Flashback is a defining statement of late 20th century Japanese psychedelic music and an essential primer to the world of P.S.F. All tracks are exclusive, this edition features the first time translation of the original liner notes. Black Editions' deluxe edition is entirely re-mastered and marks the first release of Tokyo Flashback outside of Japan and it's first ever vinyl issue. Also features Verzerk. Newly created artwork and design expanding on the original by Rob Carmichael at SEEN Sudio; Housed in custom printed deluxe Stoughton gatefold jacket and slipcase, including full color printed inner sleeves and inserts with soft touch and spot UV gloss finishes; Remastered and cut by Pete Lyman at Infrasonic Sound; Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI.
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LP
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BE 000LP
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Repressed; Black Editions present the first vinyl reissue of Keiji Haino's stunning debut album Watashi Dake?, originally released in 1981. This first ever edition released outside of Japan features the artist's originally intended metallic gold and silver jacket artwork. Over the last fifty years few musicians or performers have created as monumental and uncompromising a body of work as that of Keiji Haino. Through a vast number of recordings and performances, Haino has staked out a ground all his own, creating a language of unparalleled intensity that defies any simple classification. For all this, his 1981 debut album Watashi Dake? has remained enigmatic. Originally released in a small edition by the legendary Pinakotheca label, the album was heard by only a select few in Japan and far fewer overseas. Original vinyl copies became impossibly rare and highly sought after the world over. Watashi Dake? presents a haunting vision -- stark vocals, whispered and screamed, punctuate dark silences. Intricate and sharp guitar figures interweave, repeat, and stretch, trance-like, emerging from dark recesses. Written and composed on the spot -- Haino's vision is one of deep spiritual depths that distantly evokes 1920s blues and medieval music -- yet is unlike anything ever committed to record before or since. Produced in close cooperation with Keiji Haino and legendary photographer Gin Satoh. Coupled with starkly minimal packaging, featuring the now iconic cover photographs by Gin Satoh, the album is a startling and fully realized artistic statement. Housed in custom printed deluxe Stoughton tip-on jackets, including black on black inserts, extras, and hand-colored finishes; Remastered by Elysian Masters and cut by Bernie Grundman Mastering; Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI; Includes download code.
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