Prog Walk – Going For The One To Toyama Park
My sleeping patterns have been odd lately, I often find myself crashing to bed at the relatively early time of 11:30 and waking up a quarter after five, wide alert and ready to start the day. It’s equal parts infuriating and refreshing. I wish I could sleep more, but getting an early start to the day can occasionally be great, especially during the blazing days of a Tokyo summer. Leaving the house after 10am can feel like an exercise in masochism, as temperatures have been well into the 90s almost every day for the past few weeks. So I’ve been taking advantage of my newfound early bird tendencies and trekking out around 6am for a prolonged early morning constitutional, always with musical accompaniment of course. Continue reading
Random Weird Record Reviews
I’ve been taking a deep dive into some weird music lately. I don’t know why. Usually I would share this stuff on Lost Turntable, but since that blog is only for music that is out-of-print (support the musicians you like!) I can’t really do that.
So apropos of nothing, a series of mini-reviews of avant-garde, progressive, leftfeild, new wave, ambient, drone, industrial records that I bought last week. Some are new pressings, all are new to me. And all of them are easily available on iTunes!
Blackouts – Ashra (Manuel Göttsching)
I’d seen Göttsching’s name before and have browsed over his records in the past, but this was the first time I’d picked one up. But I think I’ll be grabbing more in the future, because this album is really special. It’s loop and sequencer based, but it also has strong melodies and hooks on top of all that. Imagine Fripp/Eno but catchy. Really amazing guitar sound on this record, I cannot recommend it enough. If you like Brian Eno, Tangerine Dream or any of the wonky shit I post at Lost Turntable, you’ll probably dig on this. Continue reading