JAPANESE JAZZ recommendations (late 60's thru 70's) Three Blind Mice label, etc.

I have the Primitive Community mini-LP box, which has 4 LPs in it, there's another one in this series that's almost as heavy as this one, it's called
something like Yugenseka, and it also has guitarist Kimio Mizutani on it (it's DTHK-003)

I also have the Inpsiration and Power 14 Free Jazz Festival one, but the 1st press fat-boy from '92 with obi...gotta seek out that Satoh - Samadhi one next month in Tokyo!

 

speaking of comps, here's 2 double CDs I recently got, both in the Dig Deep Columbia series released late last year,
I think one was already mentioned, cool stuff!

Jazz in Tokyo '69 Vol. 1 & 2 (COCB-54029-30) recorded 8-30-69, 8 tracks:
Yosuke Yamashita Trio (Mina's Second Theme!)
Masahiko Sato Trio +1
Akio Nishimura Quartet
Hidehiko Matsumoto Quartet
Takeshi Inomata Quintet (rockin' a killer version of Herbie Mann's Memphis Underground!)
Kosuke Mine Quintet
Takehiko Honda Trio
Jam Session

Sensational Jazz '70 Vol. 1 &2 (COCB-54039-40) recorded 4-30-70, 8 tracks
> there's lots of cross-pollination on this one, with lots of artists guesting with each other:
Toshiyuki Miyami & his New Herd + Terumasa Hino
Itaru Oki Trio
Terumasa Hino Quintet + George Ohtsuka (w/ Hiromasa Suzuki, Motohoko Hino)
Mototeru Tagaki Trio (w/ Masahiko Sato)
Akira Ishikawa & Count Buffalos (w/ Kiyoshi Sugimoto, Masahiko Sato)
Shigeo Suzuki Sextet (w/ Masabumi Kikuchi)
Jiro Inagaki & his Soul Media
Takeshi Inomata & Sound Ltd. (w/ Shunzo Ohno)


btw, here's a cool Masahiko Sato sessionography:
http://www.mmjp.or.jp/m_satoh/English/E_Discography/E_Discography_L1.html

 

This one doesn't seem to be mentioned yet:

 

I remember seeing this CD in Tokyo last year and almost buying it, what's it sound like?

 

Funky jazz with lots of synth mixed in with more experimental tracks with a 'far out' use of percussion. Kind of unique really.

 

A couple of albums by Sammy were re-released in April.
CDJapan lists them as J-Pop, however they're in Deep Jazz Reality series.
Are these worth checking?

 

Perhaps they are this band plus the singer Sammy?

 

This is a later recorded by Sammy:

 

this ain't that bad, I saw this one too but couldn't get past the icky awful artwork...

 

Great funky record, by the way.
The CD is already OOP, AFAIK...

 

I've actually seen that one for sale online. I might have to pick that up!

Inspiration & Power is a great live set! This edition has very nice mini-lp packaging. Love it!

Samadhi is a fantastic album. Gary Peacock on bass and Motohiko Hino (Terumasa's bro) on drums. "Fairy Rings" is hands-down my favorite track! Steve Marcus plays a killer version on the recently reissued CD with Jiro Inagaki called Something which also features Sato on keys. That's another must-have!

 

Yeah, artwork's lame but this is a good one! It might be harder to find than some of his other CDs but Amazon.jp has it in stock:

http://www.amazon.co.jp/ファンキー・スタッフ-ソウル・メディア/dp/B002WQSVHY/ref=ntt_mus_ep_dpi_3

I recommend it!

 

there's a Gary Peacock CD I see over there with Kikuchi and Togashi, from 1971:

 

I actually bookmarked that site a few months back. It's a great resource for Sato's work! I have a decent sampling of his 70s work but I would love to have the following on CD:

Duologue
Four Jazz Compositions
Metempsychosis
Trinity
Yamatai-Fu

I recently tracked down this rare Sato disc:

Masahiko Sato & Wolfgang Dauner - Pianology



It's from the same series as the Samadhi CD. FANTASTIC sound quality!

 

That's a killer recording! Same lineup on Sadao Watanabe's Paysages if I'm not mistaken.

 

some of the Satoh stuff I'm not that into, like

here is the

the only one I have from this series is violent free jazz, the kind I like, plus it has the obi:
TOCT-9362 (1998) the cover of the CD is slightly different, with just the picture and green lettering at the top...


I have another Satoh CD that's part of that Primitive Community mini-LP Box, but it's piano jazz trio stuff,
kinda boring to me (Transformation '69/'71)
another interesting one in that recent mini-LP series is Satoh and Jean Luc Ponty - Astrorama (1970) cool silver mini-LP
with Motohoko Hino and bassist Orsetd-Pedersen...the funny thing is when I bought that Primitive Community mini-LP Box
the guy sent me the wrong box (there were 3 of these sold by Disk Union) so I was able to preview them and burn the ones that didn't suck,
most of them did...and then return it to him and get mine with a refund for the postage I got for free from work, sweeeeet !

 

I understand that. I think you have to be into piano trios/solo recordings to dig some of Sato's output as he has quite a few of those. The thing I like about Sato is how he'll throw a twist into his trio recordings like on Deformation with the prerecorded tapes or Samadhi with the Rhodes and synth coloring. Good stuff IMO!

Oh yeah, Astrorama is a real banger! Nice, lengthy improvisations on there and that mini-lp is one of the coolest I've ever seen. A fantastic recording!

Haha! That's hilarious. You gotta love it when a plan comes together!

 

there's a whole spate of Three Blind Mice CDs just released on 6/5, perfect timing as I'm going in 2 weeks:

http://diskunion.net/jazz/ct/news/article/1/37116

if you copy and paste the Japanese lettering into youtube you can find most of this stuff

this one sounds cool, Masaru Imada - Green Catepillar:

 

other Three Blind Meece being released on 7/10:
http://diskunion.net/jazz/ct/list/0/0/17980

Think!
also Johnny Pate - Shaft in Africa (on the day I leave, bummer!)

Koji Moriyama - Smile
Tsuyoshi Yamamoto Trio - Girl Talk
Takashi Mizuhashi - When a Man Loves a Woman
Hiroshi Fukumura - Morning Flight
Hidefumi Toki - Toki
Isao Suzuki - Orang Utan (def getting this one!)

 

wow dig this! I wish this was on CD...

 

YOU GUYS ARE KILLING ME!Every title mentioned sounds awesome ,i'm gonna go broke.The problem is it seems like the original vinyl for these albums is easier to find than the reissue cd's sometimes,so I feel I have to buy all this stuff right away or never see it again.I've been looking for Head Rock now for about 6 months,nowhere to be found.

 

I mentioned that one earlier and it's awesome! I highly recommend it!

I'm really surprised they're reissuing these TBM CDs. I'm glad they are though. Those are all excellent recordings, especially Green Caterpillar and Orang-Utan! I think most everything by Isao Suzuki from this period is worth getting. All Right is another Suzuki album that really smokes. I still haven't found a copy of Touch though. I wish they'd reissue that one.

 

Yes!!! That's one of my grails for sure! Mal and a host of Japanese jazz greats throwing down some killer sounds. Hino's 70s output is damn near flawless.

 

Yeah, Head Rock is really hard to find at the moment. I've seen the occasional copy for sale on Amazon Japan for big bucks. You're right though, once these titles go OOP you'll go through hell and half of Georgia to find a copy sometimes. Best to scoop them up asap!

 

For those who like pop jazz I recommend The Square/T Square. My favorite albums are Rockoon which features a lot of vocals (but good vocals), Magic and The Square Live which shows what they can do when they stretch out.

Magic!